****** - Verified Buyer
4.5
I ordered the third set of tires for the different vehicles and every time I am impressed! Quite ride, improved stopping distances especially in the wet conditions. Run flat make me feel safe for myself and the family as I could ride to the nearest tire shop without stopping and changing to the spare tire.*Bought this to replace 1 of 4 set after more than 50k miles.*Hope this one holds up same value.* My old one had a slow leak after a nail damaged fixing.* Will Buy again for remain 3 as need.tire little hard , but peace of mindGood tires slow shipping great deal.Run-Flat Tires (RFT), means when a puncture accures. The tire will still work just to run your ass to the nearest tire repair shop. Does not mean it's indestructible.This tire is great btw...Going in, it's pretty difficult to objectively review a tire without (1) having much of a baseline of other tires to compare it to, and (2) really running these at some sort of max performance threshold, be it cornering break-away, wet weather performance, or snow traction... you get the picture.I've been a Michelin guy for a long time, mainly because of what Costco stocks -- various Pilot and MXM4 series tires -- but I broke away from Costco and stuck some Pirelli Scorpion tires on my Flex, and some Bridgestone Portenzas on my Legacy wagon. Wouldn't you know it, my new-to-me Acura wagon came with factory Michelins installed! So anyway, now you know where I'm coming from....and so my TSX doesn't come with a spare. I could blow upwards of a grand to correct that, but reading up, I see that many cars are eschewing the donut in the trunk because of space, weight, or manicure concerns. Unlike my vehicle, theirs come with run-flat tires. Poorly reviewed ones, I might add.So here's this DriveGuard tire, and the pro reviews -- well, they're unbelievably awesome, across the board. So great, in fact, that I give the tire a second and third look, and buy it.Now the biggest criticism I've come across is that they're a tiny bit noisy. Not road noise noisy, but a humming or buzzing that one reviewer attributed to the "cooling fins" on the sidewalls. So I've been listening for that. And maybe -- maybe -- I hear something akin to a computer fan blowing from the area of my passenger window, when it's rolled up, and I'm cruising at freeway speeds. But maybe I'm just imagining that? And if I'm not, it's certainly no louder than the air blowing out of my vents. With windows down? Forget about it -- all the other road noise takes over. So no, they're not any louder than any of my other tires.My secondary concern was ride harshness. Not only did I switch to less sidewall material (I moved from the stock 17-inch wheel to an 18-inch, so I lost about 1/2 inch of sidewall), but the TSX suspension is already runs a bit towards the stiff side, and the reinforced sidewalls of these tires are potentially less complaint versus a "normal" tire. As it turns out, this concern was unfounded. There has been no detectable change in ride comfort compared to the Michelin tires these replaced.Handling should have improved (I upped my tread from stock 225 to 235, to better match my new wheels), but "max performance" for me is taking the curve on the freeway interchange ramp at 75, or goosing the gas a little on a city street corner. What can I say? These track straight with no hint of wandering, they're perfectly well mannered pulling the car through turns, and they don't break away under anything I'd consider a normal condition.The one place I won't be driving them is the snow (none of that in these here parts).I haven't been faced with testing DriveGuard in an aired-down condition, thankfully. The stiff sidewall is supposed to offer just enough support to prevent the airless tire from folding over and riding on itself. It's supposed to take me 50 miles at speeds up to 50 miles per hour. The pro reviewers who were put in cars in this condition were satisfied with the technology -- meaning the tire didn't munch itself and roll off the rim. That's fine and good, but I'll be satisfied if it gets me off the highway to a safe place to pull over. They're not claiming the DriveGuard offers any extra special tread protection, so I'll expect to get a normal flat from time to time, just like any other tire. And I would expect the tire to be repairable just like a normal tire, as long as I don't log too many miles on the compressed sidewall.When Dryer's / Edy's introduced their reduced fat "slow churned ice cream" a number of years ago, a company spokesman suggested that the product was so good, it might replace all of their full fat offerings. (It didn't.) However, I'm impressed enough with DriveGuard that, given a few years, I wouldn't be surprised to see this technology introduced across their product line. Assuming, of course, that it performs as advertised when the tire blows out -- and you can bet I'll update my review when that time comes. For the rest of the time, I'm pleased -- it's indistinguishable from any "normal" tire.Yes they will run flat, but you will be reinflating them every 10 days to two weeks as they leak like crazy. The ride is stiff, noisy, and uncomfortable. You will feel every imperfection in the road surface. I replaced them halfway through their useful lives with standard tires and I’m happy I did. The convenience and peace-of-mind aren’t worth the hassles.It's fine except for the fuel economy. My mpg dropped about 4 mpg from the original Michilin tires. Very disappointing!
