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I need to replace the OEM tires on my 2006 Prius. I have read numerous posts about replacement tires on this and other web sites, but still can't determine which is the best tire for FE for the Prius. Is there a 185/65/15 LRR replacement tire for the Prius? If not, what other sizes can be used without effecting the speedometer?

Hey miket,

I'm in close to the same position - got 51K on the Integrities. I think I've settled on either the General Altimax HT or the Sumitomo H4 for two reasons: 1) sidewall rating of 51psi and 2) they are both relatively lightweight (~18lbs). With the higher sidewall rating, I hope to get better efficiency and the lighter weight should help by reducing the spinning weight. The other tire I've looked at is the Michelin X club tire available at Costco - mentioned in several other threads as a good LRR tire. Hope to get others with direct experience to weigh in here.

Meanwhile, I've got my OEM's up to 62/60 - getting great results so far!

Cheers, Will

I also wanted the Michelin X tire when choosing replacements for my Mom's Prius with the stock Integrities at about 55k going into winter. Unfortunately, we don't have access to a Costco, and went with the next best rated tire from Michelin, the Harmony. It has much better wet traction, snow traction, dry handling, road noise, treadlife (supposedly), and pretty much everything else better than the stock Integrities. We noticed no drop off in mileage, and that was going from well worn (55k mile) rubber, to brand new tires with full tread.

It makes sense to choose a tire with lower weight to reduce the rotational weight, but I don't see the value in choosing a higher sidewall psi, when you're going to exceed it anyway. The new Michelin's have a sidewall pressure of 44 psi, as did the Integrities. We inflated both sets to 60 in summer and 50 in snowy winter with great results. Does the MAX Sidewall value say anything about the tire? I've noticed that cheaper tires tend to have lower numbers. My old Plymouth Reliant had a set of the cheapest tires available at Wal-Mart and they were rated at 35 max sidewall. All of the other tires sitting on our driveway currently say 44 psi, and all but 4 (out of 22 tires-5 cars and one trailer) are inflated at or above that number.

Sam's Club also carries the "X". I've ordered tires online before and had them shipped to and installed in the store.

Per Wayne Brown's Prius Energy Use Simulator Software, the OEM Integrity has a rollling resistance of 0.0077 at 38 psi and 0.0064 at 44 psi. By comparison, the Michelin Hydroedge measures 0.0089 and 0.0070 at the same pressures. You would be hard pressed to beat the OEM tire. I learned this the hard way when I installed Conti Premiercontact tires which got the best rating for LRR by consumer reports. Even after 3000 miles, I still had a 4 MPG loss compared with the OEM. I sold the Conti's and replaced with new OEM's and got the 4 MPG back.

so nothing beats oem eh? not even the michellins (i heard michellins is the king of LRR tires) MX4 energy series (camry hybrid stock tire i believe), my gut goes with having the integrity is an outdated LRR design when new ones are around the block (like the new tires on the ford escape hybrid 2009!) but cannot buy in stores yet :S

Hi Dan:

___Nice to hear from you again as it has been a long time.

___About the Integrity’’s. They are not the best traction based tire by a long shot but they are inexpensive and if you really need to change them for winter snow and ice, you can pick up some Blizzak’s for the 2.5 to 3.5 months when you need those. Place the Integrity’s back on once spring arrives and you will receive decent FE during the warmer months :)

___Good Luck

___Wayne

Thanks for the info. I just ordered (4) Integrity P185/65SR-15 for my Yaris HB. I will let you know a few months from now if I see any difference in mpg. My old tires RE92's were 872 revs per mile, and the new will be 855 revs per mile, a 2% difference, that I will have to adjust for.

Hi Dan:

___Nice to hear from you again as it has been a long time.

___About the Integrity’’s. They are not the best traction based tire by a long shot but they are inexpensive and if you really need to change them for winter snow and ice, you can pick up some Blizzak’s for the 2.5 to 3.5 months when you need those. Place the Integrity’s back on once spring arrives and you will receive decent FE during the warmer months :)

___Good Luck

___Wayne

Hi Wayne!
One can find fairly newish (less than 1000 miles)OEM tires at Prius Chat in the for sale forum. They normally go for $15-25 each. When you get them new, there is no way to guarantee that you are getting Prius OEM, so I would stick with ones that I know were removed from a Prius. I have been told that there is a difference. If you need to have snow tires, I would recommend getting a set of Corolla steelies.

Per Wayne Brown's Prius Energy Use Simulator Software, the OEM Integrity has a rollling resistance of 0.0077 at 38 psi and 0.0064 at 44 psi. By comparison, the Michelin Hydroedge measures 0.0089 and 0.0070 at the same pressures. You would be hard pressed to beat the OEM tire. I learned this the hard way when I installed Conti Premiercontact tires which got the best rating for LRR by consumer reports. Even after 3000 miles, I still had a 4 MPG loss compared with the OEM. I sold the Conti's and replaced with new OEM's and got the 4 MPG back.

