Kmvreter said:
What past experiences have you had that turned you off Michelin? I'm a fan because of the last 25+ years with no problems or concerns. I'm not a Mich employee but I am kind of in the business and am curious to know what went wrong.
I had a set of LTX A/Ts on my Pick-up (full-sized 1998 GMC) and the tires seemed to have horrible traction. They consistently slipped in the rain, I slid a lot in the snow in both 2 & 4 wheel drive, the ABS system engaged frequently with them in moderate braking because of the poor traction.
They looked good, and I bought them off of the recommendations of Tire Rack (in part) and just never saw them live up to their expectations. They were at least better than that crap BFG Long Trails that were on the truck OME - those things sucked after about 15,000 miles.
I had Michelins (not sure of the model) on my '07 Highlander and they were decent tires, but seemed to wear a bit faster than I had expected a set of Michelins to wear - especially when you have a 40,000 mile warranty on them. We put about 8,000 miles on it a year and while they gave a nice ride (as I expected for a car-based SUV) I expected better out of them.
Then again, I should know better than to expect much use out of OME tires in general.
I have had excellent results with Yokohama tires (Avid Tourings) though. Drove - LITERALLY - through a hurricane in Florida with torrential rains and never once did I have even a shudder from the front of the car when we hit standing water.
You just get biased based upon experiences. My wife loves the BFG AT K/Os but I won't put them on my truck. We thoroughly enjoyed them and beat the crap out of them on her '86 Jeep Cherokee when we were dating and those were impressive tires. Just won't put French-owned tires on my truck.
It is a give and take for me.