Given
46%
while driving a
BMW 118i Sport
(205/55 R16) on
a combination of roads
for 0
average miles
I could only confirm the experience with these tires made by some of the other reviewers. Namely, they only lasted for perhaps about 8000 km, basically two seasons. The first winter was quite OK, but for the 2nd winter it suddenly became just a totally different story. First off, I realized the tires lost grip in the snow and ice quite substantially, albeit the were still relatively good/acceptable in the wet. Secondly, the Blizzaks developed a lot of "bald" spots on the tread, however I can't really recall it right now, whether it happened during the 1st winter season or right in the beginning of the 2nd. Basically, the tread seemed really worn out - as reported by some other reviewers here. Than, after that, I also noticed the compound just became hard as plastic and the outer layer of the (already) worn our tread started to come off in several places. Actually my summer tires, Bridgestone Turanza, were much softer to the touch :)!
We live in the middle of Germany, on the northern side of Rennsteig, and we have our decent share of bad weather in winter every year with snow and ice, sometimes even with quite severe snowfalls. Therefore, the snow and ice grip is quite an important asset the tire should be providing, but it was complete failure from the Blizzaks, in particular for the second season/winter. Those are definitely not for the true snowy conditions, much cheaper Fulda winters did a better job in the snow.
As I understood, this seems to be quite common with this tire model, for example, there is a rather big discussion about the exact same issues on the German discussion board motor-talk and also on the German amazon with quite a few pictures/photos of these tires having the same problems as I was. Mine were in the same production window, having the same production code and also made in Poland as those reported in amazon and motor-talk. Albeit some others reported the same problems with their tires made in Turkey as well. So I don't know, probably it really is/was a bad batch or production failure. Anyway, I wont be buying these tires anymore, for sure, neither can I get all this hype around them, it's just totally behind me. Seems like a gamble - they may work out nicely (made in France/Italy?) or just become garbage in less than 10K km (made in Poland or Turkey?), which should be nothing for a good tire and non-sporty/normal driving style. I've changed them already to the allseasons Yokohama BluEarth-4s AW21, let's see how good these are, so far OK, in the dry and wet, will probably report on them later after the winter season.