I was considering the ContiPremierContacts, but have decided against them. However, I am still considering the ContiProContacts as they have gotten good reviews on some other sites.

Miket

I did get the ContiproContacts and now have a couple of thousand miles on them. I haven't noticed any drop in mpg. In fact, my mpg has gone up because I now practice some of the techniques I learned on this site. I will just have to see how long they last. I only got 39K on the OEM Integrity tires, so I definitely wanted to try something different.

Hi All,

New to this site, I am finding it quite informative.

I too am looking for tires for my 08 Prius Touring, I lie in Arizona and commute around 80 miles a day. I was able to get around 35K out of my originals from factory, I made the mistake of going with a set of Barum's from Discount Tire, lost mpg and gained a lot of road noise. never again....

I have ready on these post's that alot of you are pushing your tire pressure higher for better performance, and negative results by doing that?

Any suggestions on a good tire would be very helpful..

Thanks,
David

Hi Zman:

Sorry we missed your question until now :(

The following article is a good place to start: When round and black becomes lean and green (http://www.cleanmpg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=24904)

Good Luck

Wayne

hi everyone. I am running on treads with these goodyears. My car has over 56000 miles. I will have had this car for three years in May, but my tires are 'may pops'. What is the best tire to get. I drive over 50 per day in southern Arizona. :confused:

How about the Goodyear Assurance Fuel Max.. You can press them to 51 max cold setting. LRR as well. Should do better than the OME Integrities? Fuel Max work well on my HCH2! H

I have Michelin MXV+4 Energy's on my Volvo, that is used exclusively on the highway.
It is an older tire design and Michelin has better updated FE versions available today.
They wear very well and are quiet. Not cheap but you need to watch the alignment and keep the air pressure three to four pounds higher than door sticker or they will wear.

When it's time to replace the Factory Yoko's on my Prius I'm going with a set of Michelin Energy Saver A/S's.

I have Michelin MXV+4 Energy's on my Volvo, that is used exclusively on the highway.
It is an older tire design and Michelin has better updated FE versions available today.
They wear very well and are quiet. Not cheap but you need to watch the alignment and keep the air pressure three to four pounds higher than door sticker or they will wear.

When it's time to replace the Factory Yoko's on my Prius I'm going with a set of Michelin Energy Saver A/S's.

That is probably what I will switch to also. The Yoko's are wearing well, but they are noisy. They have almost 40k on them and will probably last to 55 or 60k. I put a set of the MXV+4 on our HCHII before we traded it, and they were very quiet compared to the oem's. I got them from Tire Rack on sale for about $80.

After getting about 85,000 on my factory Integrity's, I went with the Goodyear Viva Authority Fuel Max from Wal-mart, so far so good. I am at 110,000 on my Prius, and they are doing great.. I see a lot of bad posts on the Integrity's, but I loved mine.. Get those PSI up, rotate ever 5000, and tires will last much longer..:D


Here is link, they have raised the price on these :mad: I got them for $89 each

http://www.walmart.com/ip/Viva-Authority-FM/11983134

You will love your Fuel Max's even more. They do very well on snow and ice as well. I am very pleased with these tires. Next time I will go the Viva route as they are a better price! H

Hi All:

I have to give a lot of credit to GoodYear for stepping up with the FuelMax lineup. From the Cruze ECO and Volt to end user reports like yours, GoodYear has really provided a great tire in the FuelMax.

Thanks for the reports and I tweeted to one of GoodYear's new PR personnel just a week ago that I wanted to "test" a set by comparison to my aging Michelin MXV4 +'s on the Accord... aging meaning over 120k miles now ;)

While the front’s are finally due for replacement, I wanted to do a quick study at placard, max sidewall and or pressures running a gambit of tests from the skidpad and coast down to weight at GoodYear’s own test facility sometime. Ride and handling would be a tough comparison because new tires always ride better than those that have seen better days…

Wayne

This thread was just what I was looking for. My 2004 Prius tires need to be replaced. I probably have about 45k miles on the OEM's but they're bald.. I was thinking of picking up a set of tires at Costco. I went there and they have Michelin X-Radials, but the FuelMax's are the way to go for coasting/reliability? Where do people usually buy their tires at? I've never purchased them online before, only locally.

I pretty much buy my tires locally at my Firestone dealer, as they have always treated me right and given me good deals on tires since I send my friends there for tires, service, etc. The FuelMax tires are highly praised here, and a few of the other sleepers are probably the Kumho eco Solus KR22 and ecowing, and the Bridgestone Ecopias. The Michelin Energy Savers are also available, but tend to be the highest priced, maybe too high imo.

I pretty much buy my tires locally at my Firestone dealer, as they have always treated me right and given me good deals on tires since I send my friends there for tires, service, etc. The FuelMax tires are highly praised here, and a few of the other sleepers are probably the Kumho eco Solus KR22 and ecowing, and the Bridgestone Ecopias. The Michelin Energy Savers are also available, but tend to be the highest priced, maybe too high imo.

