Cooper or Dayton?

[cousincletus]

I'm starting to shop for tires and don't know much about them. My truck is a 2001 Dodge Ram 1500 and the tire size is 225 75R-16. The local independent tire guy has Daytons for $87 per tire or Coopers for $92 per tire. Both are 60,000 mile rated tires. Any experience with either of these tires? Anybody know if one is better than the other or should I just go ahead and save the five bucks per tire and get the Daytons? Thanks!

 

[k1xv]

Dayton is a discount line of the Bridgestone/Firestone group. Cooper is an independent company that also manufactures for private label and some other majors, such as Nokian.

Both companies have blemishes on their records. While Bridgestone tires seem to have a good reputation, over the years there have been Firestone issues, well documented.

Cooper also had some quality control issues that led to a class action lawsuit that the company resolved. However, that problem covered tires manufactured from 1985-2001. The tires presently made by Cooper are supposed to be OK.

I recently purchased 4 Cooper light truck tires for replacements. I have not mounted them yet. However, I see lots more Coopers in use than Daytons in this area.

Sorry I could not provide more first hand information.

 

[drive it forever]

I have a seperate set of cooper all-season tires on steel wheels for winter use. I use them for winter, the summer performance tires/wheels are taken off in the fall. I am surprised that the cooper tires have worked out as good as they have. The dayton tires, probably arent going to have the same top tier manufacturing and materials as the bridgestone/firestone tires they also make. I wouldent expect one to be superior over the other imo. I would choose the tire that fits your desires/needs better. As an example, if you like a quiet, smooth ride, get the one that has a less aggressive tread pattern...

 

[ZR2RANDO]

If you are leaning towards the Cooper tires, you can also check PepBoys. The PepBoys brand "Futura" are Cooper tires. I have seen them on sale in the Sunday paper for the last couple weeks.

 

[jthorner]

In a given class of tire I would consider the Coopers and Daytons as roughly equivalent.

If you are looking for bargain priced tires, the Korean Kumhos seems to be coming on strong with good tires at low prices.

John

 

[cousincletus]

Oops, forgot to mention that the tires must be American made. But thanks for the suggestions so far!

 

[labman]

Go to www.tirerack.com and read their reports. I had a horrible experience with a private made by Cooper set of tires. They rode and stuck to the road like iron. Since then, I have learned that is characteristic of Cooper tires. Not even on my list. Might try looking at Kellys. I had some of them on my Grand Am, and were the best tires I had on it except for the Goodyears that came on it. When one of them went bad early, the local Goodyear dealer offered to replace it for regular retail price.

 

[XS650]

quote:

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Originally posted by labman:
Go to www.tirerack.com and read their reports.

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I think their user reports, while not perfect, are one of the best sources of info available.

I used them and picked Yokahama AVS S/T for my GMC S-15.

The trick is to go to the list of tires in your chosen category, in my case "Street/Sport Truck Summer", pick out a few tires that do the best in the categories that matter the most, and aren;t too shabhy in any category you care at all about.

Then click on that tire model, the "Read all reviews for this tire" at the bottom of that page. The filter by driving style,(in my case spirited) then filter by driving conditions (in my case all on orad", then filter. That limits the reviews to people who's driving style and roads bear some simularity to your.

 

[k1xv]

Originally posted by labman:
[QB] Go to www.tirerack.com and read their reports. I had a horrible experience with a private made by Cooper set of tires. They rode and stuck to the road like iron. Since then, I have learned that is characteristic of Cooper tires.

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If that were universally true about all tires made by Cooper, then the Nokian light truck and SUV tires made for them by Cooper would also be lousy, but they are not.

Cooper, like others, make private label tires to the specifications of the contract. To generalize that the poor performance of the private label tires you purchased is characteristic of all Cooper made tires is a leap of logic.

The fact that they make the highly praised Nokians shows that not all Cooper made tires are bad.

 

[1sttruck]

One consideration for A/T truck tires is get ones with a severe snow rating. The only non-winter ones that seem have that are some Nokian Hakka 10s (?), BFG ATs, and the Wild Country XTX offered at Les Schwab. I have 17in tires so it's hard to find such tires.