Tyres

[jeff1954]

Hi Guys

Google tyre shopper they list all makes from cheap to mega dear I went for a recomended mid range tyre which is called Brabus I now have a full set I don`t do a lot of milage and don`t go all that fast these days appart from the odd blast now and again but they seem fine
PS my cars a 2.7D also.

Jeff.

[MKENBYE]

I have just fitted 4 Barum Bar Bravuris 245/40YR18, great road holding and grip in wet but finding them very noisy.

Martyn

[hammie]

I have recently replaced my wheels with aftermarket 18ins alloys and they came fitted with a budget tyre [autogrip] which i have found fine at the moment in the dry and wet, will have to see how long they last, think on there own they are about 70 quid each
cheers hammie

[J44EAG]

I understand that new tyres will soon have to be marked with wear rates, and wet and dry grip gradings in addition to the information currently found on a tyre carcass. This should take the guessing out of tyre selection and hopefully it should be easier to select alternative tyres to those originally fitted to the car.

I welcome the arrival of that information. One might also hope that a noise level indication might also appear on tyres.

Mike

[MKENBYE]

The noise turned out to be a noisy diff. New diff , prop shaft and drives all fitted under warranty by Sturgess Leicester.
Really smooth ride now.

Martyn

[J44EAG]

You are indeed a lucky man, Martyn.

That must have cost jaguar or an insurance company a few shillings.

Glad to hear you have a result.

Mike

[jeff1954]

I also had a new propshaft and diff fitted free of charge by Stratstones after two weeks of ownership. And that was with just the basic one months warranty!

Jeff.

[humbrol]

Well hi everyone. Here I am again talking tyres. It is time to change mine on my 07 plate 2.7d XS all 4 corners. The handling issue persists and the car has just sailed through its MOT. No problems found, no advisories nothing but it still handles like a gurney (that's an american hospital trolley for patients). A recent visit to my local jag specialist did highlight that both front wheels were distorted so I have just acquired a set of 4 refurbished Mercury wheels.

So I don't want to labour the point but has anyone got the exact same model and tyre size 245-40-18 97y and if so what are you running.

I have trawled the internet tonight and came accross a tyre that I have not heard of before Neuton NT8000. 4 tyres of the correct size supplied £349.44. The advert also had information about the tyres Uniform Tyre Quality Grading (UTQG) which I found really helpfull. So sorry if this has been broadcast before in the forum but I thought that the following may be informative to you all.

UTQG explained

Treadwear: The index represents how quickly a tyre becomes worn. The index is between 60 and 620, with 100 as the reference sandard. E.G. a tyre with a treadware of 50 will wear 2 times faster than a normal tyre whereas a tyre with a treadwear index of 320 will wear 3.2 times more slowly. The higher the treadwear index, the longer the life of the cycle. The NT8000 has a 320 rating.

Traction: The index represents a tyre's grip on wet roads. This index is indicated by the letters AA (highest index), A, B, C (lowest index and acceptable rating). The higher the traction index, the shorter the braking distance. The NT8000 has a AA rating.

Temperature: This index represents a tyre's temperature resistance and its ability to dissipate heat. Excessive heat can cause tyre degradation. This index is indicated by the letters A (highest index), B and C (the lowest index). The temperature index 'A' means that a tyre has good temperature resistance. The NT8000 has an A rating.

Some budget tyres do not to meet these high standards and ratings. The Neuton NT8000 range do and their high quality is obvious once fitted and driven on.

[J44EAG]

Interesting indeed, Iain.

Thank you for that. Must see if I can rate my Nexons and compare to you tyres. They sound excellent value for money.

Mike

[humbrol]

What a difference a day makes!!!!!

Having just purchased my 4 refurbished mercury 18 inch wheels it was off to Kwikfit this morning to have the tyres switched over. I arrived explained what I wanted doing and left to go shopping. 30 minutes later, Linda and I were sitting in the coffee shop at British Home Store (not much shopping done so far) and my mobile goes off. Kwikfit....Mr Tennant, we have a problem with your tyres (me thinks, can't find locking wheel nut adaptor or seized wheel nuts) No!!!! the side wall on the inner side of both rear tyres had become detached from the tread and he was condeming the tyres immediately. Not the sort of news I wanted over tea and a scone (or at any time come to think of it).

