Bridgestone Potenza RE050 Reviews - Page 3

Probably one of the best tires I have ever used. I have them as 215/45/17 on a 1998 Nissan Primera using stock suspension. After using different makes, for all round driving and hard driving it has to be these. My thoughts:

Dry: Excellent take off grip, and exceptional dry handling, never had the car become nearvous on any of the corners at high speed. Using the low profile they generally shake off pot holes and bumps and are a quiet driving tire.

Wet: Probably the best tire i have ever used. Normal driving you can drive like it was a dry day and even grips extremly well. I feel you get minimal aqua planing with these also however they do cause a spray and can sometimes go over your own windscreen as it disperses the few liters of water on the road. Nothing a window wiper doesn't sort. least you have full control over the car. I hit a huge puddle at 60MPH and never pulled me at all..but like i said sprayed the water else where.

Winter: Not good for a winter tire. It struggled on the ice and snow, but there again these are designed for summer.

Wear: People has mixed reviews on this but personal experiance on the Primera, i find the wear acceptable. I managed to get around 15k miles of combined easy and hard driving on them. Make sure you have your tracking done on your car however when these are fitted new...although this should be done on any tire replacement.

Overall....I would not go past these tires. I would be happy to spend the price to purchase these again due to good grip, fun driving, occasiona drag driving, and the most important..safety. These tires will get you out of trouble more than the budgets!!

On the Subaru Impreza WRX these tires are a decent bet.

Good balanced performance in the dry with high levels of feedback and when traction is coming to an end the feeling is nice and progressive. You get scuffing, then understeer with the impreza. Its nice and controlable.

Not as grippy in the wet as something like a Continental Sport Contact 2/3 or the Goodyear Eagle F1. Not as much wet weather progressiveness but thats because they are a harder wearing compound. But the RE050 offers pretty good performance, good aquaplaning resistance and safe braking.

Comfort seems fine. The fact I am not noticing anything major to mention must be a good sign. Again noise seems fine. Certainly no louder than the Eagle F1.

The area these tires outshine the likes of the Sport Contacts and the Eagle F1s is the fact they actually last a reasonable length of time and therefore offer good value for money.

A balanced tire in every sense

Came fitted from the factory on my new Golf. Three days of ownershiop and i almost got stranded in 2 inches of snow. Absolutely hopeless even with full tread depth. Further snow fall meant the car stayed on the drive, in favor of our Fiat Panda third car which coped without issue in 6" of snow even though that doesn't have winter or all season tires.
Wet weather grip was OK when new, but once 50% worn the car had a tendency to feel nervous on white lines even at constatnt speed. Wet cornering mediocre, little confidence and feedback from the tire - i'd have expected better from Bridgestone. Dry performance was good, with no great weaknesses, but nothing special either.
Noise levels were acceptable (Dunlops are much worse apparently on the latest Golf). Comfort levels were fine - reasonable touring tire with a bit of sportiness but i wouldn't fit it to any hot hatch or sports car. This isn't a long life tire - the front tires are at the wear limiters after 14000 miles; not good for a 105bhp car which is driven 60% of its time on dual carriageways. The rear tires will probably last to 22-24k miles, not bad but nothing special. I'll fit the same again to the front axle, but once the rears are worn out i'll be looking elsewhere for the next set.
This winter i'm also fitting winter wheels - the use of summer performance tires in cold, rural climates just doesn't work, even in the UK.