If anyone cares, the M3 build series is still going ahead, we've just had issues with both the car and the weather delaying testing. The first three episodes were meant to be filmed this week, but again it's WET all week in the UK, which ruins dry testing :( I'm keeping my personal and work instas updated. instagram.com/jonathan__Benson/ instagram.com/Tyre_reviews/ I hope you enjoy this video :)

The thing with traction control, is that it can't override bad tyres. All it can do is try and keep the driver in control with however much grip it has available to it.

This video shows how actually tyres can make a huge difference in terms of safety on wet roads. Great job Jonathan!

New tyre day is one of the best days of the year!

insurance: you changed dampers to improve ride? +£500. You fitted budget ditchfinder 3000 tyres? Kool.

Back in my younger, less wise, and poorer days, I brought a used Suzuki Ignis Sport, with Yokohama's, front and Sumo Firenza, budgets fitted on the rear by the seller. How bad could they be. The first time I leaned on the car a little bit, it spun on me and put me into a wall. The car was repaired, tyres changed to quality ones and I never lost control again. It wasn't my driving skills, or the car, but those awful tyres. Back then, videos like this were not around to educate the younger me and this will save lives and mean others do not have to learn the hard way about budget rubber.

Completely agree. I bought a car with this exact mix, well, Pirelli fronts and Accellera backs. Fine in the hot sticky summer. First proper wet day... Huge overcorrection required still leading to oversteer, then even worse understeer, completely upsetting the chassis, then finally settling down. This was on a Roundabout. Absolutely dangerous. I don't know how they are legal. Honestly the worst rubber I've ever driven on. Do. Not. Buy. I know what you're thinking, maybe I wasn't driving to the conditions. All I'll say is go out and put this combo on your car and drive normally in the wet. And take spare undies. The falloff on predictable to manslaughter-inducing is nuts.

I LOVE buying new tires!!! I hate paying for them, but it’s so nice getting a fresh set of rubber!

Must agree 100% with your comments regarding the legality of the cheap products.

I'm reseller of Pirelli tires in Turkey. Cheap tires always give you a headache. Tires are the first substance that comes in contact with the ground, money is no more valuable than our lives.

Who knew tyres made such a huge difference to handling? Certainly not me when I was younger. I used to spin out all the time in the wet in my first car, always thought it was because the car was crap. But it turns out it was probably mostly the tyres it came with. My next car handled way better but it probably had better tyres.

Ive got a c63 and thought it would be interesting to see what happens to mine regarding this test. I had a set of Hancook Ventus on all 4 and it handled as you would expect, fairly good tyre. The rears needed changing so I threw some budgets on and the balance and feel of the car was just undriveable. Anything above 70 on a private road of course, the rear would become floaty, literally felt like the rear was on ice. It all comes down to having a different level of grip from front to rear and the car just doesn’t know what’s going on. I didn’t really read into it before about having different brand tyres on front to rear axle but I definitely do now. Cheers for the video 👍🏻

i love your "experiencing understeer" expression at 7:23 when you put the garbage rubber on the fronts.

Jonathan, mate, these videos are incredible. As a motovlogger I can see the amount of work you put into these - and thank god you do. As a bit of a geek I love this scientific approach to tires. Keep up the great work!

Nice work as usual 👍🏻 That did look like a lot of ‘Fun’ 🙊 I know people who have fitted regular budgets to the rear of RFT equipped BMW models. They were happy to save money, for about 5 mins that is! Then took to the internet to ask why there car was now dangerous, even in a straight line 🙈 I think that can be an even worse combination!

Really interesting, I was thinking of going for mid range tyres to replace 2 worn tyres - but opted for all conti's after watching - spent a bit more - but the car handles so much better - almost like having a new car

I've taken his advice and put budget tyres on my m3, now I am the Drift King of my city.

How about a video on premium tyres for budget cars? I’ve just bought a Panda a second car for use out in the narrow lanes where I live and it seems hard to find a good all round tyre.

