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More evidence the P Zero's suck..

PJR202

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I got some Continental EC/DW's installed last night. The tread wear on the P Zero's had been super uneven in the rear on the originals, and then again on a set of lightly used replacements which were taken off last night. As the guy was taking them off I asked his opinion on why they wore so unevenly and he said it looked like they were chronically under-inflated. I kept them at 32 cold as-prescribed and he was perplexed but said the P Zero's haven't been a good tire in a long time regardless and we chalked it up to that. His counterpart agreed.

FFWD an hour and they come into the showroom and the guy says "the tires definitely just suck. When I was unmounting them the spoon on the machine tore right through the sidewall on every one of them. That doesn't happen very often on any tire."

Soooo..there ya go. I'd like to say how awesome the new tires are but I basically drove it straight from Firestone to the local Ford dealer and dropped it off for AC work so I likely won't have it back until mid/late next week.

And unfortunately I didn't get to go do a sweet burnout on the old ones yesterday. :(
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NoVaGT

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Ford has always suggested too low inflation PSIs. Other than that, the rest of your post isn't factual.

I've had no problems with the PP Pirellis, other than tread-wear life span.
 
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PJR202

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Ford has always suggested too low inflation PSIs. Other than that, the rest of your post isn't factual.

I've had no problems with the PP Pirellis, other than tread-wear life span.
Technically your statement on the inflation isn't factual either.

I really wasn't fully in the "these stock tires suck" camp but that experience and the opinion of someone who installs tires as a profession is pretty good evidence. Plus Ford is abandoning them for 2018..so....
 

Norm Peterson

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I wouldn't pay much attention to the opinions of any "tech" who managed to tear out a tire sidewall 4 times out of 4, chalk it up to time wasted listening that I won't ever get back. Even 2 out of 2 would make me a lot skeptical.


Norm
 

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They suck for anything outside the track (road course) or 90+ ambient temps. They need to be hot to work on the street as well as (but not better than) a huge amount of its competitors. Even the UHP summers like the Indy 500 and BFG Comp 2 are better street tires, particularly on the subjective measures. The P-zeros are terrible in cool weather, pretty poor in the rain, and a bit scary in the cool and wet, in addition to the piss poor tire wear.

They were on the PP cars because they were decent for a street tire on the track, and Ford gets a crazy good deal from Pirelli.
 

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Technically your statement on the inflation isn't factual either.

I really wasn't fully in the "these stock tires suck" camp but that experience and the opinion of someone who installs tires as a profession is pretty good evidence. Plus Ford is abandoning them for 2018..so....
Yes, Ford and tire inflation PSIs has been a long-standing issue. The Ford Explorer, it's Bridgestone tires, and the ridiculously low PSI rating Ford assigned them was a huge, public debacle, that resulted in many crashes, injuries and even deaths.

Ford continues to label their cars with rather low PSI ratings to increase ride comfort, and the PP cars, with their 32 PSI labeling, is just another example of this.

Anyways, that your tire installer tore the tires removing them means nothing factually. I'm not saying you're impressions are all wrong, just that they're very subjective. Those tires could have been several years old, or just worn out well beyond their life-span. You said you got them used, so all that and more are possibilities.

Every week there's a new thread where someone bashes the OEM tires, right after they've changed to new tires. Of course the old, worn-out, used up tires are going to be viewed as terrible in comparison to the new tires just put on the car. But if you put on a new set of the OEM tires, you'd like them too. But when someone puts a different brand/make of new tires on, holly smokes!!! These tires are GREAT!!! SOOOOOOO much better than the OEMs!!!

Look, the OEM PP Pirellis are now older tire tech. Michelin's MP4S's are the new news, and there's no doubt they'll be better in many ways. If all they do is last longer than 8k miles, it would be a miracle.

The biggest problem with the OEM PP tires, is dealership sales people not explaining that they last about 8K miles, and that's it. And when they're worn out, they become almost useless. But a new set of OEMs are actually damn good tires. They grip, turn, stop, and are decently quiet.

