Today one of my coworkers pointed out my rear left tire was looking low. This was strange as FLI had said they had left all my tires at the correct pressure when I got the car serviced yesterday. When I tested it on my lunch the tire was flat. I filled it up with an air compressor and drove it to BigO because they were near by and still open thinking I can get my flat fixed and be on the way. Turns out the sidewall was "bubbled" so the tire is fu*ked. Even better, the tire shop won't replace a single tire as they claim awd tires must be replaced in sets of 4. This makes sense but if anyone wants to confirm or call bull**** on this, please do.

Basically unless I can find a similar wear Potenza to get mounted by someone who will do such a thing, it appears I'm in the market for a set of new tires. I'm leaning towards toyo proxes 4, but once more I'm open to advice. Basically I want a performance allseason tire with m+s rating. Lastly anyone in the Sonoma County have advice on a shop where I can get proxes 4s for a decent price. BigO quoted me $637 with tax and labor.

/cry Now I'm never gonna have cash for a radio.

 

Bull****. Big O just trying to make some money off you. Take your car to America's Tire. Get a tire, and their lifetime roadhazard warranty.

 

if your tires are nearing the end of their life, then yeah, you need to replace all 4. If they are still pretty new, then you might be safe with purchasing one new tire. If they are somewhere in the middle, you can always buy one tire and get it shaved down to match the other 3. I have heard it is a fairly inexpensive process. I do not know what tire shops do that though.

On a side note, I highly suggest purchasing your tires from America's Tire w/ their warrenty. If you have purchased from them you get great service and they do good work (much much better than Big O imo. I have had nothing but horrible experiences with Big O)

 

^^^^ True, Big O more like "Big Ole Heart Burn, and Troubles". Americas Tires w/ RH will make you much happier, only thing to have gone wrong with AT was a stripped stud which they replaced for free Also you can usually claim a tire that is on your car that was not purcahsed throught them. Good luck, and hope you get your car back on the road.

 

I work at America's tire co, and yes if your tires a to worn you will need all four. Its not trying to make money, i have had to personally call subaru service for advice on this type of thing. And personally i would rather pay for 4 tires then a new drive train. If you want to pm me with more details ( size and estimated price range) i can give you some suggetions.

 

Don't mean to jack the thread, and I believe this was discussed not too long ago, although I don't remember where, but is it bad to drive on your donut equipped with the car if you have upgraded rims and tires?

 

If you do get 4 new tires, I suggest Falken Azenis RT-615's. They are a great replacement for the RE070's with similar dry performance and much better wet performance. I just got mine at America's Tire a couple of months ago and they have already come down in price. I think they are less than $150 a tire now.

 

My original stock tires didn't have enough wear to replace them outright at this point but were starting to get to the end of their lifespan. Considering 1 is toast and the others are far from new, it would be a waste to buy 1 tire and shave it down or anything else of that nature. I'm on the stock 04 STi BBS rims so I believe the size is 225/45-17 I'm looking for Toyo Proxes 4 or a similar all season M+S performance tire.

Thanks again,
Matt

 

read your owners manual dood, it states that the if the tire wear is uneven and the circumference of the tires is uneven then you can cause damage to your transmission or differential.

think about it this way.
it takes less distance for a smaller wheel to complete a single rotation then a larger wheel.

or

think about how a record or CD player works. Depending on how far in or out the the needle or laser is, the disc will decrease or increase speed. Now apply this same concept to mismatched size tires.

All the wheels need to spin at the same speed, if one is bigger or smaller then this can damage the diff or tranny depending where the unmatched wheel is.

 

I used to work at America's Tire, and like everyone else it saying, yes it sucks but you need to buy all 4. My advice is to find a tire that has a mileage warranty. That way, if something like this happens you will get prorated on all 4 tires, not just one with a certificate from America's Tire which only covers the 1 bad tire.

Though, with that in mind, it's very hard to find a V-rated tire that has a mileage warranty on it. In fact, afaik there's only 2. The Bridgestone RE950 and Falken ZE-512. Though, remember, the higher the mileage warranty obviously the less grip it will have due to being a harder rubber.

 

Thanks again everyone for the advice. It appears I will be replacing all 4 tires and Americas Tires is the frontrunner for where to get it done.

 

Here's a good article from the Tire Rack about it: http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tirete....jsp?techid=18

For acceptable tire difference Subaru specifies: Within 1/4-inch of tire circumference or about 2/32-inch of each other in remaining tread depth.