Good choices for AT tires (1 Viewer)

[BobinBend]

I’ve mentioned it in other posts but looks like I will be buying new tires as soon as I can for my gx470. It has a 2.0-2.5” lift from Radflo and then I have stock wheels with spidertrax spacers. I currently have Toyo AT 2s which have done well mostly, but they have not been so great in snow/icy stuff. I do live in the PNW and drive in wet highway conditions mostly, but also do some driving in mud, dirt, or unimproved roads to get in to fish or access areas. I have also taken it slowly up some pretty rocky stuff in the occasional weekend trip. And then we deal with snow/ice once in a while and I also head over the cascade passes a few times a year which can be nasty. So basically a tire for everyday use but still handle the ice snow and trails.
I have been back and forth on deciding on tires (I apologize to those who have given me good advice that I haven’t acted on yet), but I’m hoping I can get some good feedback on the ones I am considering.

Please post if you can help with supporting recommendations on any of these for my kind of conditions (or any cautions on problems you have experienced). Your feedback is truly welcomed as I need to pull the trigger pretty quick.

I’m looking at the following;
Nitto Ridge Grapplers
Goodyear Wrangler Duratracs
Falken Wildpeaks
Cooper Stt
KO2s -I think I am removing these based on the balancing issues and wet road manners I read about

 

[JT4runner]

I’ve mentioned it in other posts but looks like I will be buying new tires as soon as I can for my gx470. It has a 2.0-2.5” lift from Radflo and then I have stock wheels with spidertrax spacers. I currently have Toyo AT 2s which have done well mostly, but they have not been so great in snow/icy stuff. I do live in the PNW and drive in wet highway conditions mostly, but also do some driving in mud, dirt, or unimproved roads to get in to fish or access areas. I have also taken it slowly up some pretty rocky stuff in the occasional weekend trip. And then we deal with snow/ice once in a while and I also head over the cascade passes a few times a year which can be nasty. So basically a tire for everyday use but still handle the ice snow and trails.
I have been back and forth on deciding on tires (I apologize to those who have given me good advice that I haven’t acted on yet), but I’m hoping I can get some good feedback on the ones I am considering.

Please post if you can help with supporting recommendations on any of these for my kind of conditions (or any cautions on problems you have experienced). Your feedback is truly welcomed as I need to pull the trigger pretty quick.

I’m looking at the following;
Nitto Ridge Grapplers
Goodyear Wrangler Duratracs
Falken Wildpeaks
Cooper Stt
KO2s -I think I am removing these based on the balancing issues and wet road manners I read about

All of those are good but I will give my opinion on the ones that I have had.

The Goodyear Duratrac is a good tire. It is between an A/T and M/T. I kept mine balanced and rotated as they should and got almost 70k miles out of them. Of course the more wear on them the louder they got but overall not a bad tire.

I had the Falken Wildpeak MT on my 4runner and they are a true mud tire. They are loud and not good in rain but did excellent off road.

I currently have the KO2 on my 100 series LX and I love these tires. They aren't loud at all and have great on road manners yet do great off road on trails.

I have a few buddies with the Nitto Ridge Grappler on their FJ's and 4runners and I haven't seen any bad reviews on them yet.

Are you talking about the Cooper STT Pro mud tire? I can't give an honest review on that tire but as being a mud tire I am sure they have true mud tire manners. Have you looked at the Cooper ST Maxx??

 

[BobinBend]

Thanks, that is good to know on the Duratracs and sounds like you love your BFGs so maybe I shouldn’t rule them out yet. I don’t know much about the coopers St or max, but had them on my list to look at.
The wildpeaks look like it checks all the boxes and my only holdback on the nittos is my worry on snow/ice traction going over passes. Duratracs sounds like it works great too. Argh. Dang tough Decisions

 

[JT4runner]

Thanks, that is good to know on the Duratracs and sounds like you love your BFGs so maybe I shouldn’t rule them out yet. I don’t know much about the coopers St or max, but had them on my list to look at.
The wildpeaks look like it checks all the boxes and my only holdback on the nittos is my worry on snow/ice traction going over passes. Duratracs sounds like it works great too. Argh. Dang tough Decisions

It really is a tough decision. To me the best tire out of those are the BFG's. They look a little aggressive, not loud on the highway and do good on trails. I think it really depends on how much you drive, the terrain you drive and what type of tire you are looking for. Hopefully the feedback I have given helps out some. Go to Discount Tire and look at some of the different reviews and hopefully others will chime in and give their opinions.

 

[JT4runner]

Not to make your decision more difficult but I would add two more tires to that list. I have heard and see really good reviews on the Toyo Open Country AT2 and also the Toyo RT tire.

 

[BobinBend]

I actually have the AT 2s now. But the snow performance wasn’t as good as I had hoped. Maybe the 285 size has bigger spaces between the lugs and will help with that?

 

[BobinBend]

Just a little more info... I stopped in to my local discount tire and looked at a few tires... they had the wildpeaks, Duratracs, KO2s and some wrangler ultraterrains that looked a lot like the KO2s. the ultraterrains looked pretty good for snow, ice and even off-road actually. Most of them are in the 54-58lb range. Might add the Ultraterrains to my short list with the wildpeaks. The ridge grapplers look great, just not sure of snow /ice performance.
I think I will make my decision this weekend and get them this next week. Now I’m wondering if discount tire does alignments too?

 

[skidplate]

Just put the Falken wild peak AT 3W on my truck and did a 1,000 mile trip. Love the performance and they look nice as well.

 

[BobinBend]

Well... I made up my mind (99% sure anyway). Getting some wrangler ultraterrains installed on Thursday. A little lighter than the wildpeaks and what looks like a good snow/ice and trail tread have to say thanks to everyone for the help and advice. I will post up what they look like and then how they perform.

 

[BobinBend]

Well... remember I said “99% sure”... so when I had my tire install scheduled we had a big windstorm knocking out our power for a day or so. I called and my call was transferred to a different discount tire. They apologized and then I finally went in and they could not find my ultraterrains. I said I needed them to head out of town over the pass.
The Folks at discount tire were very helpful and finally offered me some KO2s at the same price. And they said drive on these and if you really don’t like them we will put the ultraterrains on when you get back from your trip.
Lots of snow and icy road driving later, they work pretty damn well. So now I might just keep them.
I did some trimming and still have some rubbing I need to fix. And I probably need some new UCAs now (so might ask for recommendations on JBA or Toal Chaos, etc)

 

[BobinBend]

One more pic from earlier today

 

[JT4runner]

Man keep those! The KO2 looks great on that GX.

 

[Tak555]

i'm sorry, what size did you end up going with?

 

[BobinBend]

285/70/17 (6 ply) on the stock rims with spider trax spacers. We trimmed a little but I still need some help getting some of the rubbing dealt with. They sure seemed sticky in the mountain snow and ice.

 

[Tak555]

oh 285... they look really good! do you mind sharing how much they were?

 

[BobinBend]

Discount tire was great to work with and out the door mounted and balanced... I think it was about $1000