MachU

Considering the price point which is half the price compared to Nitto, are they really that bad?

kbroderick

So I put around 600 miles on this weekend, driving down to Wyoming for the eclipse, camping in Shoshone National Forest Saturday and Sunday nights, and then driving back via Yellowstone Monday afternoon.

So far, I have zero complaints about performance. On-pavement performance is good enough that I suspect I'm going to need a dedicated set of winter tires despite the 3PMSF symbol (if they corner this well on warm pavement, I doubt the compound is soft enough for 0' F), but gravel-road and light off-road performance (limited-maintenance USFS roads and spurs to dispersed camping) has been great.

My mileage did take a hit, but between a 3.4% nominal difference in circumference and going from a highway tire to an A/T tire, I can probably live with that. I'll need a few more tanks to get a better idea of the actual MPG difference, though—slow-travel USFS roads don't help much.

AricsFX

iTrader: (3)

Considering I had them for one day, and brought them back to spend twice the money for toyos the next day... yes. Lol

5.0drivinFive-O

Can you be more specific about you your horrible "one day" experience? Thanks

kbroderick

He did earlier in the thread:

Personally, I have neither of the issues he experienced. Mine are balanced and not particularly noisy, even at 80-85 MPH. That may indicate a QC issue, or he may just be unlucky (any mass-produced item is going to have some defective units, and a sample size of two—me having received satisfactory product and AricsFX having the opposite size—proves just about nothing). If we were talking a 50% failure rate with a significant sample size, I'd consider myself very lucky to have gotten good examples and cross the brand right off the list for my next tire purchase.

5.0drivinFive-O

I will be buying a set in a few weeks. I'm willing to give it a shot considering he's the only bad review I have heard of and it's based on a day (or less) of driving. ill let you know how mine are.

kbroderick

So I got a chance to go for a bit of a drive tonight, up a forest service road in search of snow. I only found one spot where there was enough snow on the road to give any sort of test, but it was enough of a hill to make things reasonably interesting.

So in a few inches of heavy, wet snow with either compacted snow or packed gravel below, they worked reasonably well. It's my first time in conditions that slippery with the F150, so I'd have a tough time saying how much was tire vs how much was truck; I did try going uphill in 2WD and 4WD, locked and unlocked, and in both normal driver-aid mode and in "AdvanceTrac Sport" mode. Overall, I'm reasonably impressed, but I'm still thinking I'm likely to buy a set of dedicated winter tires; I fully expect a dedicated winter tire to be substantially better on winter interstates and 70 MPH secondary roads (yes, we have plenty of those in Montana) where things can go from great traction to slippery and back real quick-like.

I also tried them on a short loose-gravel hillclimb, and once I threw it in 4L and locked the rear axle, it climbed up without a care in the world. In hindsight, I wish I had flipped the dash to off-road info to see the pitch; it wasn't silly steep, but it was steep enough that when I backed down after my first (non-4L, unlocked) attempt failed, my hitch made contact with the ground on the transition.

Overall, I'm pretty happy with them. I've also got an email into Omni because their website now indicates a 50k mile treadwear warranty as well as a road-hazard warranty, but the details aren't available as far as I can tell.

kbroderick

Another bit of fun exploration today. They closed the paved road to 10k feet, so I had to go a little further afield looking for snow to ski. For those who may be curious, I drove from Red Lodge, MT, to Lulu Pass Road, just outside of Cooke City, MT. Google shows it as 111 miles each way, most of which is 65-70 MPH two-lane pavement. Tires were fine there, although they obviously an AT tire when doing 65 MPH with the windows open.

After hitting snow, and quickly needing 4WD to continue climbing, I decided to air down a bit (from 45 front/50 rear); having forgotten a tire gauge, I just let air out of each front tire for a "35-1000" count and each rear tire for a "40-1000" count at first and then a 30-1000 count all around on the second attempt, which put me between 30-34 PSI all around according to the TPMS. That seemed to help a fair bit, and the only times I went to 4L other than for speed control were for one slightly hairy uphill section and a go-round dodging a large downed tree (no chainsaw with me), where there was a short but steep climb off the roadway and then back onto it on the other side of the tree. I did lock the diff for that (I really didn't want to get hung up there) but otherwise left it open.

Overall, I'm quite happy thus far with these as a three-season AT tire. I'm still planning to get a true winter tire for the core of winter, as I expect it to perform far better on icy pavement than any AT tire, but if I wasn't a skier living in a snowy state, I'd probably consider these an acceptable year-round compromise.

kbroderick

Quick update: went back down to Lulu Pass today, and the snow I drove in last time was mostly still there...under a layer of new snow, and somewhat icy. With the tires aired down to around 30-33 PSI (yeah, yeah, gauge is in the mail from Amazon) and the truck in 4WD, I had no trouble at all until I go to the same spot as last time and tried to turn around off the road. I pulled forward, pulled back, started to spin, and felt the dreaded "thump" as the truck sank in far enough to be at least partially high-centered on the firmer layer beneath.

A little bit of shoveling, got back in the truck (which was in 4LO and the rear locked), spun a little and then dug through. A quick fore-and-aft move to pack down a little bit of track and make sure I was going to be able to drive away after skiing, and I was good to go. No problems driving out of there, and the only other tracks in the new snow that far up were from sleds.

Also, note to self: the F150 will not allow shifting between drive and reverse unless the RPMs are very low, which makes attempting to rock out of a hole a bit difficult.

Nearer pavement, there'd been more traffic and things were firm and slightly glazed. I tried getting on the brakes hard to see what I'd have for traction, and the ABS quickly kicked in, reinforcing my thought that I do want a set of real winter tires for the middle of that season (probably going to go with Hakkapaliita LT2s). And chains, I need to buy some chains.

After getting unstuck:

kbroderick

Same drill this weekend, down towards Cooke City to ski. There had been some more snow on the paved road just east of Cooke, where it seems to be minimally maintained right now and will switch over to tracked-vehicle use in the near future. The four miles up the forest-service road were fine, but the paved road with intermittent packed snow and ice was challenging; I was creeping along under 30 MPH in 4WD while other people seemed to be either have much better traction or much less concern for their safety.



That's leaving in the afternoon; earlier in the day, the whole road was snow-covered and it was impossible to tell by look if it was a light layer of snow on pavement or a light layer of snow on packed snow and ice. If that looks like a familiar driving surface, I'd strongly recommend real winter tires. I'll be emailing that Nokian dealer tonight or tomorrow to set up an appointment for next week.