I'd go with "too high" on the Energy Savers. I like them, but the Prius seems to be eating them faster than the wear rating warrants. Out of the 40k or so miles on the first two put on, I'm afraid that they won't last past 60-70k miles. And that's with "high" PSI in them from the life tire on the car. My next set will likely be the FuelMax tires.

It's looking unlikely the FuelMax tires will last to their 65,000 rating either. They've been on the van for 26,000 and I estimate they're about halfway done. We do have a lot of "tar and chip" roads here which are basically rough sandpaper. I've never had a tire on any vehicle last as long as the warranty. This includes pre-hypermiling when I had them at placard pressure. I will say that sidewall (+) pressure still helps by reducing shoulder wear.

Ya, I'm with you on shoulder wear. The Elantra was bad for that, but it just never seemed to hold an alignment from day 1. The Energy Savers are wearing straight across evenly, they just seem to be wearing far too quickly. I put General Grabber HTS's on the Sedona, and they seem to be wearing better than expected. They're listed as LRR tires at tirerack, and were a fair price at the time. And I'm hoping that they at the very least outlast the last set of tires on the Sedona (under 50k miles... blah).

I'm afraid that they won't last past 60-70k miles.

That's not bad though. Over 100,000kms?

I'm afraid that they [Energy Savers] won't last past 60-70k miles ... My next set will likely be the FuelMax tires.Not sure you'd be better off with the Goodyears. Consumer Reports rated the Energy Savers (and the ContiProContact EcoPlus, the other tire I may consider when the time comes) "Good" for treadwear. They rated the Fuel Max only "Fair".

Well, let's hope that something better crops up in the meantime then ;).

I've been looking at online reviews of LRR tires (at 1010tires, tirerack and other sites) quite a bit lately, and of the three tires I mentioned I would probably get the ContiProContact EcoPlus over either the FuelMax or the Energy Saver if I had to buy today. The Conti is even less expensive than the Goodyear, with performance almost as good as the Michelin. It is also rated better by CR on snow (Good vs. Fair) and ice (Very Good vs. Good) vs. both the Energy Saver and this other one:

For my climate I might actually go with the Michelin HydroEdge. TireRack's testing had them awfully close to the FuelMax in rolling resistance (51.1mpg vs 51.6), with better wet grip and rated Excellent for tread life by CR. The HydroEdge is also the top ranked passenger all season tire on both Tire Rack's user surveys and CR's ratings. With its purported treadlife it might actually return the most tread miles per dollar among higher-performance LRR tires.

And in a few months we can talk about LRR winter tires, because I WILL be buying a set of those. :D

I have had both Hydro Edge and Fuel Max. I give the Fuel Max a big edge in all my driving conditions. Much better on Ice and snow. They are very quiet and great handling on all road conditions that I drive. Can be pumped to 51 lbs. max cold setting. They roll like crazy! I was never a GY tire person , but these tires won me over. Only my view of these two brands.
Cheers;
H

So I went last night and bought a set of the Ecopia 422 at Costco. They were $430 mounted and balanced, with recycling of my old ones. It was that or the X-radials there. Do people know how much they can be inflated to? Also Costco puts nitrogen in their tires and I was just going to fill it with air. That shouldn't be a problem, right?

It tells you on the side of the tire. I believe 44lbs. H

It tells you on the side of the tire. I believe 44lbs. H

I didn't realize that it was on the side of the :P Thanks. And yes, it's 44lbs.

Does not matter adding regular air to nitrogen. We got our previous Civic's tires replaced there: took off the black valve caps before going in (just don't like the look of green). After sale drove down the street to chevron, pressure up to 40, swapped the green caps for black.

Harold,

Just so you know: Every vehicle sold in the US has a vehicle tire placard that lists the original tire size and a pressure for that size. That pressure is the vehicle manufacturers specification.

The sidewall of the tire commonly lists the MAXIMUM pressure - it is not a recommendation.

Whether you chose to follow the vehiclle manufacturer's specification or the maximum pressure on the sidewall of the tire is up to you. Jjust be aware that there has been a long and acrimonious debate on this issue and there are a lot of things that are unknown - which is why there is a debate.

Going significantly higher than the car maker's recommendation, say near the max tire pressure on sidewall from tire maker, and you will experience rougher ride, feel every bump.

Besides the discomfort, I do think this makes the car's suspension work harder: at lower pressure the tire will absorb more of the road's imperfections. Just my hunch: down the road this may accelerate deterioration of shocks and springs.

If you're unsure, try something in the middle, ie: above the car maker's placard, but not by much?

Or drive like a hypermiler so your suspension is spared the abuse dished out by the racing/braking crowd.

Max sidewall will stiffen the ride, and I drop my psi a bit if I am going on cobblestone-like roads for an extended period.

CapriRacer,
Yes I understand the difference! I tend to run closer to the tire manufactures max. cold setting though. I find my tires wear and last longer this way. And the car handles better! Rough roads make me lower the pressure at times. H

Handling is improved by higher pressure not with lower pressure. There is much less sidewall flex with higher pressure mmmmm and most people observe more even wear when above 40 psi.