Low Rolling Resistance Tires Work!

Unfortunately I've discovered this fact by going the wrong direction and my mileage has taken a serious turn for the worse. The weather is warming up so mileage should be going up but after a tire replacement the hybrid is getting Winter mileage in Summer temps!

My hybrid came with LRR tires (sorry I don't remember what brand-maybe Bridgestone B381 rated 240BB). After 50k miles it was time to replace the tires. I honestly didn't think that the tires made much difference, plus the new tires claimed:

You can tell that the new Pirelli non-LRR tires don't roll as good as the old LRR tires 2 ways:

1) My garage floor is slightly angled and with the old LRR tires the hybrid would roll out of the garage in neutral without using any power. With the new non-LRR tires the car does not move an inch until power is applied in reverse.

2) Mileage has gone down, a lot! Even with the new non-LRR tires pumped up to 44 PSI mileage has suffered by around 20%!

The new Pirelli tires do seem to have more traction and with a treadwear rating of 760AB they should last a long time but I'm sure paying the price at the pump.

Next time I'll buy real LRR tires for sure...


PS

I just assumed that LRR tires were mostly marketing mumbo-jumbo and that differences in mileage were due to inflation or climate differences. I figured they would only make a percent or two difference in mileage all things equal. Man was I wrong!

 

I'll prefer some added security if I had to change driving surfaces all the sudden.

have you tried filling them with nitrogen and 2psi less than the sidewall max recommendation? That can put you probably in the same mpg as ur old LRR

 

I've already got em pumped up to 44 PSI (air). They came out of the shop at 32 PSI which drained the traction pack cause the car was on boost all the time trying to make up for the extra frictional load. I really can not overstate what a huge difference these tires make.

 

BigTuna,
If you own a Honda Civic hybrid the original tires were probably either Bridgestone B381 or Dunlops. Honda chose those particular tires because of their very low rolling resistance.
That being said, there are some other tires that really do have low rolling resistance, but it's hard to find any recent data on which are truly LRR and which are not.
I've tried Nokians and found that they have a nice balance of good traction and LRR. Other folks have been pleased with other brands of replacement tires they bought. I remember spending a long time reading posts with tire recommendations here and in other forums before I bought my replacement tires.
If your Pirelli tires are relatively new, can you take them back and switch them out for another brand? If not, and you're really unhappy with them, maybe you could sell them and put the money from that sale into the purchase of another set of tires.

 

Big Tuna,

I've had similar experience rolling our car out of the garage: we use Nokian WRG2 in winter, and are still on the OEM Bridgestone Insiginia SE200's, for the spring/summer/fall months.

There is a slight pitch down towards our garage door, and then the driveway slopes down to the street, so for washing the car it's possible to roll it out without start-up, in neutral.

With the Bridgestone's, once I put it in neutral and release all brakes, it typically just starts to roll. With the Nokian's, I need to put a foot on the garage floor and give a push to get it started.

D.O. for mileage: transitioning from the Nokians to Bridgestones in spring, the mileage goes (roughly) from 6.5~6.7 liter/100km (if we're lucky) to around 6.0.

 

Many hybrid car enthusiasts recommend an absolute minimum psi of 35 psi—and many try to push the envelope by increasing pressure to 40+ psi. You should read the manufacturer’s recommendations, and decide for yourself how comfortable you are with pumping up your tires for a gain in mpg. There could be safety issues related to over-inflating your tires.

 

I agree that safety is a concern. My tires are rated for something like 44psi max pressure. I normally recommend not going over the max pressure stated by the manufacture for safety reasons.

 

Honda Civic Hybrid. Please google "Honda Civic Hybrid" IMA. Or Facebook "Honda Civic Hybrid - Honda Corporation Has No Honor". There are people on the Edmonds forum who think hybrid technology is very imperfect only because they drive a Honda Civic Hybrid.