Writing about the
Nokian Line given
83% (205-55-16-W)
Driving on
mostly country roads for 18000
spirited miles
I fitted these to my Quattro 2.8 back in October 2015 and I have since covered about 18,000 on them. My initial impressions were really good. They seemed to make the car feel more nimble and poised on the road and the steering felt sharper and more direct and I could feel the road better.
They were quiet too, far less road noise the the Coopers they replaced. I like the tread pattern as it looked like a lot of thought had gone into it.
In performance terms, no complaints at all and I wanted to leave the long term review until I had experienced driving on snow. I figured that a Finnish brand would be good in inclement weather and they are indeed. These are their summer tires and they were great in the snow! My Quattro AWD helps a lot here of course, and its worth remembering that all summer tires will have reduced performance in the cold and snow, not just because of the tire pattern, but the tire compound is not designed for temps below about 10 degrees celcius.
Having said all that I did notice the they started to get noisier with age, and then a few months ago I had the car up on a lift for some exhaust work and we noticed that all the tires showed signs of perishing on and around the tread. Not on the sidewalls which would have been really bad, but even so the tire shop reckoned that this was unacceptable for a tire that was only three years old.
There was however plenty of tread left - probably would have seen me through at least six more months, and maybe more. However with winter coming I decided to change them and I chose Avons this time.
To be fair, you can find stories like this about every brand, so I am not damning Nokian really, just saying. YMMV.
Will post a review on the Avons ZV7 next year after they have seen some action. I will say though that already I find them more pliant and comfortable that than the Nokians with less of a crashy ride. But also that the steering feels a bit more vague and woolly. Cant have it all eh?