I'd like to replace my original-equipment all season Bridgestone Turanza EL400 V-rated tires with quieter tires that offer the same or better MPG.

A TireRack salesperson recommended sticking with the two original equipment choices (the Bridgestone EL400 and the Michelin Energy MXV4 S8) -- on the basis that Toyota chose them to maximize the EPA mileage values.

According to the TireRack surveys, the MXV4 S8 is quieter than the Bridgestones -- but the surveys also list several even quieter tires. Unfortunately, the surveys say nothing about rolling resistance -- thus the quieter tires may yield lower MPG.

Consumer Reports (Nov 2006) provides rolling resistance info, but they test only a small set of what's available. The closest I could find in CR is the H rated version of the Bridgestone EL400 (which probably has a weaker sidewall than the V), and the V rated Michelin Energy MXV4 Plus (which CR rates as having only average noise and average rolling resistance).

My priorities are low noise, high MPG, and decent performance in rain (rarely drive in snow or ice). Based on reviewing the threads in this forum, it sounds like the MXV4 S8 is the better (and perhaps quieter) original equipment choice.

Thanks in advance for comments and suggestions.

 

Sorry for asking, but shouldn't performance (and maybe even safety considerations) rank more highly than noise and mileage? I'd hate to be swerving out of control on a rainy highway and have to tell my passengers "...but at least I'm getting good mileage!"

 

Thanks to you , Haroldo, for another of your typically insightful comments.

I agree with the spirit of this question.

However, I think that in this case we are spared the need to make such a tough decision. The Michelin Energy's are sufficiently LRR AND good handling AND long lasting.

All of the user comments I've seen in this forum and in the Edmunds.com TCH forum (which forum, incidentally, led me here in the first place) seem to indicate high level of satisfaction with these tires. Based on this and on my own past experience with Michelins vs other brands, I tend to believe the Michelin claims that they have tire design technology superior to any other manufacturer for simultaneously achieving LRR, good handling and good tread wear characteristics.

I have typically seen my Michelins last 60,000 to 70,000 miles without getting down even close to the wear bars.

Several posters here have reported on their Bridgestones wearing out at 30,000 miles or so. I also noted at least one poster in the TCH forums expressing the view that he would not have accepted a car with the Bridgestones rather than the Michelins

On my recent TCH purchase, I had my choice of several cars with the options I needed and either the Bridgestones or Michelins. With the forum comments on the Michelin Energy's on the TCH reinforcing my own previous experience, I chose one with the Michelins.

For the record: most of my driving on my Michelins has been in Houston, or along the Gulf coast areas of Texas and Louisiana. In the summer, it gets very, very hot here. Most of my driving is either under 25 miles per hour on Macadam streets, or over 60 miles per hour on concrete highways. I usually fill my tires dead cold to 4 to 6 psi above the car sticker recommendations (but always below the tire sidewall max pressure), and I try to refill before they get down to the car sticker recommendations.

I keep my eye on the treads for uniform wear and tread depth. I rotate front-to-rear whenever the fronts have noticeably less tread than the rears, rather than on a mileage schedule.

And, as for quietness, with the Michelin Energys on th TCH, particulerly in stealth or fuel cut mode I often hear tire noise that I might not hear with an ICE running, BUT IT ALWAYS TURNS OUT TO BE FROM ANOTHER CAR NEARBY, NOT MINE !

Jack

 

Thanks for the feedback.

Just to clarify, I'm looking for a quieter tire that returns the same or better MPG. However long tread wear is not a priority (of course, it would be nice).

I drive about 4000 miles per year, so even a tire with below average tread wear is okay. The car is used for short errands, and for occasional side trips (200 - 300 miles each way) -- and it's on these trips (mainly on the freeway) that a quieter tire would be welcome.

My reasons for wanting the same or better MPG are mainly environmental (vs. economical). Even so, with rising gas prices, I think the total cost to own will be lower than for a gas Camry.

P.S. Other than this tire noise issue (which is not really bad, I just want it to be quieter), the car is excellent.

