Of course the speed rating makes no difference, ignore that part, but the XL rating is what I have been told is required. Or is it a case that my dealer is once again talking from his rear? By luck I have so far used XL rated tyres, so I managed to call BS on his claims I used the wrong tyres. Yet to find the spec for the tyres from the factory to prove or dis-prove the theory. The only thing I have seen is that tyre sites list it as 93Y XL.

The Barum is costing £89 form my dealer. The cheapest I have seen online is a lower rated tyre than be offered, at £69. The cheapest Yoko I have found over here is £110, and thats a summer tyre. The next best is coming in at £140, so yes there is a substantial difference in the prices here. I have always found US Tyres, come in far cheaper.
To reiterate though, I have little choice as to what tyre I use, and am being held to ransom for the last time by my dealer. He is throwing in a virtually free optiflex check. Once this has been done, if I still get an issue, when everything possible has been done to fix the car, it will all be down to Mazda then. If it miraculously gets fixed, then great, but at least the car has been proved to be as the manurfacturer set it up, and therefore all down to the fact the car has a design fault.
At this current I won't get 10K out of a set of fronts, so I will not be throwing more money at any premium tyres until the fault is fixed or the blame is moved onto those that caused it. Either way I won't be using them again, as they have proved how un-proffessional.
I would dream of 20K, and 50K would see me selling the wife and kids to acheive. I have still never known anyone to get good mileage out of Yokos though, and the tyres I used were not considered to be their sticky ones. But that was a good while back, something like 20 years with the bike.

 

I've done some checking and it seems that while there are a greater number of tire manufacturers selling tires in the UK than here in the States, the actual number of model and size offerings is actually less than what we have over on this side of the pond. Strange.

I checked with http://mytyres.co.uk and came up with the Pirelli P6 Four Seasons 205/50 R17 90H XL for £133; the thing is, they have a treadwear rating of 500, which essentially means they'll last more than twice as long as any Summer tire you can find at any price.

It seems that there are very few models of All-Season tires sold in the UK, I find that very odd. After checking further I found the following all-season tyres from Tyres - Cheap Tyres + Free Fitting at Home or Work UK Wide - etyres:

• Nexen CP641 205/50 R17 "Reinforced" (which I assume to be XL) for £92.20 (treadwear rating 400)
• General Altimax UHP 205/50 R17 93W (which is by default XL) for £107.70 (treadwear rating 440)

I've had Yokohama (all-season) tires on several cars now including the set on my wife's 4,000 pound minivan; currently they have over 50,000 miles on them and look to be good to go for at least another year. That said, when I was looking at Yokohama's UK offerings I didn't see even one All-Season model, so I guess it doesn't surprise me that you haven't gotten good mileage from UK sourced Yokos.

 

Can I ask where you are getting the treadwear ratings from? They dont seem to be listed on UK sites...

 

Tire wear ratings are a requirement in the US and are found on the sidewall of the tire, if not on a sellers website. They are based on a government study of standards to be used as a guide, so you may not have them in the UK or in other parts of the world.

I have not always found them to be particularly accurate, especially from two different tire manufacturer's based in Japan that I had personal experience with.

A reinforced rating on a tire means that the sidewalls have a little "extra" support, often an additional rubber rib to help protect the wheel in case of curbing. It may mean something else in other lands however?

And from everything I have heard or read about Barum... STAY AWAY!!! They are an awful tire. Said to be very noisy and will slide out from under you in any weather condition.

Also I know those that touted the General UHP when they first got them, only to be disappointed in them later on.

 

When I've been over in Europe I've noticed that some of the tires over there have the Tirewear rating stamped on the sidewall, and some do not. I'm assuming the ones with the rating are the ones sold in Europe as well as in the U.S. The ratings I listed above are for tires which are sold in the UK as well as here.

As for their relative meaning; as I understand it, comparing say Michelin's 500 Treadwear rating for their Pilot Sport A/S tires may or may not be a relevant measure when also looking at Yokohama's 560 Treadwear rating for their AVID ENVigor tires. That said, when comparing any two tires from any one manufacturer, the rating is supposedly spot on.

 

Just replaced my second set of tyres. The original Dunlops lasted 21000 miles and were shot on their inner edges, not down to the cord but the tread was gone. I replaced those with Bridgestone Potenza RE050A 205/50 17 Extra Load, inflated to 36psi. These have lasted 29000 miles, rotated once, and had 3mm left with still legal tread on the edges. I'm happy with that.

2.0D Sport 2008.

 

I just had the "second set" (I had the first set yanked after only 714 miles) of tires on my 2009 Mazda3 replaced today after 48,080 miles. As I've mentioned before, the set I put on a week after buying my (then) new car was a set of Michelin Pilot Sport A/S in the 205/50 R17 size. The improvement in the handling, control, predictability, and wet and snowy weather of my car was astounding; the only drawback of the Michelins was that they were no quieter than then OEM Goodyear Eagle RS-As, and they were a bit pricy (and they've gotten significantly more expensive since).

The set I had mounted this morning is the (relatively) new to market Yokohama AVID ENVigor, and even though I only have maybe fifteen miles on them, I can say they feel very similar to the Michelins in their handling and predictability, but they're way-way quieter. Not a bad thing.

Then there's the whole mileage thing; the Michelins had a treadwear rating of something like 440 and they went 48,000 miles, assuming there's any parity between Michelin's ratings and those from Yokohama, the 560 rating on the AVID ENVigors should allow me to easily exceed 50,000 miles on this set. Not a bad thing either.

 

I've decided to go for front tyres that I can flip round after 8000 miles (so the inside edge becomes the outside). Most tyres these days seem to be directional (i.e. can only roll in one direction) however. Can anyone recommend any non-directional ones?

Also would it be an MOT failure to have a directional tyre fitted the wrong way?

 

Unfortunately the non-directional tires I'd recommend I cannot recommend. Why? Because the tire (tyres) choices in the U.K. seems to be much more limited than what we have here in the States, and the best of the non-directional tires aren't available over on your side of the pond.

 

No, FAIL! I've suspected you were some kind of a low-life spammer since your first post, now you've proven me correct.