Worn out, they're the suck. With good meat on them, they're great.
 
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PJR202

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Yes, Ford and tire inflation PSIs has been a long-standing issue. The Ford Explorer, it's Bridgestone tires, and the ridiculously low PSI rating Ford assigned them was a huge, public debacle, that resulted in many crashes, injuries and even deaths.

Ford continues to label their cars with rather low PSI ratings to increase ride comfort, and the PP cars, with their 32 PSI labeling, is just another example of this.

Anyways, that your tire installer tore the tires removing them means nothing factually. I'm not saying you're impressions are all wrong, just that they're very subjective. Those tires could have been several years old, or just worn out well beyond their life-span. You said you got them used, so all that and more are possibilities.

Every week there's a new thread where someone bashes the OEM tires, right after they've changed to new tires. Of course the old, worn-out, used up tires are going to be viewed as terrible in comparison to the new tires just put on the car. But if you put on a new set of the OEM tires, you'd like them too. But when someone puts a different brand/make of new tires on, holly smokes!!! These tires are GREAT!!! SOOOOOOO much better than the OEMs!!!

Look, the OEM PP Pirellis are now older tire tech. Michelin's MP4S's are the new news, and there's no doubt they'll be better in many ways. If all they do is last longer than 8k miles, it would be a miracle.

The biggest problem with the OEM PP tires, is dealership sales people not explaining that they last about 8K miles, and that's it. And when they're worn out, they become almost useless. But a new set of OEMs are actually damn good tires. They grip, turn, stop, and are decently quiet.

Worn out, they're the suck. With good meat on them, they're great.
I really didn't have any complaint on the road performance, but I also didn't push them real hard. I tend to not take a lot of chances on a public road, more so for the safety of others than for my own. They break loose like nothing when it's cool but I knew that ahead of time so it wasn't like it was a huge disappointment. I really felt like the uneven wear on the back was my fault, which if why I asked him about it. I was hoping to not repeat the mistake.

The front tires still weren't in too bad of shape and they had 27k miles on them. I got 18k on the first set of rears but they were SLICK by the time I put the next set on. I got the next set at about 80% life remaining and they were terribly uneven and going concave in the middle just like the first set. The inside of the tire had significantly more tread than the outside as well.

Regardless, I thought the sidewall thing was pretty significant. The guy freely admitted the device is strong so puncturing a sidewall isn't far-fetched, but he and the other guy (both of which came off as pretty intelligent) agreed the sidewall was really thin, but did also both say they wouldn't have considered it dangerous to drive on but rather is just not what they would consider quality design.

One of them said Pirelli isn't even manufacturing some of these OEM tires and they're not the same compound on the OEM models as what you would get if you specifically bought the same model tire off the shelf. I have no idea if that's accurate or not (maybe that's a widely known fact and of no surprise to some of you), but if Ford gets them super cheap it would make sense if they're outsourcing production and going cheap on the compound and utilizing other corner-cutting. A tire on a mass produced vehicle (being not specialized and not intended for solely for racing) who people regularly say they get less than 10k miles on seems ridiculous so I would suspect it's being produced very much on the cheap, although not necessarily unsafe. I also have no idea why my fronts lasted 27k miles other than most of my 1600 miles a month are a very straight stretch of interstate.
 

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Yes, Ford and tire inflation PSIs has been a long-standing issue. The Ford Explorer, it's Bridgestone tires, and the ridiculously low PSI rating Ford assigned them was a huge, public debacle, that resulted in many crashes, injuries and even deaths.

Ford continues to label their cars with rather low PSI ratings to increase ride comfort, and the PP cars, with their 32 PSI labeling, is just another example of this.

Anyways, that your tire installer tore the tires removing them means nothing factually. I'm not saying you're impressions are all wrong, just that they're very subjective. Those tires could have been several years old, or just worn out well beyond their life-span. You said you got them used, so all that and more are possibilities.

