Best Tires for the Volkswagen Golf Mk5 1.9 TDI

I drove the Ultra Contact for 4 summer seasons as follows:
Season 1 (April 13-November 5, 2022): 17,643 km (10,963 miles)
Season 2 (April 15-November 11, 2023): 12,596 km (7,827 miles)
Season 3 (April 8-November 9, 2024): 8,362 km (5,196 miles)
Season 4 (April 19-November 18, 2025): 11,733 km (7,290 miles)
TOTAL: 50334 km (31276 miles).
I previously had Uniroyal Rainexpert 3 which were great, lasted 38819 km (24121 miles) in 3 seasons.

CONTINENTAL Ultra Contact: This set of mine was Made in Portugal. It's not less quality if it doesn't say Made in Germany. People often confuse Ultra Contact with UC6, UC7 and NXT. The dimension is 195 65 R15 H mounted on a GOLF MK 5, 1.9 TDI, 105 hp, manual transmission, 2004. production.

WET - excellent aquaplaning, short stopping distance, slightly weaker lateral grip in the wet.

DRY - excellent dry handling, braking and cornering.

NOISE - quiet and comfortable to drive.

WEAR - After driving 50,334 km (31,276 miles), of which 12,520 km (7,779 miles) were driven only on the highway at a speed in the range of 140 - 170 kph (87-105 mph), which is almost 25% of the total mileage. After 4 seasons, the smallest profile depth was 3.9 mm. When we consider the fact that the profile depth of the new UltraContact comes with a depth of 7.5 mm, this is an outstanding result when it comes to wear. The road infrastructure in the Western Balkan countries is of much lower quality than in the rest of Europe. In the summer months of June, July and August, air temperatures in the shade often exceed 40°C (104°F). Road surface temperatures often exceed 60°C (140°F).

CONCLUSION:
The Continental UltraContact is built for very high mileage, balanced on both dry and wet surfaces. The only downside is a small defect on wet roads when it comes to lateral grip. In my opinion, this Continental's model is one of the best in the last 10 years. I will definitely buy it again because it is worth every penny.

Has changed my driving to much more cautious - replaced some Vredstein All Seasons on the front, it now squeals round coners at quite modest speeds in both wet and dry letting go unpredictably , are harsher and noisier and are overall quite tiresome tire to drive on. For me it feels like a big mistake and am really considering binning them with around 1000 miles. I have no idea of them in snow or ice where they might be amazing, but not worth keeping as winter tire because of the poor wet performance. I've had Maxxis before which while not as good as Vredstein, they were safe predicable and honestly not that far off the performance of the Vredstein.

Golf came with Continental tires, poor. Changed to Dunlop's huge improvement on steering grip here in hot Spain, Great safe grippy tire

I replaced a set of Bridgestone Turanza and the noise level significantly dropped in the cabin. Overall pretty good confort and grip, I would definitely recommend them, especially since the price was very good. For the average non-performance car they are a solid choice. Will see how is the wear over time but so far there is no visible wear.

I got the 4 season Kleber Quadraxer 2 tire for in the winter months in Holland, they are very good tire's in the rain and winter conditions!

Pretty much great tire overall. In the dry i had no problems with understeer. In the wet they are not the best tires i tested, some understeer happens quite often but its probably bad road quality in my country that is problem. In the snow i had overall ok perfomance they will pull you almost anywhere but they are just for snow emergency situations, i would not fit them in snowy areas. Wear is amazing, 1.5 years and they are almost as new.

I have a good experience with them. Used the all seasons, 2 winters the tires are kinda done, only this winter are usable but still they have a good drip in the snow and ice.
On heavy rain i've had pretty good grip, almost drove like it was dry, never had aquaplane with them, the noise when they were new was a little high but it's not that much of a problem, after they worn out a little bit the noise disappears.
Handling was very good, didn't had any problem. I do recommend them, and they are pretty cheap.

hello, I replaced my old michelin energy tires which came on my vw golf tdi van new at 100,000kms at the front and the tho rear tires at 103,000 kms. I got the same tires again and I got the four wheels alined , I had a sidewall of one tire damaged some how on one of the new tires so I have been using the spare from the boot for the forth wheel and I got a used tire for the spare. I liked the tires well enough and did all types of driving styles and roads and speeding. the tire size was 195/55R15 91H , I changed the tires last week after covering 60,000kms and the front tires were 2.5mm and the other was 3mm and the rear was 4mm. I replaced the tires with goodyear efficient grip performance wich so far I like but I have done very little driving yet so I will not know for sure how good they are in all weathers and driving styles but so far im very happy. I changed from michelin because of the sidewall problem I had with one tire. and I now sell and fit tires myself with my own shop I can check out all the brands now. thank you for reading