I do a lot of highway driving on curvy roads. I've got a 2014 PiP with the OEM Bridgestone Ecopia EP20s and find the ride a bit skittish. I'm curious to see if anyone else has experiences they'd like to share with a better handling LRR tire? I'd look at a conventional tires, but I'm driving 22,000+ miles a year and can use every MPG I can get!
Tire Rack and anecdotal evidence from other users around here seem to indicate the Michelin Premier A/S is the king of LRR handling. Tire Test Results : Testing the Michelin Premier A/S: Is it the New Benchmark Among Grand Touring All-Season Tires?
There will be a mpg hit with the premiers, but yeah they're good for traction, braking. There's a gamut of LRR, they're not all going to deliver the same mpg. The EP20 are hard to beat for mpg, and not bad for handling. When they're worn they get noisy, and are useless in any amount of snow.
Thanks for the reply -- I live on the California coast, not too worried about snow. My wife has a Subaru AWD station wagon with mud/snow tires for trips to Tahoe.
I did some poking around on Tirerack.com and compared the Avid Ascend, Conti PureContact LRR, Ecopia 422 and Michelin Premier A/S. The Ecopia wasn't rated, the Avid wasn't in the ballpark of the Conti and Michelin which were both rated highly in the reviews. One difference was that 4 Contis were $279 after a rebate and a price reduction, the Michelins $489.56. Surprised that there were no reviews of the EP422, they seem to be a very common tire.
Was it EP422 PLUS? They are very new, could be reason for few reviews. Toyo's using them on the 2016 show vehicles, fwiw.
Here is a thought: Best handling LRR tire is going to have lousy LRR. and even if the LRR is decent, it's going to be short lived. You can't have everything.
I've given up trying to find the Energy Saver A/S tires, no one had them locally. Michelin's got a $70 rebate running until 1/31, so I decided to go for the Defender XT. It'll be interesting to see the MPG hit and improvement over my stock Bridgestone Ecopia EP20s. The EP20s have 41K miles, could have conceivably made it to 46K in the summer. With the rains upon us I'm not too worried about losing a couple of thousand miles on wearing tires.
@Kurt Weiske, Keep us up to date on how that goes. I went from my OEM Toyo Proxes 215x45x17 to the Michelin Premier A/S 215x45x17. I also got it with the $70 rebate at the time of purchase.
How did your mpg fair with that switch? My choices are somewhat limited in 215/45R17; for some time I'd just about settled on EP422 plus, but have been hearing mixed reviews, about unexpected variations in tread pattern, lackluster mpg, to the point I'm tipping back towards the Premier's. Considering it's Michelin Pilot's on there now, I'm thinking there can't be too much of a mpg hit. (BTW, if I've asked before, please be patient, I've got a memory like a sieve.)
I don't consider myself a conservative driver and I have yet to perfect the driving techniques on the Prii. That being said, if I really tried,I can get to 55 mpg and that's during the winter time in California driving at about 55-65 mph with mixed stop and go traffic. Tire are inflated to 41 psi fronts and 40 psi for the rears. I can see myself getting more in the summer time. Definitely better than my old tires and I feel safer with the Michelin Premier A/S on the car during these wet rainy days here in Cali.
The rebate was what pushed me over the edge to buy my tires. So far, I've put 30 miles on them and they feel like night versus day compared to 4/32" EP20s.
First rainy day on the Defenders, and the Prius feels like a "real" car now. Before, on the EP22s I felt like I needed to tippytoe through any curves, especially in the rain. Not so with the Defenders.
I have the Defenders on my minivan. I have a little apprehension because TireRack.com says wet traction could be a little better. Defenders are expected to lower MPG a little but are long life tires so they are cost effective in total gas+tire cost.
First impressions of the Defender: Much better handling than the Bridgestone EP20. More solid feeling when cornering at highway speeds, slightly more apt to "hunt" on grooved highways than the EP20s. Wet handling is WAY better. The bad news? -4 mpg on my first tank.I was getting 48-49 mpg highway, I ended up getting 44 on my first tank. Between the longer life (90K, supposedly), the $70 Mail-In Rebate and the better handling I'm OK with the drop in MPG. I would have liked to find the Energy Saver E/Ses, though.
