I searched, and while a lot of people don't like them, they don't say why. Also, forums aren't the place people come to to rave about their tires. I've found that, generally speaking, most people come to forums to complain about why they don't like something. The opinion on this forum is opposite of what a lot of consumer reviews report. That, in and of itself, does not mean the forum's opinion is not to be considered, though. I'm just trying to see if there's a happy medium. If they aren't worth $275, that's fine. I'd just like to know why.

 

Hey mulestang, If the tires are not radial tires then they can be mounted wherever. I tried typing your handle in three times and it kept auto correcting to " molesting" lol.

 

They are radials. I'm starting to see that there's a lot of dislike of the Scorpion. Where there's smoke, there's fire. I think I'm gonna pass and just get something new/different.
Still cracking up about the autocorrect.

 

I worked for discount tire for 14 years. The only problem with used tires like these are, they have very little miles on them. So they sat for a while without getting driven on..they can get hard and difficult to balance. All in all for the price its a pretty good deal. As far as being marked, it doesnt matter that much. Any tire dealer can measure the tread depth and tell you where to put them

 

Well, the used tires didn't work out. One had about 1/2 the miles as the rest, and the 2 of the 4 had some cracking near the bead on the inside, so I'm just gonna buy new. I've read a lot of threads here, so you can imagine how many options are out there. However, it seems most of thread contributors want more of an off-road capability in their tire choice. Also, snow/slush handling was heavily referenced in the threads. For me, living in Florida, I spend 90% of my miles on paved roadways daily driving back and forth to work. Lots of rain, though. I do, however, haul the horse to events for my daughter and we encounter some muddy parking areas. With that in mind, should I steer towards an all-terrain tire like the Cooper AT/3, or a more street tire like that found on SUVs? What are your thoughts?

 

Visited 3 tire shops today. Discount Tire was pushing the Bridgestone Alenza ($1070). Popular local chain recommended the Goodyear Wrangler RSA ($820). Another local shop pushed Nitto Terra Grapplers ($1080). 2 of 3 recommended against Cooper AT/3s, both saying they were loud and prone to wear issues. I feel like I made no progress. I thought the Nitto was too off-road for my driving pattern, but he insisted it was wildly popular here in NE Florida. Hadn't counted on that. At the end of the day, I was hoping to find a good compromise tire, but I think I'm back to square 1. I was also surprised Discount didn't recommend the Cooper Discoverer ATP or HTP.

 

Run far, far away from anything that says goodyear on them. The terra grapplers are a more aggressive looking tire, but i am really impressed with mine so far. I have 40k miles on them, and they look like they will go to 60k. The only issue I have had, is that mine are so wide, that in super hard downpours, they hydroplane a little. Love them in the snow.

 

Luckily, I don't have to contend with the snow. Just lots of rain at times. I was hoping it would be easy to find a tire to suite my particular situation (90% street/highway, 10% 'off-road' pulling trailer in wet grass/sand/mud), but it's not.

 

Tire stores push what they make the most money on. You should not expect a tire store, or anyone else, to give you a truly objective opinion based on facts - few people have driven multiple tires in the same environment over a period of time to determine true usability.

For 90% highway, you should buy a road tire. For the few times you're on wet grass with a horse trailer, one would think smart driving would cover you. If you don't have a 4x4 or an e-locker, I would assume traction control would cover you. You could also bring along things to add traction in the even they are needed - bag of sand, bag of kitty litter.

Now that you've determined you don't want those used tires, you'll find lots of threads about tires - including this one where Consumer Reports tests tires.

 

Thanks for the input. I'm in the process of swimming through the ocean of tire posts. Thus far, my takeaways are Scorpions suck, and everyone else is posting about 'which AT tire to buy'. My guess is that 'street tires' fall into the 'all season' category, so recommendations there are more scarce...other than the posted CR results. The search continues.