I've got a 1.6 2004 Civic Sport which recently had Toyo Proxes Sport put on the front and had Churchill RCB009 on the back after being told they were a "British Brand" (with a big Made in China on the sidewall). Was pretty fine during the sunny days, but the first day it's rained since I've had them and I've lost the back end on the way into a roundabout. Was coming in at about 40 and under pretty gentle steering I just lost full control over the back. I counter steered to try straighten out but with no traction in the back I was sliding towards the lamppost so tried steering into the roundabout to follow it round and avoid going off. The Toyos still had full traction and steering back right caused the back end to flick out leading to a full spin. Watching this video I thought it wouldn't really matter on my lower power FWD but clearly I was wrong. I think it's better to have cheaps all round than it is to have a mix, the issue with my situation was that on slowing down, the fronts gripped up and the backs didn't leading to the back end essentially trying to push through the front of the car. On all cheaps I'd have slowed significantly slower but it would've been gradual rather than the front getting immediate traction and the back struggling. If you're forced into a position where you're having to run a mix, I'd say put your better tyres on the back, even if it means having to deal with the understeer of less grip on the front. I've always known that cheap tyres aren't great but the moment you really find out is when you really don't want to. If you have to be on cheap tyres for the sake of budget, don't mix. Being on a full set of 4 means your braking will be long and your general traction will be worse but you can accommodate for that. Having a mix gives you false confidence and can lead you into some real trouble no matter what you're driving.

Hi Jonathan Just watched this old video. Fantastic test. Totally agree, the budgets should be banned! Tyre fitters should also have certain safety checks criteria to avoid such a dangerous set up! A neighbour years ago had 4 worn tyres on his classic 205 gti 1.9. Don't recall the tyre make but were likely hovering around 1.6 to 1.8mm. I recommended what I was running at the time all round, Goodyear eagle f1 GSD3, but he was mean and only replaced the 2 most worn. I advised him to put the new on the rear. He ignored my advice and wrote it off within days in the rain☹

I use Falken Azenis FK510s...They’re a very solid all round tyre. They suit my V6 Saab perfectly to be fair.

When I was younger I had a Citroen C2 Loeb. I put 2 new Pirelli’s on the front, the rears were budget tyres with 6mm of tread still on them which the previous owner put on. I nearly lost it on a wet roundabout when I was leaning on them, they didn’t stay on much longer after that.

Every Lerner driver should be shown this. I am shocked when I see budget tyres on expensive motors!!!

What a terrible day just have had driving the M2 on that wet circuit with different tires, drifting and so on. Tx!

Eye opening but would like to see the same test applied to a FWD hatch if possible. Something like a Golf GTi or similar.

That's insane. Great video as always JB

Thank you very much for this video! I had similar questions about this last month, and had to mix michelin pss in the rear with ps4s in the front due to availability issue. This test cleared out any lingering doubt (you mixed the conti and ps4s and it was fine). Great video as usual! And that M2 is amazing

Great video as always. I've bought a car with ridiculous budget tyres and wet roads may as well have been ice! Great to see you turning the traction control on and helping people realise that traction control only cuts power and can do nothing about weight transfer when you lift off (or worse, brake) in a corner.

A great complimentary video to a previous video where you mixed winter tires and all season tires. I won't ever be mixing tires. Thanks!

This vid is like a concusion of few previous tests. Well done.

I just recently purchased some Kumho Ps91’s and I’ve been very impressed so far. After watching all your videos, I’ll probably step up to some continentals or Michelin’s on my next set.

I have an m140i, and have the same quandary. At the moment the rear tyres are nearly ready for changing, but still 4mm on the front. They are michelin super sports. Ideally, I'd like to switch brands to Goodyear asymmetric 5's, but I'm loathed to throw away two perfectly good mpss front tyres, so I'll change just the rears to the goodyears first and see how I get on. I was worried about mismatching tyres, even though still premium, but this has helped me make my desicion. Very useful and informative video. Cheers mate, you've actually really helped me out! 👍

Even when you know, it's a pretty nice vids and cool to see, thanks !!

