Michelin LTX M/S2 vs Cross Terrain SUV

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I'd not put the Destination LE in the same treadlife ballpark as the H/L's or the Michelin Tires. Current set of LE's is at 5/32 of treadlife remaining after about 30,000 miles. Previous tires (Wilderness AT's (remember those :)) and Goodyear RTS) in the same driving lasted over 60,000 miles without issues. The last Michelins I used easily bested the treadlife warranty, and went almost 80,000 miles.
 
Remember, any tread life comparison using OE tires, whether they're Firestone or Michelin or any other brand, doesn't represent other tires of the same model but in different sizes. Because of the very specific performance requirements of OEM tires, they generally don't last very long...and are not representative of what the same tire in a different size might do under the same conditions.

This even goes for tires that are REPLACEMENT tires. For example, I can buy the Michelin Latitude in P225/65R17 size for my CR-V...but in that size, the Latitude is the OEM tire on the Chevrolet Equinox. So I probably wouldn't get much treadlife out of it, even if other Latitude tires would perform better. In my opinion, you really have to watch out for OEM tires, even when you're buying replacements.
 
Originally Posted By: MNgopher
I'd not put the Destination LE in the same treadlife ballpark as the H/L's or the Michelin Tires. Current set of LE's is at 5/32 of treadlife remaining after about 30,000 miles. Previous tires (Wilderness AT's (remember those :)) and Goodyear RTS) in the same driving lasted over 60,000 miles without issues. The last Michelins I used easily bested the treadlife warranty, and went almost 80,000 miles.


I really have to say that your experience with the LE's just doesn't match up with mine or those of others I know and have read about. Not doubting you but your experience does not seem to be the norm. Why they have not performed for you is a mystery to me?
 
The LE's haven't worked for me, and didn't work in our fleet at work either. (7 F150s and 2 Explorers in this department, about 20 F150's and Silverados in another). Poor treadlife and bad winter performance are the reasons they are no longer used in our fleet. It isn't just me, and no, I don't manage the fleet, so my opinion is not the bias there. For our fleet usage, the Destination AT has proven to be a good tire with better treadlife and lower initial cost.
 
Makes NO sense to me. Every experience I have with the LE's is positive. They have given me nothing but great tread life and unsurpased bad weather performance for an AS. Frankly the LE's have been better in snow than any OEM AT I have ever had a truck come with. I have found them to wear as well as, and perform better in the snow, than the famous Michelin LTX M+S's.

Have run LE's on many personal vehicles and have recommended them to friends who have used them and we are all more than happy with them. Again I do not doubt you but it blows my mind that you can see such vastly different results than I have with the same tire. I also don't see how you are getting the Destination AT for a lower initial cost? It is an All Terrain whereas the LE is an All Season. The AT should run anywhere from $40-$50 more p/tire barring specials.

The more you post about how bad the Firestone Destination LE tires are for tread wear and snow performance the more it sounds like you are posting about the Firestone Wilderness LE tires not the Destination's.
 
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Originally Posted By: NHHEMI
Makes NO sense to me. Every experience I have with the LE's is positive. They have given me nothing but great tread life and unsurpased bad weather performance for an AS. Frankly the LE's have been better in snow than any OEM AT I have ever had a truck come with. I have found them to wear as well as, and perform better in the snow, than the famous Michelin LTX M+S's.

Have run LE's on many personal vehicles and have recommended them to friends who have used them and we are all more than happy with them. Again I do not doubt you but it blows my mind that you can see such vastly different results than I have with the same tire. I also don't see how you are getting the Destination AT for a lower initial cost? It is an All Terrain whereas the LE is an All Season. The AT should run anywhere from $40-$50 more p/tire barring specials.

The more you post about how bad the Firestone Destination LE tires are for tread wear and snow performance the more it sounds like you are posting about the Firestone Wilderness LE tires not the Destination's.



A good friend of mine had Destination LE's on his 1997 Ram a few years ago. They were shot in 40k with mainly highway duty.
 
I wish you luck finding a Wilderness LE in a P235/75/15, a P235/70/16, or a P235/70/17, as those are the applications I work with.

Is it so hard to believe that someone has had a different experience? I trust that you have had a fine experience and don't think you haven't. I have not, and that's OK. You also note that there performance in bad weather is better than any OEM tire, and that may be true. However, there are other tires out there as well besides the OEM.

Tirerack, for all their strengths and weaknesses in the reviews, notes that the Destination LE is the 9th best Highway All Season Tire, which is pretty good. The Treadlife rating is the 19th best though. It would seem to me the broad opinion is that these tires do well, but that treadlife is not a strength compared to its competition.

