Tires
 

Why are tires so expensive? Does anyone have any recommendations for the least expensive tire shops? I need 2 sets of 245/75-16's for the truck and the suburban. The cheapest I have found are at Tire Kingdom for some Cooper knock off's for $540 installed with an alignment. I am just not a big Cooper fan. My last set wore very quickly and they didn't ride to good either. Walmart sells some Goodyear Tracker tires for $110 each which will come out close to what Tire Kingdom quoted, but they don't have very good reviews. Let me know where the deals are. Thanks in advance!

Here's where I buy all my tires from, usually cheaper than anywhere else once you figure in shipping costs.http://www.discounttiredirect.com/di...45&ar=75&rd=16

Well I ended up getting talked into a set of GeoTrac tires which are made by Nankang. They are a 10 Ply "E" rated tire and the guy at tire kingdom swears he has gotten a great response out of them. They are guaranteed so I decided to try them. I ended up paying $530 mounted balanced and alignment (which was $60 of the bill). Not bad for a 10 ply I don't think. I can say that they ride A LOT better then the Firestone Steel Tex tires that I had on there previously. The truck rides almost as good as a 1/2 ton now. I will let you guys know how they work out.

OK just a follow up on these tires...so far I hate them, but it could be an inflation issue. We went to the lake yesterday towing the boat and the ride there and back was a white knuckled one. The truck wandered all over the place and was very unstable. It also bounced a lot. When I got the truck home from Tire Kingdom they had 35 PSI all the way around and the truck rode awesome. I knew towing that it would need more air so I put 70 PSI in the rear and 40 PSI in the front. That was how we towed yesterday and like I said it sucked big time! So I am going to inflate them a little more to see if that helps. They are rated up to 80 PSI so I am thinking about running that in the back and 45 in the front which is what the door sticker calls for. When we got to the ramp yesterday I rocked the truck back and forth and there is a lot of flex in the sidewall. Hopefully a little more air will stiffen them up.
I also felt like the truck was struggling a little. It used to snatch that boat around with ease and yesterday it had to kick down a lot more than usual. I am hoping this is related to the tires. I am going to take the truck back so they can double check the alignment also.

I did a little more experimenting with the air pressure and it definitely made a huge improvement. I now have the fronts at 60 PSI and the rears at 80 PSI and the truck feels fine. The truck still feels a little sluggish though. I wonder if I got some bad gas or something. It feels like the load got a lot heavier and it didn't.

Why don't you usa silica based tires? yes they are little costly than abasto based tires but they last long really long.