 

Not to muddy the water, but I had that Michelin tire on my TL Type-S and when they wore out, I put Yokohamas on. It was like a new car!! Much quieter and better handling. Michelins are SOOOO overrated in my experience. They must give those MXV4's to automobile manufacturer's because they are stock on a lot of cars. I also had them on my Saab 9-5.
In fact, if my TCH had Michelin tires I would not have bought it. The tread wear on the Bridgestone hasn't been very good, but otherwise happy.
I had this review clipped from another forum that I was saving for when I needed TCH tires. "I did get rid of my Bridgestone Turanza EL400 OEM tires, which wore out at 29K, with incredible road noise, and replaced them with Yokohama Avid TRZ tires. Now, my TCH has 32K miles, rides like a dream, is as quiet as a church, and after keeping meticulous records for all those miles, have averaged 37.102 MPG. Hope this helps anyone with noise issues in what is otherwise a marvelous vehicle. Good luck!"
So I will definitely be checking out the Yokohama's when it's time for tires.

 

Gremhe,

Thanks for clarifying.

Sorry if, in replying to the priorities issue, I got off the track of your original question.

Here's some info and opinion that I hope is more to the point:

Based on my experience with the Michelin Energy's on the TCH, I think you would find them nice and quiet. (Though I rarely drive with the windows open.)

The Michelin Energy's are low rolling resistance tires. With sufficient tire pressure, many posters here report excellent mpg with these tires.

You might also get some comfort from the fact that these tires are original equipment tires for the TCH.

You mentioned that you do only 4000 miles per year. This is highly significant both in relation to the tire life expectancy and in relation to mpg expectations.

As you correctly observe, you might not need to be concerned with getting high tire mileage. By the time you log another 30,000 miles, you'll have nearly 8 years on the tires, and they may very well be cracking from age.

In regard to mpg expectations, you and I have a common problem. a few years ago, my wife and I both achieved a dramatic reduction in the number of miles we were putting on our cars annually. We now have 2 cars operating in about the same yearly mileage range that you are in.

In fact, this was a factor in our choice of a hybrid car. Since most of our driving now is city driving, I figured that there simply was not any way that we could get decent fuel economy other than with a STRONG Hybrid. In regard to this expectation, my Camry Hybrid experience has been one of both good news and bad news.

First the bad news re. mpg: Knocking off the miles we do on those few occasional trips of a few hundred miles each, if you do only 3000 miles per year and operate the car most days, you are doing a lot of trips of 8 to 10 miles (round trip) or even less. A trip of only 4 or 5 miles, one way, is barely enough to warm the car up. You have to burn all of that warm-up fuel and then you don't get to do any more miles over which to average down to a decent mpg.

Before I tell you how unfortunately this works out for me (mpg-wise), let me first claim that I do not think there is anything wrong with my car.

Yesterday, I made a 55 mile round trip of interstate driving, mostly at 65 mph. The computer recorded 45 mpg on that round trip. And a couple of weeks ago I made a 20-mile round trip city driving excursion at 35 mph or less with the car fully warmed up and the battery fully charged and with no A/C and with light traffic. The round trip mileage for that trip was 52 mpg.

But with a cold engine and low state of charge and a round trip of 1 mile or less (which I often do) I sometimes record as little as 10 mpg.

When I put it all together I'm averaging between 20 and 25 mpg. (My last tank was 22 mpg.)

Now for the good news: All said and done I'm now using only about half as much gas as I used with my other cars for the same king of driving. AND THAT WAS, IN FACT, WHAT I WAS HOPING TO ACHIEVE

Now that you have figured that I must have been getting only 10 or 12 mpg in my other cars, for completeness I should note that these cars were EPA rated at about 16 city/26 highway, and I regularly achieved over 30 mpg in both of them on long highway trips; so the fact that I was getting only 10 to 12 mpg regularly was not the result of the cars being true "gas hogs," nor was it the result of poor maintenance or state of disrepair. Oh yeah, I think it was strictly the unavoidable consequence of the typically short trips.

If I'm right about all of this, I expect that you will not get better than 25 mpg in your routine driving, but that you might see 50 mpg on those few 300 mile trips.