On pricing, if your retailer is docking you 40 to 50 bucks a tire between an AT and the LE, you are getting robbed. Tirerack in the sizes I work with is always within $10 a tire, and our wholesaler actually prices them lower in the AT, as they move in higher volumes (Besides the light trucks in the fleet, we also have over 40 buses of various sizes, a snowplow fleet of over 20 trucks (Sterlings, Macks, and Internationals), and a small army of crown vics, so we go through a lot of tires...). Back when I priced the replacements for the Explorer, I was quoted $2 lower a tire on the AT than the LE. I chose the LE for an all season tire with better fuel mileage,lower noise, and longer treadlife. Got 2 out of three...
 
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There is no reason for a person with a little online research skill to pay more for an inferior tire of the same brand, it is clearly LTX M/S2 is better than Cross Terrain in every category, and it cost less too. No reason Michelin should continue to make Cross Terrain.
 
The Cross Terrain will be discontinued within the next 2 years (according to the Michelin customer service line). Sizes kept dropping from the Cross Terrain line, and only a few remain. The Cross Terrain is directly replaced by the Latitude Tour line.
 
Originally Posted By: MNgopher
I wish you luck finding a Wilderness LE in a P235/75/15, a P235/70/16, or a P235/70/17, as those are the applications I work with.

Is it so hard to believe that someone has had a different experience? I trust that you have had a fine experience and don't think you haven't. I have not, and that's OK. You also note that there performance in bad weather is better than any OEM tire, and that may be true. However, there are other tires out there as well besides the OEM.

Tirerack, for all their strengths and weaknesses in the reviews, notes that the Destination LE is the 9th best Highway All Season Tire, which is pretty good. The Treadlife rating is the 19th best though. It would seem to me the broad opinion is that these tires do well, but that treadlife is not a strength compared to its competition.

On pricing, if your retailer is docking you 40 to 50 bucks a tire between an AT and the LE, you are getting robbed. Tirerack in the sizes I work with is always within $10 a tire, and our wholesaler actually prices them lower in the AT, as they move in higher volumes (Besides the light trucks in the fleet, we also have over 40 buses of various sizes, a snowplow fleet of over 20 trucks (Sterlings, Macks, and Internationals), and a small army of crown vics, so we go through a lot of tires...). Back when I priced the replacements for the Explorer, I was quoted $2 lower a tire on the AT than the LE. I chose the LE for an all season tire with better fuel mileage,lower noise, and longer treadlife. Got 2 out of three...


I was just curious if you had maybe made a mistake and were talking about the Wilderness LE's and not the Destination LE's. The Wilderness line is a cheaper quality OE tire line and they are not very good. I could see what you are saying if talking about those.

If it were your own vehicle experience vs my own personal vehicle experience, and one set of tires for each, it wouldn't be hard to believe that you saw A and I saw B. However I have a lot of personal experience and hands on experience with them and you are talking about fleets of vehicles with bad performance. We are talking 50-60 some vehicles here between us with a HUGE split between what I have seen and what you have seen. How do you reconcile that?

I have run 3 sets of them personally, on 3 different vehicles as well, and have many friends and family members now running them( on my suggestion )who love them as much as I do. Only one issue from all of that. Early wear for a friend but he does not take care of his vehicles and never rotated or checked PSI and needed an alignment. Hardly the tire's fault. You have always claimed poor performance period. I just find that hard to believe.

Wear can vary due to use, driver habits, and maintenance. Snow traction however is what it is. How you can claim the LE's perform poorly in the snow is a mystery to me however and while I don't mean to be disrespectful I have a really hard time with that part of your story. For you personally on your own vehicle ok but not for an entire fleet with so many different vehicles and drivers. Nope, no way.

I have run countless tires and tire types in the bad weather and the LE is easily one of the top handful of tires I have ever used. Right up there with the best. Off hand the only tires I can come up with that have done better are Bridgestone Dueler AT Revo's and BFG AT's. Let me also add that while better in the snow than the LE's those 2 tires are not so much better that they are worth the extreme $$$ difference p/tire.

My comments about the LE's being superior to OEM tires was a specific reference to them being better than the OEM all terrain tires I have had( 99% Goodyear [censored] ). Most people just assume that an AT will always be better in the snow than an AS. Not so. The LE's have even done better than the OE AT's I have had and even better than some non OEM and popular AT's in the snow for me.

When quoting Tirerack reviews make sure you pay attention to how many miles of reviews are associated with the ranked tire. The LE's have an established reputation as they have been out for a while. 22 Million + miles worth of reviews. You can be safe taking what is said there about them as being accurate for the most part with that many review miles. A few of the tires ranked higher however are new/newer tires( one only has 340K worth - what good is that for any real reliable info ). New tires will always get better reviews as a tire will always perform better when it is new(er ). I place more faith in high mile reviews where you get a better sample of reviews and not just people reviewing some new tires they just put on or that came on the vehicle when they bought it new.