I’m not a pro, for me the tyres & the breaks are the most important part of any car!? On this video, that much difference very interesting indeed. keep up with your great videos. 👍🏻🏎

Excellent test. You should do the same but fit conti in the back and different brands in the front

325i. Your videos are addictive as I love tyres

Another great video. I'm totally with you on banning those cheap tyres for safety reasons. It's something transport authorities & governments overlook time & time again.

Another great video. Totally agree re cheap budget tyres - but in my experience there is simply no telling people.

This was fun to see. I bought my LBB M2 LCI with Michelin PSS on the front and Vredestein ultrac vorti's on the rear :) Will swap over to Michelin PS4S allround I think. It's not that bad at the moment actually.

-Traction Control definitely improved "safety" at the expense of precision control. -Premium rear tires on a RWD car was perfectly viable. All said and done: get a complete set and pay a bit more for at least decent tires.

Tire change time is always my favourite time. Just love seeing new rubber being put on. Granted, I don't have anything else to spend money on apart from food & life stuff; zero other hobbies LOL

Hi Jonathan, Nice video. I always tell my friends the same thing as you show here. It is so important. I have a Impreza with a summer set Dunlop Sport Maxx RT2 and a winter set Continental Wintercontact TS 850 P. Love both sets. Really like your tests and reviews. What do you think about where to put the most worn tire? Not so much in my case with AWD, but in general? Thanks again for all the information and nice video's.

5:58 that face summed up everything I guess

I like the way you use a beautiful blue M2 for your tests, just like mine 😁

Thank you so much for all your kind answers.

I completely agree with you comment that certain tyres should be illegal. I have bought a few cars in my time that have had cheap tyres on and (in one case) thought that I was going to have an accident every time I went out in it in the rain (I ended up buying a set of Goodyear GSD3s). In every case, when I changed the tyres, it was like I had just bought a new (and amazing handling) car. I NEVER buy cheap tyres - it is just an accident waiting to happen! I prefer the best wet weather grip at the expense of a little dry weather grip as I believe that one is more likely to have a scary moment when it is raining, than when the sun has been beating down for days. Love the vids - keep up the great work Jonathan! :-)

I ran S1 EVO2 Hankooks up front Michillen PSS in the rear so far they are perfectly working together fine.

A very good advocate for decent quality tyres. I would also go further by saying people should regularly rotating their tyres, to avoid large differences between front and rear grip (especially for RWD cars) and for 4x4 cars that could knacker their control systems because of tyres with mismatched tyre tread wear.

Great video! What about a video about normal summer tires vs sports tires. Ex: Michelin Primacy 4 vs Pilot Sport. Is there a big difference in driving?

Tyre Reviews, another awesome video and demonstration, thank you. I'd definitely be interested in your thoughts on the part worn trade? Are part worn premium tyres better than new budget brands or a big no no and should also be illegal?

One of the BEST videos showcasing the NEED for tyres that work. The thing that makes it for me is the section where you showcase how an average driver would handle the situation (no countersteer) on a soaking road with the traction control on. If this is not a wake up call for the cheap tyre enthusiasts then nothing is.

When i got my E46 330d it had some cheap rotalla f105 tyres on it. It was all over the place in the wet. Changed them for a set of Bridgestone Potenza RE002. And it felt like a new car!

hey I am your new subs.. ! great video, like it ! keep it up !

With a dull commute each day sat at 50 mph, I replaced the Michelin Pilot Sport 3's on my Volvo S60 with Evergreen EU72's. They cost half the price, but lasted roughly the same miles. 28-30k. So long as you did not drive the car like you had stolen it, they were fine. Having said that, the wife's car always gets premium tyres to give her that little extra margin of safety.

Love this channel 👍

Will you be considering making a video about installing new tyres on the rear if changing front tyres, and rotating new tyres to the rear and the benefits it brings with safety in the wet

Would love to see the difference in grip with different budget tyres fitted on the same axle

Thanks for another great video.

9:50 My take away: 'my talkie lady loves talking'. Mine too mate. Mine too.

Thanks for the lives saved by good tyre advice. Tyres are all there is between us and eternity.

It would be interesting to see mixed winter tyres on the test.

