Best Tires for the Skoda Fabia 3 hatchback

Used these tires for 2 seasons. Mostly drive in the city, but 5-10 times per season driving 200+ km on autobahns. Since my car Skoda Fabia has just 55kw i can not describe the handling quality. I even has never lost the traction on dry asphalt due to a low engine power, but while doing more agressive turn the tire a bit "floats", but maybe it's just a feature of my fatty size. I can only compare Kleber to my older Nexen N'blue HD and they are definitely better in terms of wet grip and comfort. Wear is (i don't know) let's say OK. Overall, a nice and safe enough tire for a more relaxed city/autobahn cruiser.

I bought these Falken AS210 tires in November 2018 but have not yet had an opportunity to use them on ice or snow. What I have noticed is that the grip appears far better than the Bridgestone Turanza ER300 summer tires that originally came on the car (a Skoda Fabia). I have a long steep driveway (90'; 1 in 6) and reversing up it in my Skoda Fabia on the Bridgestone tires was not the smoothest as the car shuddered on the way up (in reverse). I thought this was because the car had a small engine but with the Falken AS210 tires reversing up the drive is no problem and far smoother.
In terms of mileage, to date I seem to be averaging about 2 miles per gallon less on the Falkens than on the Bridgestones but as I have only driven circa 1,500 miles so far on the Falkens I would treat this comparison only as 'indicative' at this time. The ride strikes me as being a little firmer on the Falken tires while the noise levels appear similar to those I experienced with the Bridgestone tires..

Got them on my new fabia 2 years ago, i done 55,000km with them, first 40,000km was great for the tires value, great grip on dry and wit roads, they give me the confidence to drive on 120km/h on highway in a middle of rainstorm and they performed well, average in noise and comfortable , they starts to lose grip on hills and wet road on 45,000km and they a bit noisy, not the worst but they need to be replaced.

Pros:

+ Excellent grip in the dry. Just as good in the wet, best tire I have had in these conditions
+ Very quiet, hardly any noise even at motorway speeds
+ Great comfort even with cars that have hard suspensions
+ Best tire I have owned for minimizing tramlining, especially if you travel regularly on bad road surfaces
+ Best road feel. I have owned Dunlops, Yokohamas, Continentals, Pirellis & Bridgestones. The Good Year beats them all in this.

Cons:

- Very soft quality rubber, can easily pick up damage from scrubbing a pavement & even potholes
- Can wear out quicker than other brand tires. This was also pointed out by a very experienced tire mechanic

Overall: I always thought these tires were all hype after reading some reviews. But after trying a pair on my old Skoda Fabia, there is no going back. Improved the handling a lot over the Bridgestones & Pirellis I previously had fitted. Just a note that as pointed out in the cons, you will most likely be replacing these more than other tires in the same price range.

Note that this review is for when I had these tires on my Skoda Fabia 1.6 105 bhp which I eventually sold.

Good:

Very good quality material used. Did maybe 8000 miles before I sold the car & they still looked like new

Very stylish design. Best looking tire I have seen.

Quiet. Could not notice any road noise.

Good grip in dry weather.

Bad:

Very expensive & poor for their performance. See the below points.

Suffers badly from wheelspin in damp & wet weather. I had these on the front & even when I wanted to accelerate away a bit quicker than normal, the wheels would go into a spinning frenzy. My Fabia was hardly a monster & nor did I go around like a boy racer, but for the price I paid I would have gone for a budget make instead which would have had the same issues & saved a lot of money.

Driving in the rain felt like I was on ice. No feel at all.

Can make the steering tramline. Not the worst I have experienced, but again not impressed.

Overall:

For the price I cannot recommend these. I got two Goodyear F1 AS2s, stuck them on the front & the Pirellis on the back. The difference was much better. No wheelspin, fantastic in the wet, & good road feedback. The only thing is that the Goodyears were softer than the Pirellis & looked more visibly worn out but gave a lot more confidence in all driving conditions.

Advertised as a low rolling resistance tire, I was taken aback by the increase in noise over the OEM Dunlop SP10A's of the same size when I drove it out of the tire suppliers yard. Soon found out where the energy for all the noise was coming from as MPG dropped from a 46mpg average to 41mpg. Wears better than the Dunlops, but not by enough to pay for the extra fuel. Pretty well worn out at 22,000 miles (Dunlops shot at 20,000m).

On my car these tires were absollutley useless in snow and ice. Anyone buying this model with these tires on should be told they will need a set of winter tires as well to drive safely. Skoda Fabia 3 , 1.4 hatch.