Ecopia EP422 tires suck

I put my money where my mouth was and replaced our worn Ecopias with Michelins in June. I expected and immediately received fewer miles/kWh, but now after 7000 miles I kind of wish for Ecopias again. The cold weather performance is now in the lower 50s. For the first time, this week we stopped at city hall for 30 minutes of charge (free) to get home. LeafDD gave us the confidence to roll into the garage with 13 Gids. Just another day....

HighDesertDriver said:

I put my money where my mouth was and replaced our worn Ecopias with Michelins in June. I expected and immediately received fewer miles/kWh, but now after 7000 miles I kind of wish for Ecopias again. The cold weather performance is now in the lower 50s. For the first time, this week we stopped at city hall for 30 minutes of charge (free) to get home. LeafDD gave us the confidence to roll into the garage with 13 Gids. Just another day....

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Thanks for your post.

I replaced my tires with Ecopias after seeing the reports of reduced range. I'm glad of the choice now. We will be be lucky to get out of the 30's this week, I need every mile/kWh I can get

JPWhite said:

...I replaced my tires with Ecopias after seeing the reports of reduced range. I'm glad of the choice now. We will be be lucky to get out of the 30's this week, I need every mile/kWh I can get

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JP,

Do you (or anyone else) have accurate estimates of the loss of efficiency/range when replacing OE Ecopias with new ones?

Has anyone found any replacement tires with efficiency similar or superior to Ecopias?

It has a lot to do with how worn your old tires are when you replace them, as a new tire, even of the same make and brand, is less efficient than an old tire. I replaced my Ecrapias fairly early in their life due to the fact that I simply did not like how they handled and I felt that they were fairly fragile based on anecdotal evidence. I took a hit of about 4% when I did. Now, some 30,000 miles later, it is closer to 2%... Well worth it to me. And remember, if you do most of your driving in highway or freeways, it will have less effect as wind resistance becomes the predominate influence at higher speeds...

edatoakrun said:

Do you (or anyone else) have accurate estimates of the loss of efficiency/range when replacing OE Ecopias with new ones?

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edatoakrun said:

JPWhite said:

...I replaced my tires with Ecopias after seeing the reports of reduced range. I'm glad of the choice now. We will be be lucky to get out of the 30's this week, I need every mile/kWh I can get

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JP,

Do you (or anyone else) have accurate estimates of the loss of efficiency/range when replacing OE Ecopias with new ones?

Has anyone found any replacement tires with efficiency similar or superior to Ecopias?

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After putting the new Ecopias on, the miles/kWh did drop about 0.2 miles, the old tires were pretty worn and in need of replacement. As far as I am aware the tires I put on are identical to the OEM tires.

TomT said:

It has a lot to do with how worn your old tires are when you replace them, as a new tire, even of the same make and brand, is less efficient than an old tire. I replaced my Ecrapias fairly early in their life due to the fact that I simply did not like how they handled and I felt that they were fairly fragile based on anecdotal evidence. I took a hit of about 4% when I did. Now, some 30,000 miles later, it is closer to 2%... Well worth it to me. And remember, if you do most of your driving in highway or freeways, it will have less effect as wind resistance becomes the predominate influence at higher speeds...

edatoakrun said:

Do you (or anyone else) have accurate estimates of the loss of efficiency/range when replacing OE Ecopias with new ones?

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with all your range loss due to pack degradation, how can you determine that 2% is caused by the tires?

Ecrapias
Nice!

Bogustone Ecrapias!

DaveinOlyWA said:

...with all your range loss due to pack degradation, how can you determine that 2% is caused by the tires?

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I was wondering the same thing.

As I'm not convinced that I can estimate my own loss of available battery capacity, even from multiple range tests, to as close as "2%", nor do I anticipate being able to do so after:

...I replace my tires and see what sort of efficiency loss results...

...in my own real world use, and now with only 11 capacity bars (I lost the first on 8/22/13, during a 730 mile trip to the Bay Area) my LEAF still goes ~ the same distance as it did ~2 years ago, on a “100%” charge.

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http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=9064&start=30" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I know and recorded what my M/Kwh is on the routes I drive regularly from the day I first got the car... I assume that any efficiency change is due to tires as everything else should pretty much be a constant and I use a long term average... I'm not justifying the numbers, just reporting what I get and how they have changed over time...

DaveinOlyWA said:

with all your range loss due to pack degradation, how can you determine that 2% is caused by the tires?

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i miss the range, but at least once a week i am glad for the better mxv4s.
i mean, we have no spare, right?
yn(eeds)mv

Exactly!

thankyouOB said:

i miss the range, but at least once a week i am glad for the better mxv4s.
i mean, we have no spare, right?

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I just switched from the stock Ecopia to the Michelin Energy Saver http://www.michelinman.com/tire-sel...ssan/LEAF/SL/PS/BNW/energy-saver/tire-details. Since I switched for the Ecopia (totally worn out) I got a .4 hit on the Miles/KWh (from 4.0 to 3.6) but I think part of this is due to the weather. The temperature dropped 20F (from 60s to 40s) just before I got the new tires so I have not been able to measure my efficiency with the new tires in the same conditions I had measured the worn out Ecopia. But so far I'm pretty happy. The road noise is noticeably lower and the car feels more responsive in the corners.

BTW, I got those tires through Walmart.com. What looked like a decent proposition at first ($149, free shipping) turned into a mini quagmire: The tires shipped the next day and were delivered by Fedex at the pickup store 3 days later. But the store "misplaced" the tires and I had to wait for 2 weeks for them to "find" them (basically they would not want to look for my order until the original delivery date was expired). Then when I finally got the set mounted on the car I found out one of the tires had been produced 5 years ago. It's borderline with the 6 years limit some experts say tires start to become unsafe. I guess that's why Walmart can sell then $50 below other places, they sell tires other vendors won't. Just be careful if you buy tires from them.