It took a silly accident at less than 20mph and me being naive about tyres for me to never buy budgets again. From now on premium all the way I happily pay for the science and development which most of us have no clue about.

i feel the need to repost this comment here again that i had already commented on one of your other videos. i love your videos they really highlight stuff everyone should know about their cars and tyres . i bought a Bmw 645Ci years ago and it had those Acellera Phi on them when i got it. i live in Ireland which tends to be quite wet, i lived in a state of fear anytime it rained, they were by far the most dangerous tyres ive ever had. Even when driving the car slowly going around roundabouts it lost grip in the wet. in the dry they were fine but when it rained they were lethal i ended up buying new Goodyears at the time even though the acelleras were nearly new. Instantly the car was transformed. There are some ok budgets out there but Acellera Phi could be used as a test case example of why tyres should have to meet minimum grip levels to be sold in Europe or anywhere else for that matter

Excellent video there mate. I have seen people that had spent some money to lower their cars, bought some new flashy wheels but put them on budget tyres. Looking good while losing control of the car?

Great review

Funnily when I bought my last e46 m3, it had acceleras on the front and a winter tyre and another Chinese summer tyre at the back lol. Happy days ! Funnily that set up was a bit more comfy than the MP4S I very quickly replaced them with The e63 I just bought has MO at the rear and mps4 at the front. Grip etc is fine except in the cold where the michhies grip much harder than the contis at the rear and you can feel the balance being a bit out. Still, I've done 1.5k miles and will leave the tyres as they are until I cook the contis.

Another eye opening video. Can I ask where do Hankook sit in the tyre brand leaderboard?

This video potentially explains a lot of vehicles in dashcam clips swapping ends while driving around round roundabouts when it's wet. Now I know what to comment on the next one of those I see.

The tiny 64hp Kia Picanto I drive used to have Dunlops and eventually Bridgestones. When I went out to purchase a new set of wheels, I was offered cheap tires to accomodate the new size and was also at a discount. At first I thought it wouldn't be much different because of the very similar tread pattern but it was proven otherwise on the road. The threshold was noticeably weaker and tends to understeer even with the underpowered hatchback. They also tend to chafe very easily too. Road noise was incredibly atrocious too.

i used to drive my car with michelin in the front and used 10 years old tyres in the rear. On wet road it was VERY dangerous ! a small input in the wheel i could already feel the rear loosing grip ps : quality content :)

Same goes with aged tyres. I learnt how to drive when I owned my first Pug 205 gti back in 2005: Michelin Pilot Exalto 2 on the front, Michelin MXV from 1987 on the rear. On the wet even full throttle the back was never coming back 😂

Many years ago, I had a motorbike that the previous owner had treated to some truly horrendous cheap rubber on the back wheel... it stayed on just long enough to try to kill me the first time it rained. Always do your research, go for the best you can afford, and avoid cheap budget tyres like the plague.

would be fun to know how the budget tyres had for time if they where on both front and rear, just in comparison...

In a past life, I've owned a lot of fairly quick cars. I'm now a pensioner who still enjoys progressive driving, but I drive a smart car. It costs sod all to run and is modified to 130bhp. As it only weighs eight hundred and something kilos, it is huge fun. Trouble is, toytown tyres with 4.5J front and 5J rear. Finding QUALITY tyres in 15" is next to impossible.

I have been working as a minicab driver for 4 years. I tried to save money and I used falken, debica, roadstone, hankook ventus3 evo3 and v12 ....... I had many unpleasant experiences and I decided to use michelin primacy 4 to see the difference. I did 28000 miles with michelin and I had 4 mm on the edges and 2 mm in the middle. My car has rear-wheel drive. I certainly save more if I refer to the number of miles and the performance of the premium tyres.

I put some autogrips on the back on my rx8 when i was 20, certainly learnt oversteer.

Great vid btw

I completely agree with you about mixing tyres are bad. Weirdly your test shows a completely legal setup all around the world. But in the UK you could have a different brand of tyres in every corner. It would be interesting to test what happens if you let's say hit a pothole that takes out both tyres on one side (that actually happened to me once on the way to the Ferry) and you fit different tyres to one side.

