Cooper opinions and interesting NHTSA stats

Merek said:
Evidently General has discontinued the 43's and replaced them with the 45, seems like a decent tire overall but like most when they near the end of their lifespan they get brutal as in harsh ride quality and the noise. Depending on the tire I've found that anywhere 5k-10k miles remaining tread life is typically when it becomes an issue.

I don't have any experience with Cooper but I agree that the general consensus would be that with the statement made about being bought out by Goodyear and the quality may have gone downhill. I've always wanted to try Goodyear but honestly I cannot find anything I even like from them with good enough ratings for me. They seem like an ok tire but for the money I can save and actually get better tires it doesn't make any reasonable sense to go with them.
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I'm good with Goodyear.. closest tire store to my house is a Goodyear Corporate owned store.
treat me right, do things on time..
about the only store near me that will handle a dually without trying to rip me off with extra's..
you know how they are, hey you need ball joints, brakes or you are going to die before you get home sales pitch.
 
Cooper STT Pro's on the H3 have survived many ridiculously rocky/rutted trails getting pinched and smashed and twisted on sharp rocks and ledges. There's some small gouges/chunks peeled out of treadblocks and some balancing issues cropping up now after ~35K miles with plenty of hard use in there and lots of miles run with poor front-end alignment, which is all expected wear/tear given how they have been used. The STT's offer a reasonable balance of treadblock durability and traction(stickiness) similar to Goodyear MTR. No outright failures or flats, no punctures or tears despite being put through plenty of abuse. I'll probably run them out to about 40K before replacement as they are getting close to the "end." Not bad... Road noise has been tolerable (they are muds, expected to be noisy).

Cooper Discoverer M+S Studded on the XC70 in winters have lasted ~7 winter seasons and have lots of tread remaining and still deliver pretty useful winter traction despite the aging rubber. These started with 15/32 of tread with nice big voids between blocks and lots of siping. We're measuring about 10-11/32 remaining after an estimated 12-15K miles total on them (mostly on dry pavement through winter). Ice traction is waning as they are getting very old (in years), but we're going to use them through this winter one more time. I took them out in our first snow the other day here and they are comparable at 7 years old to a brand new set of weatherpeaks... No longer in "dedicated winter tire" performance class after 7 years of rubber hardening, but still usable. My biggest complaint of these tires is that they are very heavy for their size but that's probably a consequence of their truck/suv oriented nature with the ultra-deep tread. They have since been discontinued and their replacement, the "evolution winter" is lighter in the same size. Tempted to try those with studs for the 24/25 winter season. If we drove this car more per year, I believe these winter tires could have easily gone 25-30K on mostly dry pavement before total wearout.
 
I am liking Cooper Tires again. General Tires too!
I say again because they've stepped up their game in the past decade or two(somewhere in this century).
I had liked them both ~40-45 years ago but then they declined in quality & drivability for a while(IDK how long). However, I have been purchasing both brands as my new(ish) go-to tires for everyday-ness. They're fine and work well for their price tags. My favorite is still PIRELLI at the higher end and Michelin at the highest end(for me).
 
I have the AT3 on my Jeep, been through a set (old wheels) and now 33x12.5s great tire.

I will say they used to be cheap and even before COVID they were creeping up.

In 2016 I paid $124 a tire P265/75-16, now they are almost $200

In 2019 33x12.5 were $177 now ~$250
 
I have had one set of Cooper all terrains, the RTX. It felt to me like they found and kept a tried and true recipe for a solid tire with 20 year old technology. This wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. They were heavy and handled loads well. They had surprisingly good rain grip. The grip was probably from soft rubber which did wear, but the treads were deep and there was plenty of tire to wear. They were very predictable in hard driving. They started funny wear patterns early in life, earlier than any other tire I’ve had, which would have become notable cupping, and i was rotating them regularly.

so, probably not the greatest, but if I was driving rocky, or heavily pot-holed roads frequently, they might get another look, because at the least they seemed very sturdy to me.
 
Just ordered the Cooper SRX for the 2017 Tahoe

OEM Michelin = 40k
Cooper Evolution = 50k

Next:

IMG_1971.jpg
 
I’m not going to bash Goodyear, however I’m a total tire snob and years back I coined the phrase “Good For A Year”.
Honestly I think Goodyear has made some progress in the uniformity department.

I put a set of GY Ultraterrain A/T tires on my 2020 Tacoma 4x4. These are exclusive to Discount tire and I got a deal on them so I figured I would suffer for a few years and save some $$.

It kills me to say this but these are the finest light duty truck tires I’ve ever bought. They balanced perfectly, very quiet (considering how aggressive the tread is) and are wearing great. They had 16/32 new, after 10,000 miles they’re still at 14/32.
These are as good or better than the LTX M/S 2’s I took off…..and the LTX is definitely not worth $125 more per tire.
 
Goodyear builds alright tires. They're usually decent performing and plenty strong. They just tend to wear out extremely fast or explode with no warning. Many of their tires live a long and useful life.
 
Most of my GY experience included super-hard rubber that had poor rain grip, except for one set … an early offering in what might be their integrity line around 2012? It reviewed on par with Michelins on tire rack and I bought a set and they were fabulous. I would have bought another set but they changed them so I stayed away.
 
I’ve had several sets of cooper discover ATs from the AT2s to the AT3 XLTs. I’ve generally had very good experiences with them. I did seem to rapidly lose wet traction with the AT3s (pre-XLTs) towards the end of their life.
 
4WD said:
Mounted - smooth and stable - only rain turned to sleet so can’t comment on wet performance yet - tread looks right for it through …
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Keep us posted.

Cooper has the Endeavor Plus and Discoverer SRX for my truck, which will be needing tires soon.
 
drtyler said:
Keep us posted.

Cooper has the Endeavor Plus and Discoverer SRX for my truck, which will be needing tires soon.
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Will do - the Cooper Evolution still had good tread at 50k - but that’s where I like to get a new tire and deep tread - and by then the tires have plugs and patches from the roofing crews etc ~
 
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