It looks that, after 30,000 miles my tires (stock, Prius tires) are going to need to be replaced. If anyone has a suggestion for new tires, I'm listening.

Toyota chose the OEM tires because they have low rolling resistance, and give you the best fuel economy. The Michelin Energy MXV4 tires have, I believe, the lowest rolling resistance of any available replacement tire.

30K miles on a set of tires can be very good or very bad. You have to compare with other tires on the same roads. Some areas of the country just have very abrasive roads, and tires in those areas just wear out quicker.

Consumer Reports lists five tires as being low rolling resistance:


I'm using Sumitomo HTR T4s and have been quite happy. At $45/each from Tirerack.com, they are affordable and I bought my first set from the local Toyota parts department. Living in Alabama, we don't really have much roadway ice.

Bob Wilson

Operation Iraqi Oil Freedom:

Automatic, stock, project car.

My other 1500 cc car:

Automatic, stock, backup car.
Free speech, dialog and knowledge thrives without the poison of SPAM.

Thanks for the info, SH. I'll shop around. Texas it seems falls in that category.

I have Michelin Hydroedges. Wouldn't have been my first choice for fuel economy, but a Saturday morning flat from an unrepairable road hazard, with substantial wear on all of them already, forced my hand. They were what I could get on short notice.

I estimated a 5-10% fuel mileage hit afterwards. Now after they are well broken in, I have recovered a lot of that. How much is impossible to say.

Other pros and cons: They wear much better than Integritys. I have 14K on them now and tread depth is from 1/32" to 2/32" less than new. They also handle much better, wet and dry pavement. They are noisier than the Integritys. And pretty expensive, >$100 each.

Jim

Lifetime fuel mileage:

After learning how to hypermile:

Anyone out there have any experience with General Altimax HP tires. It's time to replace the OEM's. These tires are supposed to be LRR and have a max pressure of 51psi - I'm thinking that I might be able to get better mpg with these than the Michelin X tires that I'm also considering.

Any comments?

Thanks, Will

I have a set of Michelin X Radials from Costco and have been very happy with them. No mileage hit. In fact they seem to be slightly better in the summer than the OEM's.