I wish I’d seen this 5 years ago before I became a “car guy” as this could literally save someone’s life or at least save their car becoming written off. Tyres are number 1 priority before anything else but other people would rather discuss suspension or fuel quality 🙄

Another great review. Could you maybe show the tread comparisons so that we can see the difference between the premium, mid, and budget ranges. You're right about putting cheap tyres on cars. It shouldn't be legal. It's a great idea to have it mandated to be specific grades, perhaps through your MOT. If the government mandated that MOT centres had to sign off on tyre performance, then this might solve the issue. The other option are the insurance companies who could mandate that the vehicle has to have certain grades of tyres to be insured. In a recent service my mechanic gave some sound advice regarding the Low Oil light; he said: Oil is cheap, engines are not. The same applies here; Tyres are cheap, entire cars (because you've wrapped it around a tree) are not.

Hi, great informative video. I currently have Toyo proxos T1 Sport that I'm keeping on front (6mm) & want to go for a different brand for new rears. I'm considering either Maxxis Victra Sport, Yokohama Advan Sport v105 or Falken Azenis FK510 to pair with the Toyo's. Next time around I will change all 4 together. What is your choice for rears with a £150 budget per tyre? Rear wheel drive manual BMW by the way. Thanks

Had a Fiesta mk4 for a few years, nice when I had it but towards the end of its life it was showing its age and milage. Set of bugets on the front please (being a student), oh lord how to make a bad car worse. Going forward I didnt repeat that.. Have eagle F1's XL's on my Octavia and they are great in all weather - however if they so much as sense a snowflake then you are going all directions. Got some Conti winter tyres on 16" steel wheels as the F1's in the snow were the worst I have ever used but otherwise fantastic; just switch them over for the season. Great channel, always happy to see a new video.

Interesting for comparison would have been to have the budget front budget rear to compare times. Otherwise, people may suspect it's just the combination which is bad and not the budget tyres themselves, or at least to be able to see the difference against the premium.

Hi Jonathan, I picked up on your channel and have just started watching a few videos based on your chat with Sam on his "behind the glass show" this is a very worthwhile video, given modern cars suspension setups can now be more accurately tuned into a specific set of tyres these terrifying experiences which we probably don't think would be that bad... will just get worse.. I am thinking specifically of a M3 CS which is very dialled into it's tyres.... and is the main reason it is any quicker at all, than its regular counterpart an M3 Comp. The rest is all about being a run out model. Fortunately, I have spent my life with the principle you never mix brands, cross ply or radials, if you ever knew a cross ply tyre!!.. :-) In the same manner I never repair tyre damage, I replace the whole tyre and all of this becomes even more acute the faster and more expensive a car becomes... given your safety, other people's safety and the value of your car is all highly dependent on a very small contact patch... it is not worth trying to out engineer the millions tyre companies invest in the first place.... You either buy an average multipurpose tyre or a tyre for a specific purpose knowing it will be worse at everything else. i.e. dry -v - wet. and you need to drive accordingly. A great video, well done..

That face of dissapointmen at 5:57 is priceless. It should be meme

Had Kenda in front, barely legal worn out Falken in the back on my Civic Si, on the rain car felt like driving on wet ceramic had almost no grip, switched to a set of Falken FK510's and car feels miles better!

This year it's my first time with mixed tires (Michelin Pilot Sport 4/ Barum Bravuris 3) in my BMW and I totally agree with this test. In the wet corners, when the Michelin is at the limit, the Barum is giving up and the car is drifting. Budget tires ruins the car.

Great stuff as usual! Is it not done then to name the budget tyre, because I need a no-grip tyre for my drift course next month.. I have some idea as to what it could be, Achilles, Wanli, Linglong..?

