bias ply tires
It appears that the R-Vision I bought, has Bias ply tires. Should I go back with those or Radials. Thanks Jim
Forum Discussion
The problem with the testing report provided by users of forums like this is that by and large you only get the negative reports. You don't hear anything from all the people that had no problems with a particular tire. This leads to a negative bias against popular brands - which may not fail frequently as a percentage, but appear to because there are so many of them in use.
Let's just assume for a minute that, on average, all tires are subjected to the same amount of good/bad care and therefore we can ignore things like over-loading, going too fast, under-inflation, road hazards, and so forth. (IMO, this is not something that we can assume, but let's do it anyway just to see what we can learn.)
Based on the information you've gleaned from forums, for each of the following please provide the failure rate as a percentage of the sample size, and the size of the sample (so that statistical significance can be calculated):
GoodYear Marathon
Carlisle
LT tires (of various brands)
Maxxis (Bias play and radial)
TowMax (and related brands) (Bias ply and radial)
Greenball (and related brands) (Bias ply and radial)
(add in other brands, as appropriate)
This sort of thing CAN and IS done with independent testing for other products. Not ST tires, unfortunately, though.
Consumer Reports gathers data from MANY people about the reliability of various cars, appliances, and the like. While anecdotal in nature, it includes both positive and negative reports (unlike the forums) and they get enough of it from their members to establish statistical significance. They don't report data for a particular model if they don't get enough responses for it to be statistically significant. They also do their own independent testing of these things, buying a number of samples from local retailers. They're funded by their members, not advertisers or other entities with an interest. Their reporting isn't perfect, but tends to be more accurate and useful than other sources.
They don't really do this for tires (they just test traction and handling, not reliability) and not at all for trailer tires. Either they or someone else could though, using the same model.
Let's just assume for a minute that, on average, all tires are subjected to the same amount of good/bad care and therefore we can ignore things like over-loading, going too fast, under-inflation, road hazards, and so forth. (IMO, this is not something that we can assume, but let's do it anyway just to see what we can learn.)
Based on the information you've gleaned from forums, for each of the following please provide the failure rate as a percentage of the sample size, and the size of the sample (so that statistical significance can be calculated):
GoodYear Marathon
Carlisle
LT tires (of various brands)
Maxxis (Bias play and radial)
TowMax (and related brands) (Bias ply and radial)
Greenball (and related brands) (Bias ply and radial)
(add in other brands, as appropriate)
This sort of thing CAN and IS done with independent testing for other products. Not ST tires, unfortunately, though.
Consumer Reports gathers data from MANY people about the reliability of various cars, appliances, and the like. While anecdotal in nature, it includes both positive and negative reports (unlike the forums) and they get enough of it from their members to establish statistical significance. They don't report data for a particular model if they don't get enough responses for it to be statistically significant. They also do their own independent testing of these things, buying a number of samples from local retailers. They're funded by their members, not advertisers or other entities with an interest. Their reporting isn't perfect, but tends to be more accurate and useful than other sources.
They don't really do this for tires (they just test traction and handling, not reliability) and not at all for trailer tires. Either they or someone else could though, using the same model.
