Hey Guys, I have a friend with the aforementioned Camry that wants advice on new tires for her car. I will admit that I don't know that much about tires as far as letter ratings go. I'd appreciate any advice that I can pass along to her about her tires. She commutes about 90 miles per day to work as a nurse at Vanderbilt so she does travel around 75 mph per day for quite a distance. The rest is stop and go and she travels in the ice and snow too, along with the rain. She's a careful driver, and a great friend, so I'd appreciate any and all advice. Here's the email she sent me about what she's done in the past.

Hey Charlie,
I need new tires for my car. My old tires have a "V" speed.......I don't remember why I chose them??????? (too long ago LOL) In choosing my new ones, is there a better reason to choose "V" versus "T" versus, I believe it's "H"???? I'm not sure I really understand for sure which one would be superior for my Camry, although the "T" would seem to be adequate. What would you recommend?

 

Have a look at
http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tirete....jsp?techid=35

It explains the basic ratings system and how the letters relate to the max speed ratings as well as which speed rating tire is commonly used for which type of vehicle.

As far as ride and handling vs speed rating goes check out
http://www.kumhousa.com/tire/basics/rating-selection

At the bottom it describes the tradeoff between speed rating and ride comfort.

What's on the car now? P195/60R17 88H. For example.

 

Basically, she's asking you about speed ratings... A V. Rated tire is good for like 149mph, H is good for 130, and T is good for 112...

The T rated tire would seem adequate for her car, though less grippy than the H or V, unless she does lots of high speed interstate driving... From what I understand, tires wear out faster as you approach their rated speed, so if she routinely cruises over 100mph(160km/h), I would recommend at least a H rated tire...

Just one more thing to consider, generally speaking, the lower the tires speed rating, the higher it's tread life rating would be... That's the 440 A B (for example) that would be on her sidewall...I've seen T rated tires with 800 tread life ratings before, and they last forever when equipped... As an example, I generally use up a 400 rated tire in about 18-20k miles with spirited driving, sometimes less...

 

Thanks for the replies, guys. I'll relay the information and let her decide. No sense spending money on a V rated tire, from my point of view, as she's not an aggressive driver at all. She usually just drives the speed limit or a little under. I don't know what she has on her car right now, derf. My wife and I will be spending the night at her house this coming Sunday as we're taking her in for some cancer surgery on Monday morning. Poor little woman just had thyroid cancer surgery 3 months ago and now she's got breast cancer. She's tough as hell, but I don't know how much more she can take. Y'all say a prayer for Anna Marie. We love her like a sister.

 

In my thoughts