Overall the LE is 9th but you have 4 tires ranked higher with fewer than 6 million worth of reviews = LTX M+S2(2.9M), Geolander H/T(340K), and the Road Venture APT(5.4M). Even the HTS only has 8 Million. Just not enough miles worth of reviews, IMO, to say they are a better tire. Now the original LTX M+S w/ 79 million miles worth of reviews is the real #1 on that list IMO. I personally like the LE better( have run both )but if you want to use Tirerack to help decide the original LTX is the real #1 on the list.

The treadlife is actually 17th ranked not 19th just FYI. I would again tell you to look right and see the number of review miles. 3 tires have fewer than 1 million review miles, 2 have fewer than 2 million, 2 have fewer than 3 million, 1 has fewer than 6 million, and 1 fewer than 9 million. Only 6 tires have more than 10 million miles worth of reviews on that list. Hardly a true indication of how the LE ranks for treadwear IMO.

Out of curiosity why did you not mention how the LE ranks for snow traction? Light = 8th and deep = 10th. These lists are a bit more accurate if you go by review miles. Even so I would bump 4 from the deep snow list and 1 from the light snow list due to low review miles. If you want to use Tirerack to defend your claims the bad snow performance claims don't hold up.
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They rank 11th for would you buy again. Once again however you have 4 tires with low review miles. 2 under 1 million so they really should be ranked higher.

You can't compare wholesale tire prices for a garage to what we the average consumer would pay. For John Q public the LE is cheaper than the AT.
 
Relax, man. We believe.

It's not hard at all to imagine an individual having a different experience. There are so many variables! Tire pressure, wheels, alignment, driving style, load, etc.

Makes perfect sense to me.
 
We have one van with three old gen LTX MS and one LTX MS2 on it. All 4 tires are within 100 miles of the same age.

It would appear the MS2 is wearing better but I'll keep watching it with interest.
 
NHHEMI, we get it, you like the LE's and consider them the best thing since sliced bread. I've had a different experience personally and in our fleet, and thats OK.

It isn't personal, it isn't me calling anyone a liar, and I'm not calling anyone confused about which tire we are talking about either, as you've questioned me on.

You may draw whatever conclusions you want from the Tirerack data. It still comes out as the 8th-10th best tire (consistent with its overall rankings) in snow traction in its category, (higher ranked by your mileage criteria, but still not the top of the heap) meaning there are better choices availble based on overall user experience.

Consumer Reports also indicates similar results in their more "controlled" testing, reporting a "good" rating in snow, and a "fair" rating in ice braking, and a "fair" rating in treadlife. There are many, many tires that did better in those categories as well, including the Michelin tires the OP asked about.

Respectfully, I'm done with this issue.
 
Why truck (and so-called SUV) tires on this car that sees very light duty? I know that it is marketed as a sport utility vehicle, and that is is somewhat heavy, but won't a good passenger car tire that meets all the weight ratings give good service for this rig?
 
Originally Posted By: MNgopher
NHHEMI, we get it, you like the LE's and consider them the best thing since sliced bread. I've had a different experience personally and in our fleet, and thats OK.

It isn't personal, it isn't me calling anyone a liar, and I'm not calling anyone confused about which tire we are talking about either, as you've questioned me on.

You may draw whatever conclusions you want from the Tirerack data. It still comes out as the 8th-10th best tire (consistent with its overall rankings) in snow traction in its category, (higher ranked by your mileage criteria, but still not the top of the heap) meaning there are better choices availble based on overall user experience.

Consumer Reports also indicates similar results in their more "controlled" testing, reporting a "good" rating in snow, and a "fair" rating in ice braking, and a "fair" rating in treadlife. There are many, many tires that did better in those categories as well, including the Michelin tires the OP asked about.

Respectfully, I'm done with this issue.


Just responding to you man. That is all.
 
I had Destination LE's on my RX300 before, I got about 50k miles out of them. I installed them at 90k miles, and replaced them at 140k miles.

The tire were great, in all weather conditions. I drove the RX300 in Michigan/Chicago snow conditions numerous times, and they were great. The AWD system in my RX300 is beastly though, so It could have been the combination of the two.
 
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Originally Posted By: hypervish
I had Destination LE's on my RX300 before, I got about 50k miles out of them. I installed them at 90k miles, and replaced them at 140k miles.

The tire were great, in all weather conditions. I drove the RX300 in Michigan/Chicago snow conditions numerous times, and they were great. The AWD system in my RX300 is beastly though, so It could have been the combination of the two.


What did you replace them with?
 
Goodyear Wrangler HP 225/70/16

I got a set of 4 for $225 installed. They are brand new too, I got them off a wrecked suv.
 
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