Road tyre view

[Ecky Thump]

Just thought I'd add my little bit to the road tyre debate.

I ran General Grabber UHPs on the 80 for a couple of years and they were awesome in all road conditions, including winter snow in the alps. Alright they were no where near as good as ATs but very good all the same. They were great for standing water, cutting through the surface and leaving the truck with full traction. They even proved themselves over and over off road.

Anyway, now to the other half's new 80. It came with and still has Kumho ECSTA XTS tyres. These look similar to the UHPs but slightly more aggressive so I was expecting a lot of them. The truth is, in the dry they are perfect, in the wet they are good but not excellent.
In the recent snow, they are atrocious. A bit of ice or frozen sludge and you are no better off than most cars on normal road tyres even with four wheel drive.

If you are not an off roader and want good road tyres I can highly recommend the UHP but I would suggest steering clear of the Kumho.

 

[Ecoman]

Now thats interesting as I had GG UHPs on my Surf and I found them to be as bad in the wet as my mud terrains are in the snow. Now a 2.4TD auto surf is not overly powerful but I could light up the back tyres leaving the lights in the wet and I could get the back end to step out under normal driving conditions. I ended up replacing them with Khumo KL71s (only thing I had lying around at the time) which was a marked improvement.

 

[callum]

mine has those kumhos on the front and they're pretty rubbish. not too much good on anything but dry tarmac so they will be replaced very soon. have proven particularly poor in the snow so my land rover is vehicle of choice at the moment.

 

[Ecky Thump]

Now thats interesting as I had GG UHPs on my Surf and I found them to be as bad in the wet as my mud terrains are in the snow. Now a 2.4TD auto surf is not overly powerful but I could light up the back tyres leaving the lights in the wet and I could get the back end to step out under normal driving conditions. I ended up replacing them with Khumo KL71s (only thing I had lying around at the time) which was a marked improvement.

I suppose tyres are a very subjective thing.
Maybe it is the extra weight of the 80 that makes them so good.
My mate has a 3rd Gen Surf and he can spin the back tyres regardless of which tyres he has on it.

mine has those kumhos on the front and they're pretty rubbish. not too much good on anything but dry tarmac so they will be replaced very soon. have proven particularly poor in the snow so my land rover is vehicle of choice at the moment.

We'll have no swearing on here please Callum

 

[Lorin]

Your point about vehicle weight and type is a good one Ecky. I know from experience of trying different high-end performance tyres on road cars that the weight and type of car (i.e., front or rear wheel drive) can make a huge difference to the performance of a tyre. Pirelli P Zero for example were rubbish on a light, front-drive car but the best I ever had on a relatively much heavier rear-drive car.

My experience of tyres would suggest that how they perform on other vehicles would be little indication of how they'd perform on an 80 unless roughly equivalent in weight and is a 4WD.

 

[Crispin]

A friend of mine was asking me about these. He has a CRV with 19" wheels and can find no good tyres for winter. He is thinking of getting a set of these and new rims. Last year he was stranded in the snow with no traction.

A CRV weighs about 1/10th of an 80's wheel arch so will see how they perform...