2003 Camry Tires Question

I have been quite pleased with the Toyo UltraTouring tires on my wife's

95 Camry LE.

I do have Continentals on my 99 Camry LE, and I'm generally not too happy with them. When they are worn out, I think I will put the same type of Toyo's on that car too.

I buy Michelins from Costco. It's reasonably priced and if I need to fix a flat any Costco in the US would do. Plus they give you free balance and rotation and nitrogen fill. If you use T-speed rated tires check out their Hydroedge. But H rated selections are more limited.

Friends have good results with Toyo. Probably won't go with Bridgestone/Firestone or other lesser brands. Some can easily go out of round or pull to the side as they wear.

So Toyota still hasn't stopped using OEM tires that try to kill you when the road gets wet??? They were doing that back in '95. We had good luck with Goodyear tires...until they outsourced production to Turkey and elsewhere, and the tire sealing surfaces started to crumble. Now we use Hankook Mileage Plus (IIRC) tires, and get a good combination of grip, wear, and reasonable cost.

I have new Michelins on my 2002 LE and after a trip to the far north in December 2006 on snow and ice covered roads for about 200 miles (400K), I had no problems with traction or handling .,the trip was about 1800 miles toatl ,from Hamilton Ontario

On one occasion I had the right wheels on ice and snow and the left wheels on dry pavement .And I had to make a sudden stop

The ABS worked perfectly in this situation.

I have made several sudden stops here in southern ontario on rain days and the ABS is 100%.

Ed

If as you say your vehicle is ABS equipped and it is locking the car up and letting it slide , causing accidents , DRIVE IT STRAIGHT TO THE DEALER and have a code scan done. ABS is just that,........ ABS and if it causes lock up it quite obviously is faulty. There are a couple of common faults with this that toyota are well aware of. best wishes, dave

I had conties on my 2001 LE and now on my 2005 LE. These are some of the poorest quality tires I have ever experienced. They wear out very quickly and I drive very conservatively. They leave black tracks on my white concrete driveway where I turn on the apron. My wifes Honda's Gooyear tires don't leave a mark. They hydroplane after 20k miles in heavy rain storms. They are terrible in the snow. Very dangerous tires.

Shame on Toyota for using such garbage tires. I believe it is part of Toyota trying to cheapen the product for a buck in their pocket. I wish I had my

2001 (and a new set of different tires) after owning this sqeaky, clunky, rattle trap 2005. I hope the 2006 + Camrys are better quality than the 2002-2006, but I think Toyota is headed downward and doubt it.

Get rid of the tires before they kill you.

Reb

The trouble with driving in snow/icy conditions is that the tire's tread gets packed with snow rendering it a racing-slick. I would go for tires which have a softer more pliable tread which will squirm or flex as the vehicle's weight is applied. This "unlocks" the trapped snow allowing it to exit from the tread.

Many tires come with "S + M" or snow and mud ratings, but I wonder what standard they are complying with.

Jason

Contis are very soft tires. I'm not sure that's the answer for better snow tires. Toyota uses them to get the nice ride but they are so soft they wear out quickly, and are very poor in rain & snow. Tires are like the Triangle. You can do one thing really well, two OK, but not 3 . Ride, Handling Safety, and Wear seem to be the 3. Contis suck at Safety/Handling and Wear, and have a nice ride. That's what sells the car initially. Thats the Toyota way now.

Reb 05 Camry(getting Cheesier)

Agree about the triangle analogy,..its difficult to achieve everything, especially if you're driving on mixed surfaces.

Jason

True, but if you get tires that are safe and grip well, you can usually get a decent ride from them (with some loss of grip, or at least precision) by running them at the low end of the inflation scale. Tires that just ride well should be reserved for tire swings.

I have Hankook K106's on my Supra and so far they are a very good tire. Decent ride, decent traction, and since I have the removable roof, I was concerned about noise, and they are QUIET! I only drive the car in the summer, and then mostly on sunny days (one bad thing about the roof...it LEAKS!) but the few times it has been in the rain they have worked quite well. They're supposed to be All-Season tires, but I'll never find out how they are in the snow in that car!

All season Michellin Energy standard on the 07 camry works well in snow, I tried swerving the car (25 mph) on snow covered road and braking (no VSC) and I'm still in control. But not with 6 inch snowfall starting off from overnight parking, but I get that too even on wet road where the tires spin coming from a dead start. I only have problems on moving from stop but once it gets moving I never had problems since.

The ones we use are good in snow. Not as good as snow tires, but not dangerous.

== Try tirerack.com for Yokohama AVID TRZ. The idea is that by using computerized tread design and advanced rubber compounds they can blend the favorable characteristics of "winter" and "summer" tires while still achieving quiet smooth ride and long tread life. For deep snow you need dedicated snow tires, for light snow others have said they actually work well. They are "asymmetric" in tread pattern - install with the labeled side facing out. TRZ is "three ride zones." AVID is advanced, integrated, vehicle, design - and the Camry is one of the cars for which they are designed. Yokohama web site has more information. Generally, Yokohama is well regarded as a quality brand, yet quite reasonably priced.

Fair enough. I find the Camry is a little hard on their front tyres, they need 30psi minimum. The rears last for ever. I only got 30,000ks outa Dunlop Gran Prixs (an Ozzy brand I think) on the front.

Jason

That is why you have to rotate your tires every so often, tires dont last forever, after use for so many years the material deteriorates, I know that somebody in this group said no more than 5 years.

Yeah, true, rotation is an option if you start with 4 good tyres, but I bought the car 2nd-hand where the fronts were worn significantly more compared to the backs. Then you have a situation where the fronts having been swapped to the rear, are not in good enough condition to go back on the front, but will continue to give many more 1000;s of Ks on the back. In Australia, the minimumtread depth is around 1/8th", now even if the rears have 3/16" they are too worn to go on the front of a FWD drive IMO, and if you do, they wont last long. Rear-wheel drive is more balanced front to rear wear-wise.

Jason

Jason

I am also a satisfied Hancook tires user.

If that's the case, when you get a chance, get yourself a set of two new tires to replace the worn ones. Safer, too.

I did something similar. But in my case, I had a nail in one of my worn ones. So I replaced the two worn tires. (I was on a budget; just finished school, flat broke.) A couple of years later I replaced the other two.

Best wishes,

Michael