Interesting . . . My experience with various auto tires is limited. I'll
take note of the wet/dry/cement/asphalt performance of the Contis and get
back to the list. Regarding the Continentals being extremely expensive, that
wasn't my experience in this particular instance. Michelins were
expensive--nearly twice as much. Would have liked to have gone with them,
though. They get pretty high marks from the volks who use them.

Chad
Minneapolis
'87 Wolfy
----------
>From: Andrew Grebneff <andrew.grebneff@STONEBOW.OTAGO.AC.NZ>
>To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
>Subject: Re: Reinforced Tires - was Yokohama Tires Revisited
>Date: Thu, Mar 22, 2001, 5:12 PM
>

>>Spec-wise, the Contis are solid. Here's the link:
>>
>>http://www.tirerack.com/tires/Spec.jsp?make=Continental&model=Contact+CR21
>>
>>Might have mentioned this, but my previous tires were 205s, brand unknown.
>>Might
>>have been Uniroyal. Although they were nice tires in perfect weather, they were
>>terrible winter tires for me. Too wide. I went through a stretch of being stuck
>>every time I parked it anywhere near snow or ice, of which there is plenty in
>>Minnesota. The Continentals were an enormous improvement. Adding a little
>>weight
>>in the back end didn't hurt either.
>
>I was talking to a tire outfit on Monday re tires for 16" & 17" alloy
>wheels. The guy said that Continentals are very poor tires, as well as
>extremely expensive. They are designed for CONCRETE roads, where they work
>well in wet & dry. But on oily asphalt roads (as most paved roads are) they
>are slippery as hell, even in the dry (this was my own experience with
>Conti Twins bike tires... an old rubber-framed Honda CB350 Twin with
>near-zero cornering clearance, but you couldn't even scrape the footpegs as
>the rear Conti would let go!).
>
>So the Conti 205/55R16 ContiTouringContacts on my CLK wheels will have to go!
>