Please share your thoughts about all of this and any data you have.

Jack

 

My vote is for the Micheline Energy S8 tire. I started running 38 psi in them when I first bought the car. After a month I upped them to 40 psi cold. Then it seemed to coast easier. I saw where some others in the forums that used 42 psi. I tried that the last few tanks. So far I have got the best mpg ever from my TCH. I'm just now ready for my second oil change. Evidently learning to use the EV and hybrid modes has really paid off.

When I bought the TCH I mentioned to the sales manager, if my car does not come with the Energy tires, there's going to be some static. Lucky, it had them on it when it came off the convoy truck.

I have used Michelin's for years due to their long life and quiet ride. I'm talking about the mid to upper quality Michelin's, you won't see in Walmart.

Always but always rotate and balance your tires every 5000 miles. It's easy to remember to do around the time of your oil change. Discount Tire does a good job in the south. It's easier for me to use Walmart due to me being 80 miles from the nearest Discount location.

 

Thanks to Smilin' Jack and rburt07 for the info on the Michelin tires, and to userboy about the Yokohama tires.

Regarding the gas mileage so far using my Bridgestone tires (1600 miles since buying the car in late December), the readout has been about 28 mpg for city driving (mostly short errands), and about 40 mpg for a 400 mile trip to a mountainous area (about 35 mpg for the mostly uphill direction, and 45 mpg for the mostly downhill direction). And like Smilin' Jack, that's much better than from my previous non-gas-hog car.

The dilemma now is whether to get the "known" MXV4 S8 (which sounds quite good) or try the probably quieter Yokohama tires (or similar) and risk a drop in mpg. Without knowing the driving patterns of that one Yokohama/TCH driver, it's hard to know if 37.102 mpg is better or worse than with the original Bridgestone tires.

Thanks again to all for the feedback.

 

I just looked at the tirerack site. I see the EL400-02 Bridgestone $105, and the Energy S8 ($125 on special) as the only two oem tires for the TCH.

I noticed the EL400 shows a UTQG of 260 where the Energy tire shows a UTQG of 440. Looks like the Energy would have the longer treadwear.

 

The confounding factors in tread wear are the differences in driving habits and operating conditions. Noise is closely related to operating conditions, also.

The obvious factor is driving habits -- people who drive fast, with high acceleration forces, wear out tires. This is most obvious when you see a young man in a "muscle" car leave a stripe of black tire rubber on a straight road. But, any sort of aggressive driving leaves some rubber on the road, both during straight-line acceleration and during cornering.

The less obvious factor is the operating conditions. This includes temperature and road composition. High temperature roads make the rubber softer so it wears more rapidly. Roads made from small, fine, smooth pebbles cause much less tire wear than roads made from larger, coarse, or rough gravel.

Noise is also caused by road conditions. Most of the tire noise comes from the interface between the tread and the road surface. Roads made from coarse, rough gravel make low-frequency high-amplitude sound, which the human ear can hear easily. Roads made form fine, smooth pebbles make higher frequencies and less amplitude, which are harder to hear.

A lot depends on where you live. In each area, they use locally available gravel. There's no sense in trucking loads of gravel half way across the country. So, in Florida, the roads are made from coral rock which is very rough and coarse, so the tires make a lot of noise and wear out quickly. In some places, they have ready supplies of fine river gravel, so the tires make less noise and wear longer.

The tire ratings are, at best, relative. Within one manufacture, there may be some actual meaning. But we have to realize that different manufacturers each do their best to get high ratings. So they all "cheat" on those tests. They each build their own test tracks, their own test equipment, and have their own engineers run the tests... so there is lots of opportunity for cheating. It's just that some will cheat more than others.

It would be helpful if someone like Consumer Reports would include noise and rolling resistance numbers in their test results. A sample from each manufacturer could be tested for tread wear, but of course that is a long duration test that is expensive to do. They might also do a survey of readers, to get a lot of sample data quickly.

Until then, I suspect, the ratings at Tire Rack are probably the the best that are available.