This is my year to replace tires. Anyone have an opinion as to whether steering tires are worth it?Got all the same tires last time and it seemed to work fine.

Richard,
This is another of my upgrades I must do to our newly acquired (last October) Breakaway this year. So I'm interested in your opinion on a couple of things... What brand tire did you put on the last time? How many miles/years did you get out of them?
Barth II has Michelins XRV's on it presently, but they are 8 years old. They are in great shape, but they are 8 years old. Drove over 2100 miles on them last year to bring Barth II home, but they are 8 years old. I'm not sure I want to continue pushing my luck. I had just put Sumitomo's on Barth I in the spring last year and we sold it in the fall. I may go that way again. Both Barth's had the same tire all around.

You and me both. Looking to be on the right path with tires. Bill NY has made sure I saw this post.
http://barthmobile.com/eve/for...=372104523#372104523 and I have multiple times. I'll be interested to see what everyone has to say seeing as our Coaches are so closely related. I was figuring the same tires all the way around was the way to go. We will se.

I am also interested in opinions on brands of tires used. Barth I got Sumitomos (19.5") by way of recommendation of my local tire shop. Barth II (22.5") getting the same? I don't know, these Michelins are nice riding and have held up well for 8 years old...

After the purchace of our Reagal, I had 6. new Goodyear G-670-RV 19.5 put on. have been happy with them so far. I know that GY had issues with Other tires, but these are made for RV's. 5 year warranty against side wall cracks. Smooth ride and handle great. Cost less than Mich. more than others. So far happy with them.
Doorman.

On my former Regal SE I put Michelins front and back(tag axel was ok). No problems and a great ride. When I got the Breakaway I went to the Chatanooga GTG on short notice, had a blowout on the way home and had six new Michelins mounted the next day. Still happy with brand name tires regardless of cost.............

I put Bridgestone tires on and they seemed to wear well. I have about 40000 miles on them.

quote:

Originally posted by Bruce & Kathleen:
Richard,
This is another of my upgrades I must do to our newly acquired (last October) Breakaway this year. So I'm interested in your opinion on a couple of things... What brand tire did you put on the last time? How many miles/years did you get out of them?
Barth II has Michelins XRV's on it presently, but they are 8 years old. They are in great shape, but they are 8 years old. Drove over 2100 miles on them last year to bring Barth II home, but they are 8 years old. I'm not sure I want to continue pushing my luck. I had just put Sumitomo's on Barth I in the spring last year and we sold it in the fall. I may go that way again. Both Barth's had the same tire all around.

Richard,
How old are they?

I've had them a little over 5 years.

Well, I got prices and opinions on different tires from the local shops here. Below are some pricing for tires with mounting and balancing:

Seems the Goodyears were the most expensive at 488.00, Michelin XZE at 411.00, Michelin XRV at 354.00 and Sumitomo at 345.00. None of the local shops quoted me on Bridgestones, as they were not dealers for them. Looks like I'm leaning at putting the XRV tire back on....

Funny, the shop that quoted me the XZE does not care for the XRV tire and feels the XZE tire is a better buy for the money. I expained that I only put about 3-4,000 miles on per year so some consideration needs to be made about cost, as I will be replacing these new tires because of age WELL before wear. Any opinions on that?

Follow up to my last message....H-E-L-P!!!
The internet is good for information, but sometimes that information can be mind boggling. Has anyone here with Michelin XRV's experienced problems with them? After reviewing MANY opinions on the internet, I am wondering if it wouldn't be better to step up to the XZE for more piece of mind. But, I must say that most of the negative fellings for XRV's was in the early to mid years of this decade. Maybe Michelin made improvements to stop the sidewall zippering that seemed to be a problem? And the XRV's on Barth II are going on 8 years old and are in good condition. I am only replacing them because of age.

Personally I would go with the Asian tire. They use more natural rubber and will not weather check as much.

All the tires must meet DOT standards. The difference in price has more to do with brand and how many miles the tire will go. Yup, the Michelin will do close to or more than 200,000 miles, but do I care. If I get 50,000 on them before time to change I feel lucky. The best tire I had for RV use was on our bus. Put Kumhos on it and 12 years later they still looked great.

See this write up:http://www.cache.toyotires.com/sites/default/files/rv-techbulletin.pdf (the dash is supposed to be an underscore but the ipad does not have that key). The important thing is the proper weight bearing capability. It seems tha almost all tires are steer type and you have to search for drive types. These are inferior for the steering pressures and are the ones you see strewn along the highways when the recap peels off. Toyo, and I suspect most others say never use a drive tire on the front of a vehicle. I don't ever remember seeing a drive -steer distinction on 19.5 inch tires, but they may be available. I would not use drive type on my Gillig chassi bus.

quote:

Originally posted by Tom K:
The important thing is the proper weight bearing capability.

That's high up on the list for me. Our front tires are operating at just over half their capacity. That is to say that one of them can almost support the entire front end. I believe that gives us a wide margin of safety.

Okay, I pulled the trigger yesterday and ordered the Michelin XRV tires. Spoke with the previous owners of our coach and they ran nothing but them since the coach was new without any problems. And it seems that the Michelin "zipper tears" that were spoke about often has seemed to fade away. Add to that, the shop quoting me these tires are pretty close in price with the Asian tire prices. So I decided to go with what has worked so far....
Now all the bad talk seems to be about Goodyear. Maybe now they are supplying the majority of tires to the RV industry and therefore more of them are on the road so therefore more complaints?