Cooper's new UHP all-season tire, the Zeon RS3-G1

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UTQG 500 AA A

The Zeon RS3-G1 is asymmetric. I'm going to guess it will be made in China, since it's replacing the Zeon RS3-A which is Chinese. It appears to be available in the same sizes the RS3-A was offered in.

There doesn't seem to be a replacement for the summer-only RS3-S, which is also Chinese

Cooper Zeon RS3-G1

CooperZeonRS3G1.png
 
Chinese, no thanks. I've got a few sets of US made coopers, but if they offshore, I'll look elsewhere.
 
Originally Posted By: dan_erickson
I have had fantastic luck with my "China" Coopers


I just got a set of rs3-a, old model of this tire and have been very impressed. I had Pirelli P7 all season plus before and so far think these are a notch above. Despite being made in China. Pricepoint was also lower than made in mexico p7's.
 
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If these are supposed to be higher-performance than the CS5 Ultra Touring tires I recently put onto my Cruze, they'll be gumballs in the wet and dry. Cooper's been making some solid tires lately, regardless of COO.
 
They may or may not have more "traction"

But certainly better handling/cornering and worse ride.

I'd like to see a sidewall photo before I condemn them to being chinese without any info.

Most likely same place they made the rs3-a but thats just a WAG at this point.
 
Some thoughts on *Chinese* tires.

Every tire manufacturer I know anything about has a quality department - and they have published standards and procedures. For those who are aware of it, TS16949 was the last international standard being used by the tire industry (I hope I got that number correct!) TS16949 is more about having standards and procedures, and that they are being followed - and not about what those standards are.

The internal standards for any given tire manufacturer typically comply with TS 16949 and there are independent auditors who verify this. I know of no vehicle manufacturers who does not require this audit for supplying tires to them - and many require much more.

There was a time where Cooper wasn't supplying tires to any vehicle manufacturer. I heard through the grapevine that the reason was because of the added expense and hassle of doing these audits. I now see that Cooper is indeed supplying tires to a few vehicle manufacturers, so they must have stepped up and started following TS16949.

But while TS16949 is applicable across the entire corporation, there maybe a few individual plants not included in the certification. However, the system would be in place and it would be a fairly easy matter to get ALL plants up to speed.

And there are good reasons to do so. It's a whole lot easier if the management has only one quality standard to deal with. Plus, each plant competes with all the other plants using these kind of indicators as a guide as to how each is doing (productivity, cost, etc are also indicators.)

So I think any major tire manufacturer can be counted on to have these quality standards in place for pretty much all of their plants, regardless of where the plants are located.

I also think that tire manufacturers who are new to the US market - ala Chinese, Indian, and other Asian based companies - will go through the same process the Japanese and Koreans went through: Their first products didn't do so well, but they improved over time as they learned what was needed to compete with the big boys. As an example, the first Honda's weren't very good, but look at them now.
 
I agree with the above post.

I don't love the idea of buying Chinese tires. I've avoided them in the past, but I would consider a tire made in China in a factory run by one of the major companies I'd normally buy from.

Where you really get into the sketchy Chinese tires are when you've buying cheap, no-name tires sold by a tire marketer and made on contract by a small no-name tire factory in China.
 
I bought two sets of RS3-As, one set was made in the US, one set in China- I could tell no difference in performance, quality, or longevity.
 
I'm sure the tires made in China can be as good as tires made anywhere, but If I'm spending
almost $1000 for a set of tires I would like to think that some of that money is going
into the pockets of my neighbors.

My Cooper Ultra Touring tires were made in the US. Had considered Pirellis but...
 
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The name brand vs. Chinese debate is always interesting. I personally try to go with tires with the best reviews, but sometimes you end up with something different whilst buying a used car, etc. Before I bought my current (used) Mazda5, I tried to buy one that happened to have Hi-Fly tires. Being that this was a family hauler, I would have felt uneasy driving on them and replaced them with something more proven.

OTOH searching for tire recalls always shocks me with the "top tier" brands having numerous (albeit small) recalls:
https://www.consumeraffairs.com/tire-recalls
 
Found this thread while searching and thought it may be due for resurrection....

Put a set of these on the Taurus SHO to replace a 60k worn out set of Michelin Primacy MXV4's that was on there. For the price ($164 ea for 245/45R20XL) and $100 rebate on 4 I don't think you can touch them in the value department.

Yes, they were made in China by Cooper Kenda according to the DOT code. A little old with a 1216 DOT Code but still looked great.

So far they cured a vibration at speed that had been there for a long while on the Michelins. Much quieter than the Michelins although that's to be expected with new vs dead tires.

Walmart also did a fantastic job mounting and balancing them. Took about 45 minutes and I even saw them break out the torque wrench to tighten the lug nuts.

Will be interesting to see how these wear.
 
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