I have Pirelli P Zeros on my fronts and Pilot Sport 4s on the back, car handles amazing. I have about 11k miles on the Michelins and they're more than halfway worn so I will be replacing all 4 with Pilot 4s next time around, might see some improvement. Fronts have extreme inner toe wear which is from the Maserati factory alignment might see the cords soon here hopefully same time as the Michelins get to the wear bars. Last owner sold it with toasted rear tires. The Pirellis definitely have a stiffer sidewall and they take longer to warm up to grippiness.

Great showing. This is why almost all manufacturers do not recommend mixing tires. Especially true when the difference in grip is so huge. Now tyres have branding labels on wet grip and dry grip, so I presume that it could be made illegal if you drive with a big difference in either wet or dry grip, based on those branding labels. Lets say one tyres has an A, the other has a C. But then spares must be excluded, also spares must be branded as spares /with a sticker/ and must be no more then one spare on a moving vehicle. That is how it should be done. You can lobby that. The difference could be greater , like from A to D , but you get the point. No one should be illegal for getting all cheap tires, but rather for having differently rated tires. This will prevent the mixing of winters with summer tires as well.

For a while I had the Michelin PS4 on the Front and Continental SC 3 on the Back on my BMW 320d. It was the most nervous car I have driven in my life. Terrible when dry and extremely dangerous when it was raining. So having two premium brands on one car doesnt mean it will work out. Putting four tyres of one brand completely solved my problems.

i manage a tyre fitting garage, this video will be replayed many many times. just like your winter tyre video. just last week i fitted 2 budgets to the rear of an R32 . he ordered and paid online. i urged him to reconsider this, as he just may as well have got a golf 1.6 that's how bad for the car it is, i explained. its just the rears he said.

I haven’t driven on new bad car tyres (only Continental) so can’t say but it’s understood in motorcycles that new tires are slippery and you have to ride cautiously for the first 500 or so km. Could that be the case?

Damn 360 spin just like a movie! I want that! /s

Great, thank you! Tyres got so cheap versus 15-20 years ago when I first began driving, that nowadays Goodyear Eagle F1 and Dunlop Sport xxx are within reach with pretty decent money from that point of view. 16-19 even 20 in tyres are not impossible in price in their premium touring and even sporty models. Early 2000's Conti Premium Contact 205/65/15's were more expensive in absolute price than today's 235/55/17 Goodyear Eagle F1... Say 150 Euro Vs 125 Euro today. In 2006 285/60/18 Michelin's or Dunlop's were upwards of 250, even 300 Euro, today it's half or up to 200 Euro. Today 200 Euro is say, 150 in 2006. Then 20's were firm near 500 Euro, today 255/45/19 or 245/40/20 are up to 200 Euro... I have absolutely no doubts for buying premium tyres up to the level of top of the line normal tyres Sport Contact, Eagle F1, Sport Maxx etc. For smaller sizes Dunlop Sport Blue Response is a gem that is around 50-60 Euro. Again premium. One should be mentally ill to buy cheaper than already cheap.

dude you are cool man.. i enjoy watch your videos

I made that mistake when I bought second hand wheels with tyres for my 3 series. Left the budget rears on them as they were fairly new and replaced the fronts with Asymmetric F3s. I thought staggered setup should have more grip in the rear due to bigger width so I should be fine. Boy was I wrong. Cutting across a very big roundabout in the wet (no traffic) it went sideways four times before I straightened out.

Taking a Locost to an airfield we tried 185s front and 175s rear. All the same make and type admittedly. Drifting was unbelievably easy to the point where it was getting boring.

Hello I'm from Poland and while I was working at the tyre shop I learnt thing or two. Continental is overpriced and loud, nothing special really. Pirelli is very good but expensive (both summer and winter). Summer Dunlop and Goodyear are great, very sticky even on wet and very quiet. Michelin is great but also very soft (fast wear). Cooper tyres are surprisingly good and cheap. That's all I know lol :P

I've just picked up a used i20N which had really cheap budgets on it, on research they are £50 per tyre from Camskill. The car was absolutely frightening, losing traction at incredibly low speeds on roundabouts and gave an overall feeling of being very unsafe. A quick change to Eagle F1's totally transformed the car and gave me the confidence in the cars handling. Budgets should come with a warning when they are that bad.