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Tyres

The decision to change the tyres on the defender was an easy one to make.
It came with General Grabber TR 235 / 85 / R16 as standard on 16 inch Boost Alloys (7J Width). During the summer months these tyres seemed fine. In fact we were very happy with the way gripped the road and they gave reasonable grip off the road for anything that we needed to traverse.

The cracks in their performance started to appear when summer ended and it started to get wet. The off road traction was reduced considerably and in some instances we were getting aquaplaning. This combined with the fact that we wanted to upgrade to a beefier looking tyre and one with slightly more off-road ability meant that we started shopping around.

Which Tyre?

While searching for new tyres we made the following observations and were given the following advise:
- The side channels (Sipes) on the Grabbers are blocked - a trait characteristic of a sand tyre
- The wider the tyre the more likely it is to aquaplane
- An all-terrain tyre would probably give similar performance to the Grabber tyre on the road, whereas a dedicated road-tyre will give the best road performance
- Softer compounds give better tarmac and wet traction but wear out quicker

We shortlisted the 3 most popular All Terrain tyres and these were:

1. BFGoodrich All Terrain AT KO
2. Pirelli Scorpion A/T
3. Goodyear Wrangler ATR

The BFGoodrich is probably the most popular tyre and is recommended by many people as a good 50/50 biased tyre which are apparently good for 75k miles. The Pirelli is a less common tyre with a 60/40 road bias, but they are rumoured to have a soft compound which affects their lifespan. The Goodyear was recommended as a solid all-rounder for comparison purposes.

Note: The BFG's seem to last for ever but this, as we discovered, is due to the fact that the compound becomes progressively harder as they wear down.

With all this information we headed into our local tyre supplier Tom Geraghty Tyres Waterford. We lined up the BFG AT KO, the Pirelli Scorpion AT and our own Grabbers. With the help of Dave and using all of the info that we had accumulated we decided on the Pirelli's.

Pirelli Scorpion AT 265/75 r16

This came down to a number of factors:
1. The tread pattern was the only one to have directional clearing (good for wet driving).
2. The sipes were larger all the way round to give good mud and water clearance.
3. The sidewall technology and pattern seemed to be much the same as the BFG but the BFG tread was less directional and quite interlocked.
4. They were the softer compound which may mean that they wouldn't last as long
but they will definitely give good traction on road.

€640 lighter we were on our new rubber.

So, Had we made the right choice? I am glad to say yes.

We had to wait about a week until we had some good heavy rain, but as soon as we did we were out and testing. We were astonished at the difference. The under-steer has completely disappeared. Gunning it into wet roundabouts now is like driving a car, albeit with more body roll but it handles like its on rails. Our early brake locking has disappeared as well and aquaplaning is basically a thing of the past. You still get it when you hit a full on massive section of standing water at 60mph but you'd get that in anything.

So we're delighted with the Scorpions and wouldn't hesitate in recommending them to anyone. They also look badass (as they are 30mm wider than the old ones) and given the more balloon style side wall they have also made the ride that little more comfy as the side wall is able compress and absorb more of the vertical force experienced on bumps.

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