(photo courtesy: svtrichie @ http://ift.tt/1c0MnLp)
Jimmy writes:
I hope this new year finds you well. Back in 2007 I bought a new Hyundai Santa Fe. Nothing special, no ABS or four wheel drive. But it did have 20"s on it with low profile 12 inch wide tires. Later that year I had the chance to drive it in the snow. First time ever. Was not a good time.
The only thing I know about snow is take it slow. And that's what I did. Driving down to the end of my block I gently pressed the brake to slow down easy. No problem, I'm almost stopped and got ready to make a right hand turn. When some where under 10 MPH the rear end whipped around and I found myself sitting sideways in the middle of the street. It took me some time to unclinch my anal orifice from the drivers seat.
I thought driving in snow was closer to suicide but I had to pay the gas bill if I wanted to keep the heat on.
The next four stop signs were no problem. But on the fifth stop sigh I had to make a left turn. And just like the first stop sign, the back end slid around to the right. Having never driven in the snow, I didn't know if this was normal or not. Either way it sucked. Took it too the dealer and had it checked out. No problem. But of course no snow then either.
I just got the car back from the dealer after it's secound oil change. It was cold but not snowing. It was 9 a.m. no wind. The snow wasn't melting. And the roads were in good repair. The snow itself was 12 inches deep and even across the road. I was the first one down the road.
Their is no problem breaking on any other surface. During a hard rain last week I tried to make it do something stupid. It always stopped streight and true. These were not snow tires. They were Mastercraft with less then 7 thousand miles on them.
In each case I don't think I was going more then 7 MPH. Is that too fast ?
I don't know if this should go on the board or not. I'll let you decide. I had one of the tires on my Hyundai Santa Fe come apart from the tire case. I took it to the dealer who said, those arn't Hyundai tires or rims we won't fix it under warranty. Makes since, not factory tires, but installed by the dealer. So I went to where they did the install. They said if I didn't buy it from them, their's no warranty. Before hitting the dealer I looked up "MASTERFCRAFT TIRES" on the internet.
They had a recall for the tires I had. But still no warranty. I'm still pissed off. 1650.00 dollars for a new set of Goodyears. Mastercraft tires according to tirerack.com had a price of 225 each with 80 thousand mile warranty. My tires didn't make it past 7 thousand miles. Also screwed up some body work. But it did remind me to put a lug wrench in car to fit my fancy rims. After auto club took 4 hours to come and change the tire. On the first hot day of the year.
I don't blame the dealer. After all it was almost a year since I bought the car and the window sticker did not have anything on it about the rims and tires. But I do think the mastercraft dealer should have done something.
As a side note: I was originally going to buy a Honda Pick-up SUV thing. But I went on my favorite site, TTAC, and found out the little Honda gets crappy gas milage. I did take the Honda for a test drive, and I couldn't get the sales man to tell me exactly how many miles to gallon it gets. Just like TTAC predicted.
Thanks for the vent.
Sajeev answers:
My luck with off-brand tires on daily driven machines is horrible. After enduring several sets of shamefully bad Maxima (off brand Generals) and Mastercraft tires on vehicles that eventually became my hand-me-downs, I said never more…except for limited use vehicles like my imported Ford Sierra with impossible to find rubber sizes.
And when you combine off-brand all-season tires, aftermarket 20″ wheels and snowy/icy conditions? Oh my damn, son…
That's a terrible combination. There's nothing necessarily wrong with big aftermarket wheels, in theory. But they weren't designed with your car's suspension in mind, and those "recalled" tires were probably sub-par from day one. My advice?
Simple: keep the Dubs for the summer, if you really like them. You need a proper set of winter wheel and tires (factory 16-17″ sizes) so you can go much faster than 7-mph on city streets. You could go, like, 14mph instead. Awesome.
Send your queries to sajeev@thetruthaboutcars.
The post Piston Slap: A Tale of Mastercrafted, Aftermarket Dubs appeared first on The Truth About Cars.
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