The conversation went something along the lines of.......Your rear tyres are shot and both the front and rear tryres are not XL rated which is probably the cause of your rears delaminating in the first place. He suggested that all four tyres were changed.

We discussed the options and the only tyres that he had in stock were Dunlop 245 40 r18 93y SMaxx3 so the little car was fitted up with a set of four tyres and I was fitted up with an £831.92p bill.

It was at this point that I wished I had a Brandy not a tea. Anyway, I went to collect my car and we looked over the tyres. The rears had indeed started to delaminate. one had a split in it that run continuously for approx 60% of its circumference. The other had rips all the way around but not yet linked. I was shown a tyre where the side wall had completely detached and it was explained that this would have been the outcome of my tyres, probably on the motorway at highspeed. (nearly all of my driving is highspeed motorway) this prospect horrified me.

But what worried me even more is that my car has been into 2 Jaguar specialist within the last month and had actually passed its MOT 3 weeks ago. Not only did no one notice the rips and cracks but no one noticed or mentioned that none of the tyres fitted were XL rated.

We discussed the handling issues that I had been experiencing and although not conclusive the conclusion was this. Firstly none XL rated tyres were the side walls flexed too much. Second directional assemetrical tyres on the front and none directional variable tread pattern tyres on the back. Third, The side walls on the Eagle F1 fitted front are stiffer than the continentals fitted back and lastly the continetals have better wet grip than the Eagles.

Combination....a car that handles like a tea trolley.

£800+ lighter in the wallet and bit more knowledgable in the mind I drove the 8 miles home. It was a different car. I had to stop and get out to check the registration number in case I had driven off with someone elses. The tramlining had gone along a section of road in town that I always hated driving along. Road noise was drastically reduced due in part to the warped front wheels being replaced, steering seemed more positive.

So a short journey today but a longer one tomorrow so although I do't want to leap to unsubstaniated conclusions, the jury is still out but may have come to a conclusion. Another report in a couple of days.

But, before I close. If you are running none XL rated tyres please, please check your side walls very carefully especially the inside where you don't normally look. I dread to think what the outcome could have been of a double rear blow out at highspeed in the outside lane of the M1

I don't know how to upload an image to my posting but will happily send it on to anyone who wants one. Also noticed that the tyre bead that attaches to the wheel rim had started to thread as well.

[J44EAG]

Phew, Iain.

What a story. An answer at last!

I`d like to send this tale off to Nigel as a short article for the magazine please. If you are ok with that, perhaps you could let me know. PM, mail or call me if you wish to discuss. I can drag and drop all the text from here no problem.

Do you have any images of the failed tyres? They could come to me via my JEC mail address as attachments. Images which are on this site are rather too small to be used in the magazine. Perhaps too late for that as I expect the tyres have probably been disposed of and you will have better things to do that go back and photograph a load of rubber junk!.

Rather alarming that these faults and mismatches were not seen earlier. A few words needed in the appropriate ears maybe.

As regards image attachment to posts, this is no more difficult really than attaching to an email. Go to just below the green bar below. Click "Browse", go to your picture gallery and select the picture you wish to post. Click on the picture and a pop up box will appear saying an upload is in progress. Then click "Add the file". Go back to your post and place your mouse pointer at the end of the sentence where you wish your image to be placed , then left click to place the vertical bar. Then click "Place in line" near the green bar below and alpha/numeric coding should be seen. You can continue to add text or two more images after that. Once you have submitted the post, check view what you have just posted and your image should be present along with the text.

One thing to remember. Many of our pics can be too large for this site. Google "shrinkpicture.com and follow directions for resizing. It is simplicity itself. Go to resize, select a picture via "Browse", tick the 350 circle and "Best quality", click resize, wait and look for "Download this picture" to appear. Click "Download" and transfer the image to your library. I normally rename the image as resized so that I know for future reference that it is of small kb size suitable for this website. Once you have done it a couple of times, it isn`t that difficult.