TomT said:

Exactly!

thankyouOB said:

i miss the range, but at least once a week i am glad for the better mxv4s.
i mean, we have no spare, right?

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+1 Having lost two Ecopias to road hazards, I would rather have security than mileage, but . . . I still miss the mileage. ICI'ing now for a short trip while the Leaf charges for a 30 mile run with heat tonight. When new, the car could make that trip twice without charging.

ericsf said:

I just switched from the stock Ecopia to the Michelin Energy Saver http://www.michelinman.com/tire-sel...ssan/LEAF/SL/PS/BNW/energy-saver/tire-details. Since I switched for the Ecopia (totally worn out) I got a .4 hit on the Miles/KWh (from 4.0 to 3.6) but I think part of this is due to the weather. The temperature dropped 20F (from 60s to 40s) just before I got the new tires so I have not been able to measure my efficiency with the new tires in the same conditions I had measured the worn out Ecopia. But so far I'm pretty happy. The road noise is noticeably lower and the car feels more responsive in the corners.

BTW, I got those tires through Walmart.com. What looked like a decent proposition at first ($149, free shipping) turned into a mini quagmire: The tires shipped the next day and were delivered by Fedex at the pickup store 3 days later. But the store "misplaced" the tires and I had to wait for 2 weeks for them to "find" them (basically they would not want to look for my order until the original delivery date was expired). Then when I finally got the set mounted on the car I found out one of the tires had been produced 5 years ago. It's borderline with the 6 years limit some experts say tires start to become unsafe. I guess that's why Walmart can sell then $50 below other places, they sell tires other vendors won't. Just be careful if you buy tires from them.

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sorry to hear that. and thanks for the warning to others.
i use and recommend a tire store for tires. maybe costco, which is less of a grift than walmart. ymmv or need to.
my tire store has a bay just for checking and topping up air in your four tires. i use it often.

thankyouOB said:

i miss the range, but at least once a week i am glad for the better mxv4s.
i mean, we have no spare, right?
yn(eeds)mv

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We have no spare, but in 37,000 miles of driving I've only had one road hazard to deal with. Small nail created a slow puncture. In fact I had no idea of the puncture until the LEAF Battery app started to beep. The leaky tire looked OK, but was down 10 pounds.

With no spare tire I'd say the most valuable item is the LEAF battery app. Any tire can pickup a nail and leak.

JPWhite said:

thankyouOB said:

i miss the range, but at least once a week i am glad for the better mxv4s.
i mean, we have no spare, right?
yn(eeds)mv

Click to expand...

We have no spare, but in 37,000 miles of driving I've only had one road hazard to deal with. Small nail created a slow puncture. In fact I had no idea of the puncture until the LEAF Battery app started to beep. The leaky tire looked OK, but was down 10 pounds.

With no spare tire I'd say the most valuable item is the LEAF battery app. Any tire can pickup a nail and leak.

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Will the battery app go and get me a spare from the nearest salvage yard, cleaning it up if needed and paying any excess in cost? If so, I'm getting me an Android phone! Because any Ecopia tire can just blow out and be unrepairable.

It's been almost three weeks since I've replaced the stock Ecopia with the Michelin Energy Saver now and I've finally been able to compare my mileage to what it used to be. Just after the switch, cold weather came in and my mileage took a nose dive. Tonight it was the same temperature (mid 50s), no wind, fluid traffic and I was able to drive the same flat stretch of freeway exactly the same way I did just before ditching the Ecopia (60mph on cruise control, climate off).

The verdict: The brand new Michelin get me the same mileage as the worn out Ecopia. I might even say the Michelin might be a bit less than 0.1 better (4.2 vs 4.3 for the Michelin).

To be precise I got the summer version, not the A/S version of the Energy Saver. I also got the specific model made for Mercedes which is almost 2 pounds lighter than the VW version per tire (Michelin part #: 08947). Interestingly the summer Energy Saver is a more expensive tire than the A/S but I figured a tire designed for snow and mud and not just rain and dry has to have some compromises somewhere. My LEAF will never see a flake a snow so I'm fine with a summer tire all year long. Needless to say that handling is much improved and road noise seem to have decreased too. Now that I've been able to check that my mileage is the same as before I totally recommend the Energy Saver.

Thanks for the feedback on the Energy Savers. In Prius-land they are well known to be basically the best. But they are expensive. TireRack lists them as $201/ea!

Anyone try the Goodyear Fuel Max on a LEAF? They seem to do well on the Prius as well.

drees said:

Thanks for the feedback on the Energy Savers. In Prius-land they are well known to be basically the best. But they are expensive. TireRack lists them as $201/ea!

Anyone try the Goodyear Fuel Max on a LEAF? They seem to do well on the Prius as well.

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Yes, the MSRP is $200 but got them for $149 at Walmart.com - no shipping cost added.

ericsf said:

Tonight it was the same temperature (mid 50s), no wind, fluid traffic and I was able to drive the same flat stretch of freeway exactly the same way I did just before ditching the Ecopia (60mph on cruise control, climate off).

The verdict: The brand new Michelin get me the same mileage as the worn out Ecopia. I might even say the Michelin might be a bit less than 0.1 better (4.2 vs 4.3 for the Michelin)...

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As someone pointed out in this or a related thread, at freeway speeds tire's rolling resistance isn't that important because it is negligible compared to the air drag, with that I'm not so sure this test tells us anything about Michelins vs. Ecopias.