I was going to fir some Michelin Diamaris....
 

My E70 has the 20" Y spokes and I've had enough of the poor ride quality that the RFT's give me. Seemed like the Diamaris have decent reviews from people so I rang up a tyre centre to get a price...only to be told they are not suitable for the E70. Now I've never heard of Load Indexes but apparently the Diamaris in the correct size for the Y spokes only has a load index of 106 but the correct specification is 110. Never seen anyone say anything about this before, do people ignore this or are the people I spoke to being overly cautious ?

End of the day these load indexes must be there for a reason.

I've found a couple of other tyres that do come in the right spec

Vredestein Ultrac Sessanta
Yokohama V802

Does anyone know anything about either of these? I've never even heard of Vredstein!

Thanks
http://www.blackcircles.com/public/w...eral/empty.gif

Vredestein Ultrac Sessanta :thumbup:

Load Index is basically the value given for a tire's ability to carry weight/load...
By going with a 106 load index vs. the oe 110, you are "giving up" the capability
of almost a thousand lbs of theoretical load carrying capacity.

Unless it was "just me" driving around solo all the time, with an empty car, I
would not go to a lower LI.

I realize the tire choice is limited with RFTs or, for non-RFTs in replacement.
Others here may have experience with the Vreds or the Yokos.

A quick GOOG search turns up pages of good tire info/ratings interpretation...
GL,mD

I agree with you, I am just very surprised that people have the Michelin's fitted. You would think that there must be some obligation on the part of the vendor or the fitter to make sure the tyres comply with manufacturers specifications.

I was told of the dangers of the 106 as well by Toyo themselves. They said to always make sure to keep it at a higher psi... never let it go low.

Toyo Proxes S/T II Tires - Tire Size & Price Details - 1010tires.com

note the XL next to some of the sizes. extra load.


the OEM Bridgestone RFT 19s on my truck had the XL rating on the sidewall.

i just put a set of these all-seasons on my X and i like them very much.

BTW RH, over-inflating a tire to account for extra weight is a really bad idea IMO.

Well all they meant was to ensure it never goes under recommended, ever. I think her words were "be really careful about it".

It looks like the manual recommends (for 2 rows & sport pkg) 32psi for the staggered 20s at anything under 100mph, but that's with 106 fronts and 110 rears. If you are running on 106 rears, what psi are you guys at? I have had it at 35psi, which should still be comfortably under the tire's max. I'll drop it if you guys are running lower but I really want to stay away from that minimum since they stated that to me. I do want to get to the bottom of this.

Those with the new Proxes ST II should also be running on the 315 rears with load index of 106 only.

Not sure about over inflating/making sure tyre pressure is at maximum. According to this website http://www.blackcircles.com/general/sidewall it's about 100 kg in load carrying capacity so about 220 lbs. More interesting that they say your insurance can be void if incorrect tyres are fitted.

if you're not towing or hauling heavy loads regularly the greatest problem i see will be your tire wear.

probably what Toyo was getting at with their explanation. under-inflation could accelerate potential sidewall degeneration.

I would be more worried about the insurance becoming void. That's a serious problem in my mind...not just the fiscal implications but the legal ones.