Which tires are better for my 325xi?

[jakip2000]

I am having a tough time financially right now but don't want to give up my car just yet. We will likely get snow here this year and while I'd like to have winter tires and summer tires I have to get some middle of the road all seasons... or re-finance my mortgage which I'm pretty sure is a bad idea.

My tire connection has two options for me in my price range...

Yokohama Envigor
Or
Good Year F-1 Asymmetrical

The Good Years are $100 more. Is it worth it to get those?

[Critter7r]

I'm not a fan of Goodyears or Yokos.

Check into Michelin Defenders. Tire Rack has them for $120 each. Less than the Goodyears, but more than the Yokos.

[jakip2000]

Thanks for chiming in. Any particular reason you prefer the Michelin's? Have you had a bad experience with the others?

[Critter7r]

obviously my limited experience with tires is anecdotal, but I've had 2 sets of Yokos that worked fine for about the first 40% of the tread, and then started to have a little noise that got progressively worse and at about 3mm of tread (above the wear bar) developed a slight twittering in the steering wheel that couldn't be balanced out. The 2nd set I bought were a really good price, so I thought I'd give them another shot. I won't give them a 3rd.

I put Michelin Primacy MXM4s on my car and Defenders on the wife's car and have had great results with both. I've gotten 50k problem free miles out of the MXMs through 2 winters in Michigan. The tread was at a point now where, if it were March, I'd have run them through the summer and replaced them about now, before winter. But at this time of year, I opted to get snows and put the MXMs back on in the spring for one more season.

I'm not really sure why I don't like Goodyears. I only had one set of GYs on an E46 years ago and it went pretty much the same way as the Yokos.

[jakip2000]

I have to admit, you're not the first person to suggest Michelin to me.

[Critter7r]

They're not the leading tire manufacturer for nothing. But ... they also don't have the cheapest tires.

[pDubs]

What size tires do you have?

I ran the Continental ExtremeContact DWS last winter and they ran great on my e36 m3. They got me to work just fine in the snow. I've also ran the Dunlop SP sport signatures in a few snow storms with no complaints as well.

This is coming from a guy who used to drive an AWD Subaru WRX with Bridgestone blizzak ws70 winters mounted on it. Obviously I was a lot more confident driving in the snow with that setup. Now I'm driving a rwd m3 with no traction control and all seasons, haha. If money grew on trees I would have dedicated winters too like I used to but priorities are there.

Although allseasons are just okay tires all around as long as you take it easy and drive cautiously in the snow with them I've never had an issue.

[jakip2000]

Factory rims put me at either a 205/55/16 or a 205/50/17. I have heard good things about the DWS. You need to get yourself into another AWD ;)

[jakip2000]

Ended up with Firestone Firehawks. Time will tell.

[Jim@tirerack]

The DWS is the best of the all season performance tires in the snow. You can call or email me anytime with any questions.