Every week there's a new thread where someone bashes the OEM tires, right after they've changed to new tires. Of course the old, worn-out, used up tires are going to be viewed as terrible in comparison to the new tires just put on the car. But if you put on a new set of the OEM tires, you'd like them too. But when someone puts a different brand/make of new tires on, holly smokes!!! These tires are GREAT!!! SOOOOOOO much better than the OEMs!!!

Look, the OEM PP Pirellis are now older tire tech. Michelin's MP4S's are the new news, and there's no doubt they'll be better in many ways. If all they do is last longer than 8k miles, it would be a miracle.

The biggest problem with the OEM PP tires, is dealership sales people not explaining that they last about 8K miles, and that's it. And when they're worn out, they become almost useless. But a new set of OEMs are actually damn good tires. They grip, turn, stop, and are decently quiet.

Worn out, they're the suck. With good meat on them, they're great.
I totally agree with you. Yes the wear sucks, but that's because of the soft compound that gives you all that grip you want on the TRACK. They were better on the track for me than the Continentals and Nittos I have used.
 

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One of them said Pirelli isn't even manufacturing some of these OEM tires and they're not the same compound on the OEM models as what you would get if you specifically bought the same model tire off the shelf. I have no idea if that's accurate or not.
It's not uncommon for the OEMs to have tires of some nominal make & model tweaked in various ways to suit their needs more precisely. Maybe not just in the compounding, either.


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NoVaGT

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In about 20 months, someone with a 2018 PP car is going to start a thread saying how much better the new Pirellis they installed are, in comparison to the OEM MP4Ss that came on the car.
 

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the reason he tore the sidewall on all 4 tires is because he's an idiot and these PP wheels are reverse mount.
 

NoVaGT

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NoVaGT

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the reason he tore the sidewall on all 4 tires is because he's an idiot and these PP wheels are reverse mount.
Hey, can you explain that better?

Does that mean the tires should be removed and installed from the back of the rim, rather than the front?

'Cause that would explain a whole hell of a lot for me. Like seeing every tire shop take 3 guys to wrestle new tires on my rims, after I've warned them not to scratch the damn things.
 

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I really didn't have any complaint on the road performance, but I also didn't push them real hard. I tend to not take a lot of chances on a public road, more so for the safety of others than for my own. They break loose like nothing when it's cool but I knew that ahead of time so it wasn't like it was a huge disappointment. I really felt like the uneven wear on the back was my fault, which if why I asked him about it. I was hoping to not repeat the mistake.

The front tires still weren't in too bad of shape and they had 27k miles on them. I got 18k on the first set of rears but they were SLICK by the time I put the next set on. I got the next set at about 80% life remaining and they were terribly uneven and going concave in the middle just like the first set. The inside of the tire had significantly more tread than the outside as well.

Regardless, I thought the sidewall thing was pretty significant. The guy freely admitted the device is strong so puncturing a sidewall isn't far-fetched, but he and the other guy (both of which came off as pretty intelligent) agreed the sidewall was really thin, but did also both say they wouldn't have considered it dangerous to drive on but rather is just not what they would consider quality design.

One of them said Pirelli isn't even manufacturing some of these OEM tires and they're not the same compound on the OEM models as what you would get if you specifically bought the same model tire off the shelf. I have no idea if that's accurate or not (maybe that's a widely known fact and of no surprise to some of you), but if Ford gets them super cheap it would make sense if they're outsourcing production and going cheap on the compound and utilizing other corner-cutting. A tire on a mass produced vehicle (being not specialized and not intended for solely for racing) who people regularly say they get less than 10k miles on seems ridiculous so I would suspect it's being produced very much on the cheap, although not necessarily unsafe. I also have no idea why my fronts lasted 27k miles other than most of my 1600 miles a month are a very straight stretch of interstate.
Those tire mounting guys who don't think the P Zero 2 ply sidewall is strong/high quality are going to love the 1 ply PS4s sidewall. :)

https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tires.jsp?tireMake=Michelin&tireModel=Pilot+Sport+4S

Specifically tuning the application of the cord filament provides Michelin engineers the ability to balance tension and strength, and a single-ply, polyester cord casing balances trade-offs between ride quality and responsive handling.
:D
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