jz78817

I've 33,000 miles on the stock tires on my car (18" wheels.) tires aren't down to the wear bars (I'd say they're under 1/8" above the wear indicators, will double check.) it's been raining lightly but steadily all day, and tonight while driving home on the freeway I went through a patch of water on the road and the front end of my car decided it wanted to go off to the right, then to the left. I looked up reviews of these tires on Tire Rack and they're fairly highly rated for hydroplaning resistance, but I'm guessing those ratings are for mostly new tires. anyone had a similar experience with the Neros after having them on the car for a while?

JimC

I had that same experience with the P zeros after that many miles. They also were quite noisy. I moved to the Nitto Motivo, good wear, good grip, and less road noise.

tbear853

ANY tire will hydroplane when you drive it through water at a rate that exceeds it's ability to displace the water between the road surface and the tread contact patch. Water is not very compressable and even large ships can "hydroplane" ..... they are called "hydrofoils".

What will affect the point that it occurs with a tire on a highway are things like remaining tread depth, tread design, vehicle weight, vehicle speed, depth of water, pavement surface (smooth vs rougher).

jz78817

thanks. car's never acted like this before (and I've driven it through some downpours.) just looking for a sanity check. and yeah, these things have become noisy as hell. I usually don't want to toss out tires which still have usable tread, but after this... I think these things have to go.

I know all of that. I'm an engineer, I don't need a physics lecture. I was asking about these specific tires.

and no, watercraft which hydroplane are called (wait for it...) Hydroplanes.

1985GTto2013GTCSV

I bought my car with 24,000 on the Zeros. One was so noisy I took it to the dealer thinking I had a wheel bearing or something else going out. It's very easy to find fairly cheap near new take-off tires or even entire wheel/tire sets for a Mustang. Yes, they7 technically have tread left but I'd replace them. They will only get more noisy and at 33,000 miles you've already taken them further than most would.

Norm Peterson

The wear bars are at 2/32" but wet performance starts to degrade at least 2/32 before that (or by the time your tires hit about 1/8" total tread depth).


If it makes you feel any better at all, the KDWS tires that Ford used for their 18" tire option in 2008 were worse overall in the wet even when new with over 9/32" tread.


Norm

Art161

I think those tires have had it based on wear, but I wonder whether it was pure hydroplaning that caused the issue.

A patch of water on the freeway gets me to thinking that there was a pothole or some other rough surface that caused the patch of water to form in the first place. The tires might have been following some irregularity in the road. You couldn't see it because it was covered with water.

tbear853

I'm sorry jz78817, I didn't know. I guess it was the part where you said you looked up hydroplaning reviews for worn out tires that threw me off the track. My point was simply that "any" tire will do it under the circumstances you laid out.

Dad (an engineer himself) used to say "you can always tell an engineer, you just can't tell him much".

jz78817

I think I can see why this is happening. In the attached pic (of a new-ish P Zero Nero) the tread blocks have these "bridges" between them (circled.) Mine are worn down to these bridges which means water has no outlet through the sides of the tires anymore. These things are pretty much done for.

Any tire recommendations? I don't drive this car on snow so summer tires are OK, though I'd prefer something lower noise and with a decent treadwear rating.

nah, I know that stretch of road pretty well and the pavement is in good shape (especially for Michigan.) It was under an overpass so just a low point in the road. It also was far too violent of a movement to be simple tramlining.

Derf00

Define 'decent' tread wear rating? Over or under 400? Summer tires are 400 and under and because of that don't last nearly as long as higher tread rated tires like All Seasons. Dry Grip or high tread wear rating, they are mutually exclusive.

I use these on my rear and will be replacing my fronts with them this weekend. Not the tread wear of only 300. Grip really well here in AZ, do ok in rain and probably won't last more than 20-25K miles. if that
http://www.nittotire.com/passenger-t...formance-tire/