At £208 per boot, I don`t think you have been robbed although there is a dent in your wallet. You have quality, long lasting tyres now. I love Mxx as it is quiet, very long lasting and very grippy. It is very much a pick of the bunch tyre as far as I`m concerned. The one I have remaining on the car that hasn`t been pothole damaged has done nearly 30k miles and there is loads of life left in it. In my opinion also, the only tyre that comes anywhere near the same quality is a Continental. Regret a Pirelli is not for me.

Cheers Iain. Thanks for the update and glad you found the answer.

Mike

[humbrol]

Hi Mike,

Of course, go ahead and submit to the mag if it helps anyone to stay safe I will be happy.

Fast drive down the A38 this morning to Derby and I picked a road to come home on that was as bumpy and twisty as I could find. The car behaved absolutely impeecably. Responsive, sure footed not at all skitish. It went exactly were I pointed it on the bends. On the A38 no wandering about like a druken new born Giraffe from the back end on undulating road surface. No tramlining a real pleasure. I finally have the car that I thought I had purchased. And it is wisper quite now as well, again partly because I removed the buckled front wheels.

I will PM you later with a picture of one of the tyres. Not great as the damage was not easy to image but high res so if you zoom and crop you can see the damage.

So it only remains for me to say thank you to everyone that had an input into this especially you Mike and thanks for allowing me to take up the space on the forum. With the original posting and this related one, do I still have the record for the longest thread on the forum?

Cheers

Iain

[humbrol]

Just remembered. The cost of the 4 tyres was after a 25% discount price would have been something in the region of £1038.00

[J44EAG]

Thanks Iain.

If you could let me have some images of tyres, the car and of course yourself, that would be good. In the meantime, I`ll bring this post to Nigels attention with a view to having the saga published as an article in the magazine. This may not happen immediately, but it all gets in there in the end.

The thread was started by our friend Andy Pryce on 14th April 2010 with your first input on 11the October 2010. Here we are on 27th February 2012 some 22 months later with the thread still intact with 27 different posts and 427 viewings. Perhaps not quite a record but certainly showing that we can find the answers between us given enough time and money!

I`ll have to do more research to say whether this is indeed the longest running thread. Where did I put my anorak now?!

I suppose all this goes to show just how valuable this Club resource is to us especially when the reasons for a problem are obscure.

Well done everyone. Keep this sort of thing coming.

Mike

[dhdove]

Hi Mike et al

I hope you won't mind if I add a couple of comments to this excellent thread which I have read with great interest.

First congrats on the length of the thread and the info it contains - however I too have no idea if it's the longest! I do think that it will form an excellent basis for a magazine article.

More importantly I think that it illustrates a salient point that all of us should be aware of. With regard to what we may call high performance cars and I think pretty much all modern Jaguars fit this description, the car is designed from the outset with it's component parts working together to deliver that performance safely and securely. As we all know the only thing between us and the road are the tyres on our car. Hence the manufacturer recommends certain tyre manufacturers and types as OEM. Whilst it is probably true that there is a certain amount of hand in glove going on in these arrangements nonetheless they have calculated at great length that this equipment will safely handle the design loads imposed upon it.

When these vehicles make their journey down through the second-hand market there is inevitably a temptation to fit cheaper third party alternatives to the original recommendations in the belief that all things are of the same quality. Clearly this is not the case, especially when one intends to "press-on" then there is a risk there that the tyres will not meet one's expectations. This thread illustrates the risks that can come from such a policy I think. Although buckled wheels won't help.....

In short, whilst we all love a bargain, I think that when it comes to that thin ribbon of rubber between us and the road we should all be prepared to bite the bullet and shell-out for one of the choices of recommended tyres, of whatever type we choose based on tread type, longevity, noise etc. Jaguar recommend these tyres for a reason and not just to put money into the pockets of tyre manufacturers.
Otherwise expensive and (personally) damaging problems may await us.

Perhaps, if you can't afford the tyres then you can't afford the car?

I know that this opinion goes against the grain of all of us, myself included in the past ( the old Hankooks on a 2.8 Capri, soft as s##t and lasted weeks!) but with our cars nowadays capable of 100mph in the blink of an eye perhaps we should consider more seriously what is keeping us on the road and how much we value staying there?

That's my two-penneth worth..........

Regards
TonyS