Aquaplaning

[Eoin2]

Originally Posted by artiedtke

+1 here, have had the Kumho Ecsta's, very good tyre even if considered 'budget'.

I find good tyres pay you back. More grip wet and dry, lower noise and last longer.

I used the Kuhmo Ecsta KU31 on my Lotus Elise and that was a rare example of an excellent tyre at a cheap price. They were particularly good in the wet, gave up some dry grip and feel to the bespoke expensive Yokohama tyres but not much.

Generic budgets are normally much worse on aqua planing and wet grip. I find they normally wear ao quickly that the cheaper price benefit is lost. Personally I like Michelin tyres but they are probably the most expensive.

[960kg]

Originally Posted by Paul240480

I'm running on Khumo Ecsta on the front right now (850 N/A 170hp) . Not had any issues.
Ran for 25k on Roadstone 'all-weather' before they were £99 fitted and balanced so quite budget, again no issues & I very nearly went for them again - it was availability here (on-line) so went 'up' to the Khumos at £70 each.
The back end has Events, loads of 'bad reports' on these I found after they were fitted. They must be on 35k or so now & 3-4 years old. Just starting to crack in the walls, but loads of tread still. They have a higher speed rating than the Khumos + they are 'heavy duty' for extra loads, like when the caravan is hitched.

Originally Posted by artiedtke

+1 here, have had the Kumho Ecsta's, very good tyre even if considered 'budget'.

Originally Posted by Eoin2

I find good tyres pay you back. More grip wet and dry, lower noise and last longer.

I used the Kuhmo Ecsta KU31 on my Lotus Elise and that was a rare example of an excellent tyre at a cheap price. They were particularly good in the wet, gave up some dry grip and feel to the bespoke expensive Yokohama tyres but not much.

Generic budgets are normally much worse on aqua planing and wet grip. I find they normally wear ao quickly that the cheaper price benefit is lost. Personally I like Michelin tyres but they are probably the most expensive.

+2 Me too, i have the Kuhmo Ecsta LE Sport all round on my `97 T5 V70
and use all it`s power + regularly with no probs.

[big_yin]

On my Volvo S40 i had GT Radial Champiro BAX fitted which where very good and lasted me a very long time.
The V70 AWD is in need of 4 new tyres soon and i am thinking about fitting these .

[S70 B5254T]

For what it's worth, I drive several different cars as part of my work, all of which are much newer than my 854, and I have always found my car to be very surefooted in the wet, and no worse than other cars over standing water. Furthermore, my car runs a set of P6000 with plenty of tread depth. My car is normally used unladen (apart from filling the fuel tank!) and it's obviously a saloon, so will have slightly less weight over the rear axle than your 855 and V70 models.
I have found the previous two versions of the Vauxhall Astra estates to feel particularly light at the front end.

I would imagine that the front-to-rear weight distribution of FWD cars is more biased towards the front end than RWD cars, which tend to have more of an even weight distribution; taking that into account, the majority of FWD cars should feel more stable over standing water than the majority of RWD cars.

My own opinion is that there are several variables affecting car control over standing water - correct tyre pressures, good tread depth, tread pattern etc, but few of them will have as a great an effect as a driver's behaviour and reactions when encountering standing water across part, or the entire width of a roadsurface.