Tire RackReviews 54,712

The tires are excellent, much quieter than the Dunlop Signature 2's I had been running and they seem to have better traction in most cases. Purchasing the tires was great, they were able to accommodate my special request that all four tires be from the same date code and the initial pickup of the tires was painfree.

I meant to have the tires installed by my local mechanic, but unfortunately one of my old tires split right after picking these up, and thankfully Tirerack was able to fit me in right before they closed. I genuinely appreciate that

However, I watched the installation of my tires, as I normally perform all maintenance which I can perform without special purpose tools, as I take comfort in knowing things were installed correctly. Unfortunately, I saw a few areas where the installation was lacking
- When jacking up my car, they used a floor jack underneath the side doors. This resulted in at least slightly bending the body underneath the drivers door and possibly at the other locations (but I didn't look too closely). When the installer noticed the metal bending, I explained that it was expected since, per the service manual, floor jacks should only be used on a plate under the engine and the rear differential. Unfortunately, I think the installer mistook this as permission to continue.
- When installing the wheels back into the car, they initially used an impact driver to install the lug nuts. This resulted in some of the lug nuts being tight enough that when they torqued them down, the torque wrench indicated the torque was met before moving the lug nut. Additionally, they torqued the lug nuts to the high end of the allowed spec (per the service manual) and it appeared they tightened them past where the torque wrench indicated that torque was met. While I can understand this from the perspective of avoiding liability due to under-torqued fasteners, the torque ranges are published in the manual for a reason

I do appreciate that they managed to perform the service reasonably quickly and I didn't notice any balance issues while driving, so I suspect the balancing was done well. I also appreciate that they took the time to refill the spare tire since it was low on air

Overall, the purchasing and pickup experience was excellent. And considering my car is a daily driver and on the older side, I'm not too upset by the issues noted above, especially given how affordable the mounting was. However, if these tires were for a nicer car, I would recommend just buying the tires and having your friendly neighborhood mechanic mount them to avoid possible minor damage to the vehicle