PriusOnline.com

I know this has been there before but I am now getting ready to replace my goodyears. Question should I stay with goodyears or go to someting that last a little longer or rides a little better orhandles better in rain not much snow here(or for that matter rain) but that is another topic.

If you do a search on the forum for Tires, you'll find a ton of posts on the subject. Here's one of them http://www.priusonline.com/viewtopic.php?t=8869. Don't use the Google search. Use the search command to the right of the screen under PriusOnline.com.

Two things to keep in mind when replacing tires. No matter what tire you get, fuel mileage will decrease until they're worn for a few thousand miles. And LRR (low rolling restriction--EDIT: resistance) tires will yield better mileage than conventional treads although they may not perform as well.

I just switched to Goodyear Assurance. My mileage seems to have dropped so far about 5 MPG. In retrospect, tire break-in may have been a factor when I had lower than expected MPG when I bought the car. It took about 2 tanks (1000 miles) before I got high 50's. Of course I also started driving on slower roads, and stopped playing with the car's toys while sitting with the AC on.

A couple weeks ago I used Costco's "$60 off a set of Michelins" coupon to upgrade to the Michelin X-Radial. I too have lost about 5 MPG so far. I expect that to go up, but after doing the math, I determined it's actually cheaper to buy longer-lasting tires (and take a MPG hit) than to get another set of Integritys. The X-Radials were about $12 less per tire than the HydroEdges. I also read somewhere around here that they have better rolling resistance than most tires.

The car feels much more "grounded" now, but isn't as nimble. It seems to handle fine, but I never had a problem with the stock tires.

BTW - I ended up gettind 36K out of the original tires, which isn't too bad. Should get 60-70K out of these.

I seem to be in a minority on this board, but I didn't have any ride or handling problems with the OEM Integritys on my '04,, and replaced them at 63,000 miles with the identical tire. I did not experience any loss in fuel economy with the new tires, and I am satisfied with the same type of tire as originial equipment on my '06.

I recently changed my OEM Goodyear Integrity’s to a set of Goodyear Assurance tires BUT, I changed back to a set of new Integrity’s after two-weeks.

While I wasn’t unhappy with the original Integrity’s that came on my Prius (I think I got better than average service from the Integrity’s as I put 62K miles on them before I had to invest in new tires) I wanted to see if a “better” tire would improve the ride and handling characteristics of my Prius without sacrificing mileage, so I upgraded to a set of Goodyear Assurance tires.

I immediately noticed that the new tires did in fact handle better and were a little quieter than the Integrity’s, but now there was a more pronounced, unpleasant road vibration in the steering wheel which was accompanied by a low level vibration in the cabin.

I figured that perhaps after a break-in period the tires would perform better, so had a business trip scheduled which took me, roundtrip from Los Angeles to San Francisco, but after the trip I was now getting 4 miles less to the gallon and the vibration didn’t get any better; I was not a happy camper. So the Assurance tires came off and I had the dealer replace them with a set of new OEM Integrity’s. My mileage is back-up, the vibration is gone, there was no charge to switch to the Integrity’s as the Goodyear Assurance tires came with a 30-day, no questions asked guarantee, plus I was refunded the difference in price between the Assurance and Integrity’s. I’m a happy camper once again.

Best of luck,

05CAPrius,
Thanks for the backup. Now we're a minority of two! We must have been doing something right to get the miles we did out of our OEM tires. Mine weren't quite worn out at 63k, but I didn't want to push it and not have good traction when it was needed.
Roger

My mileage is slowly climbing back up. Also have been using Texaco gasoline, since they have the lowest prices in town right now. Other stations are coming close to Texaco's prices so I may go back to Hess or the less expensive BP station.

You guys have carpeted highways out in CA? I do wonder how there can be that much difference in the same tires on the same car.

Hep,
We used to have pretty good highways, but then the legislature "borrowed" tax money that we, the public, had specified was to be used only for highway maintenance and construction. Somehow, the money never gets repaid. This has gone on for years, so now some of our highways are in pretty poor shape.
I have always gotten fairly good mileage out of my tires, and also my brakes. I'm tight when it comes to spending money on them, so I make sure I'm doing whatever I need to in order to make them last. I try to keep the pressures between 35 and 38psi. Maybe the folks that go for the 42/40psi for fuel economy are wearing their tires out faster? I don't know if that would make a difference.
I would suppose that your highways suffer from the winter temps, but I'm not sure how that contributes to tread life.
Anyway, these discussions are the reason that I read this board regularly.
Right now I'm doing so with my morning cup of coffee. Cheers, Hep!
Roger

I just replaced my Integrities with a new set of Integrities. After my first tank of gas, my mileage appears to be exactly what it was before the new tires. I don't know what to make of it, but I don't see tire "break in" affecting MPG as others have reported.

Overall I have been happy with the tires. I replaced them at 43,000 miles. I could have gone 50,000 but I got a screw in one and took the opportunity to replace them before our rainy season.

I've been running my tires at 40/38 for the most part, and just replaced them at 65K. Probably could have gone another 5-10K.

You're talking about the Integritys that came with the car? If so, 65K is amazing to me.

After 30K on mine, the inside and outside edges were bald. I ran them at 42/40, but they wore like they were underinflated.

I figure the wear was due to my habit of taking corners a little (OK - a lot) faster than I should. I'd be interested to hear how you would describe your cornering technique.

Yes, original factory tires. Only one was replaced under 6 months, (so that would be about 10-15K) due to getting a hole in the sidewall.

I corner normal, drive at speed limits. Rotated tires almost every 5K.