Gen 4 Tyre Review

Toya Open Country + 215/75/15 - Tyre Review

Just back from an eventful shopping trip.
Just back from Tesco's and found myself in the role of recovery man. On my way there came cross a Ford Focus who had spun out at a corner and ended up off the road and sitting on the bank. Driver was fine. Car looked fine but he was stuck. I stopped to ask if he was ok and he optimistically asked whether I had a rope. I advised I did and positioned my Jimny to tow him out. He looked a bit surprised when I pulled out the various recovery ropes and shackles. Jimny did great, low ratio, 4 wheel drive and managed without any drama or wheels spinning. One happy relieved and damage free car driver.

My Jimny is fitted with 215/75/15 Toya Open Country + tyres and the adventure above and the most recent driving in the snow has prompted me to post a wee tyre review.

Quite quickly I came to the conclusion that I wanted to replace the standard 195/80/15 Bridge Stone duellers. This was nothing to do with performance purely based on looks. My experience of the standard tyres were all good with the possible exception of wet roads where on a few occasions felt a bit skittish but nothing of note and perfectly good tyres.

However I wanted AT tyres with a more aggressive tread and look without compromising on road noise, mpg or ride. The most sensible thing would have being to keep the standard tyres but I am not always sensible.
Heart said BFG Goodyear's. Really look good and great reputation and last for ever based on reviews etc. However a bit noisy does impact mpg and very heavy. So after a lot of reading reviews, comparing weights etc I identified the Toya's. One of the lightest if not the lightest AT 215/75/15 tyres available and still look to my mind aggressive.

Ordered them and have driven approximately 10K miles with them fitted. Had a major issue when I first bougt them as I really struggled to get the wheels balanced with the Toya's Tried 4 different tyre shops including Suzuki dealer and the only way they could get them balanced was by loading the wheels with lots and lots of weights. Never really resolved the issue with the SZ5 Alloy wheels. If weight could have been applied on the outside of the wheel balancing would have been easy. If using old lead weights and happy to fit on outside of wheel and possibly damage the alloys balancing would have been straightforward but did not want to damage the alloys. However I personally prefer the steel wheels which come with the SZ4 rather than the alloys so purchased the steel wheels and fitted the Toyas. Easy to balance and no further issues.

Most of the driving has been on A/B North East Scotland Roads with some town driving. I have driven to Southern Spain where I had lots of motorway driving (4K Miles) and when in Spain lots off easy to moderate off road trails. What with living in Scotland had lots of very wet roads to contend with and in the last few weeks lots of snow and Ice.

Very happy with my tyre choice with a summary below.

Noise - No noticeable difference compared to Bridgestone Duellers. Happy to sit at 70Mph all the way to Sunny Spain and back.
MPG - minus1.5 mpg compared to standard
Wet - Better than Standard
Dry - same as standard
Snow - Good, not as good as proper winter tyres but combined with 4x4 when roads completely white very capable and very secure. Given my specific needs won't by Winter tyres. PS I highly rate winter tyres and have had them on lots of my previous cars but will not be fitting winter tyres this time. Happy with the Toya's.
Offroad - Not a hard core off roader so can't really comment. Worked well for me when offroad and experienced no issues or any problems but not an expert so can't really comment.

Would I recommend? Absolutely I would.

However I have nor driven my Jimny with Bridgestones or with Coopers or etc etc and it may well be they are better. But for my partcular requirement which was AT and a bit more agressive without compromising the ride or mpg etc I am very happy with my choice.