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My Fiat panda 4x4 needs two new front tyres. The existing Bridgestones are not available. ATS say Viedersteins Snow Traks will give me twice the mileage of the Kumo Snow tyres being suggested by my local garage. ATS say the Kumos are a budget tyre but the garage say they are mid-range. The Viedersteins will cost £150 total fitted. The Kumos just under a £100. I want to support my local garage but not at the price of half the lifespan. My local garage can't get the Viedersteins. Help?!
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You could buy the tyres you want online (mytyres, blackcircles many more) and pay your local garage to fit and balance them thereby saving you cash and supporting your local business.
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I have never found those companies cheaper than what you can buy from a local tyre dealer.
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You'll have a job to beat Camskills for Vredestein tyres.
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I would suggest going for Nokian WRs which have snow and M+S ratings but are classed as an all-year round tyre by Nokian who also do full-on winter tyres. Our Suzuki Jimny has had them on for two years next month and looks OK for 25-30k before a change at around 4mm. I have just had a set put on an MPV last week for the first of several trips this winter to the Alps and am typing this in an hotel just off the autoroute. They are less noisy than the worn Bridgestones that came off and handle fine on a non-4x4. Whether they wear well on the heavier car remains to be seen. In the Panda size they are nearly half what I paid and work out at just under £40 each on Mytyres. Those you quoted seem to be cheaper on there after allowing for £10-15 each for fitting and balancing. However, the prices change daily. Delivery was four days incidentally -- from The Netherlands.
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ATS say the Kumos are a budget tyre but the garage say they are mid-range.
They are certainly not a budget tyre.
Many woud say they are above midrange.
www.honestjohn.co.uk/forum/post/index.htm?v=e&t=68...7
I do not have any idea on mileage but I think you are getting some "mixed information"
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I drove a Panda Climbing 4x4 for over 3 years/ 33,000 miles, now replaced by a Panda Cross. As with many 4x4 drivers, tyres become a bit of an obssession for me.
I swapped tyres back to front and vice versa, a wise move with any 4x4 as the 4x4 systems don't like tyres with big differences in wear, and replaced the whole set of Bridgestones at 24,000 miles when not far off the legal limit and showing deteriorating wet weather grip.
I've used MyTyres for a long time now. Prices and choice are excellent and my local tyre fitter fits for £5 a wheel all in. I chose Hankook Centum H720 tyres and found them hard-wearing with excellent performance in the dry but a bit lacking in the wet (but only when pushing handling to the extreme). If I were changing now I would go for Vredestein QUATRAC 2 tyres as good all-rounders with excellent performance in the wet. There has been debate on www.fiatforum.com/panda-new/ and these Quatrac seem to be the choice there of 4x4 drivers.
Unless you live in a highland area I would not choose a Winter tyre, as your tyre dealers seem to be pushing on you, but go for all-season tyres. The problem with UK tyre depots is that they have access to a very limited range of all-season and Winter tyres especially in the size needed for a Panda 4x4. MyTyres have a much wider range as they supply the whole of Europe from Germany.
I could get 2 Quatracs fitted for only a little over £100. This should be your target price for high quality tyres. I would rate the Kumhos as mid-range but, again, as they are Winter tyres the performance on an all-year-round basis will be compromised.
Finally, as you are replacing front tyres only, may I remind you to swap tyres round every 6000 miles so as to even out wear and to be kind to your 4x4 system. The wheel tightening torque for alloys will be 98N.m.
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Some more thoughts for you.
Tyres on the front wheels of a Panda 4x4 Climbing wear quite heavily. I believe that some tyres will wear better than others but do not believe that on this car any tyre will last twice as long as a competitor's product. Maybe 10-20% more miles but not much more than that.
Looking at prices of Vredestein and Kumho Winter tyres on MyTyres suggests that, as I have long believed, Kumhos are well below Vredesteins in quality. Kumhos seem often to be supplied by local garages who can make a fair margin of profit on them and still charge the customer a fairly modest price.
Look at www.mytyres.co.uk/ and search in all-season tyres. Cost the Quatracs, delivered, then ask your local garage to quote for fitting. You can also get a fully-fitted price on MyTyres, in the case of the Quatracs £60 per wheel.
If, as I assume, you have a UK panda 4x4 Climbing, you are searching for 185/65 14T tyres.
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You've got a local garage that fits tyres???-most contract them out to the nearest tyre-fitting place- who have the proper machinery and,hopefully,people trained to use it.
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The local garage are a Kumho supplier and seem to have the required equipment and skills to fit tyres. They also seem very competent at checking and adjusting tracking. However, they also service and repair most cars and Carry out MOTs. When they do the MOTs they also rectify minor faults without further charge and without pestering me, which I appreciate. Examples are fitting new bulbs and, on my Panda 4x4, levering a rear spring back into its lower mounting. We reckon it had jumped out a bit when I jacked up the car to replace the rear brake pads.
Oh, and the garage really is local, ie at the end of the street, which is dead handy.
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A guy on www.fiatforum.com/panda-new/ has just had 4 of the Quatracs fitted to his Panda 4x4 for £188 at his local tyre depot. Excellent price!
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A guy on www.fiatforum.com/panda-new/ has just had 4 of the Quatracs fitted to his Panda
And i got my local place to slip 4 of em onto my daughters 106 for even less, and they're the cats whiskers, stick like the proverbial in the wet.
Just as an aside, but with good quality tyres being so cheap for sensible sizes, why would someone fit ditchfinder rubbish to such a car, thats why 4 went on if you hadn't guessed, i checked and some of the tyres fitted were below £20 with tyretest reviews in the abysmal categories.
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