Postby amr40509 » Wed May 23, 2012 9:49 am
So far my Pathfinder has had 3 sets of tires.
Stock Generals - always sucked. Traction was poor in the wet, worse in the snow, and non-existent off the road. At 30K they were getting pretty worn and noisy.
I replaced them with the Pirelli Scorpion ATR's you mentioned. They were a better tire, traction was REALLY good across the board. The only complaint I had with them was that they would flat spot a little when parked on a warm day that cooled down a lot overnight (think spring and fall) and took a couple of miles to smooth out in the mornings. I put 37K miles on them and then dumped them as they started to get a little loud and were getting pretty low on tread. I probably could have gotten 10K more out of them, but I use tires pretty hard (some off-road, some towing) and they were well past their prime.
I now have the Michelin LTX AT2's and have put about 35K miles on them. They have been nothing short of prefect. Wonderful traction in all conditions I've encountered, very smooth when at normal load and when towing my big boat, quieter than I'd have ever imagined a tire this aggressive being. They still drive and look VERY good. I'm sure they have lost some tread depth, but they still have a ton left, way more than 1/2. When you walk up to my truck, it looks like it has a fresh/new set of tires with no visible wear.
I'm totally sold on these tires. You get a fairly aggressive tire (it's not MT, but I've had it in some rough stuff and it has done REALLY well with everything I've put it through), that is smoother than the stock tires, quieter than the stock tires, and grips MUCH better under ALL road conditions than stock. Cost is really irrelevant, because they don't cost more than 2X the other options, but seem to last 2X as long.