mdv

Kluger towing limitation of 2000kg is imposed by Toyota. It does seem somewhat arbitary ... when a Territory can tow 2300kg. My cynical side thinks it is a clever marketing ploy by Toyota: if you want to tow > 2000kg, buy a Prado. If you want to tow > 2500kg buy a Landcruiser.

What I do not quite understand is how a 5 door Prado can tow up to 2500kg whereas a 3 door Prado can tow up to 3000kg.

Holmsie,

Thanks for the heads up. Mine (same model & colour) is now at 78,000km and I do not relish the thought of forking out that much for a service. Might first get a non-Toyota quote for this logbook service.

I recently replaced mine with the OEM Bridgestone D400's. Best price I got was $365 per tyre.

There are few other options and they were all more expensive. I have been quite happy with the D400's but I know a lot of other people are not.

If you are happy with the standard tyres, I would suggest going with them. Because Bridgestone are the main player in that size (245/55/19) they do a lot of volume and prices are quite competitive.

I am one of those who was not happy with OEM D400's - only managed 38,000 km out of them. Replaced with Toyo Open Country H/T which have now done 38,000km with at least 50% life remaining.

My Toyos now have 34,000 km on them and I expect to achieve 60K+ km out of them.

Rim size appears to be 7.5" see here

Would you believe after making the initial post in this thread in Aug 2008, I am still on the original tyres and my Kluger has just clocked over 60,000km. I have rotated all 5 tyres, and they're just about shot now. Not displeased with that mileage

Yeah, but you have an unfair advantage with all that driving on grass (as per your images).

I had to repace my tyres at 36,800 k as the edges were badly worn but not the centres. I very regularly checked the pressures in them.

The new Bridgestones have done just under 10,000k and show bad signs of feathering on the edge once again, despite being rotated, balanced and wheel align done at 5,000 k's and due again.

Went back to Bob Jane where I bought them from yesterday and was told that was 'normal' wear and to keep up the rotations etc and that 36,000 k out of my old ones was doing well and the new ones were doing 'well' also despite the feathering edges. So 1 year out of 4 x $400 tyres? 7-8 wheel alignments and balances (every 5,000k) in the lifetime of the tyre adds up to a lot of $$$ or the price of 1 tyre in the 1 yr I expect to get from them.

I asked about the Hankook or Toyos and they advised that I would get even less mileage out of those and that some were only getting 18,000k from them.

Am I just being jerked around here? What are peoples experiences with other tyres after they have done around 10,000 k's or more on them?

Thanks

As per my previous post, I am entirely happy with Toyos after 20,000 km. Attached photo of tyre (currently front right) shows very little wear overall, and edges are holding up much better than Bridgestones. Tread pattern does, however, collect and hold a lot of small stones if driving on gravel roads.

Hi all,

I have just put the Toyo Open Country H/T 245/55 19s on my Grande this morning. Initial impressions are excellent. Road noise is a lot less than the Bridgestones and hopefully I will get more than 45k out of them!

Huge price differences when ringing around the different companies, eventually picked them up for $396 minus Defcom discount whereas other shops were quoting over $500.

Cheers

Rich

I have little doubt you will get many more than 45k out of your Toyos.

I have now done 20k with my Toyos and there is very litle wear. At same stage with Bridgestones, the front wheel outer edges were badly worn - too many roundabouts where I live?? I only managed 38k out of Bridgestones - I am aiming for 60+ k out of Toyos.

I changed to Toyo Open Country and have now done over 10,000km with them. Are they better than the Bridgestone tyres? Very much so I reckon - handling is much the same but the Toyos show much less wear, and almost none of that front-wheel edge scrubbing that was so evident with the Bridgestones. Would I go back to Bridgestone D400's? Never.

...

OT ... Your avatar image is awesome!

That's if you can find tyres that meet this load rating in this already difficult size.

Cheers

Only 245/55R19 tyres available locally appear to be the Bridgestone D400 and the Toyo Open Country - both are rated 103S

Going to 255/55R19, the Yokohama Advan ST is rated 107Y, and the Pirelli Sorpion Zero and Goodyear WRANGLER HP AW are rated at 111V

Hi,

I have confirmed the minimum 107 load rating on my KXR placard, but can someone who owns a grande or kxs confirm what their placard states please?

This just seems plain stupid on toyota's part

KX-S placard (on driver side door frame indicates max load rating must not be less than 875kg or have a load rating not less than 103 and and speed rating of not less than S).

Looks like a very good possibility as a replacement for the D400's, although the rolling diameter could make the speedo error worse. I need to get the exact diameter from the tyre specs and compare it with the D400 before I get too excited.

From my rudimentary research:

245/55R19 (D400) has a diameter of 752mm ... and we all know/suspect speedo reads a bit high with these (116kph speedo for 110kph actual).

I believe 255/55R19 (with a diameter of 762mm) would correct speedo error.

However, 255/50R19 (with a smaller yet diameter of 737.4mm) would make speedo error even worse ...

BTW, the Pirelli Scorpion ATR I mentioned in my previous post on this thread is currently not available in Aust (or anywhere by the looks of it) ... so I went with the Toyo Open Country.

My Canberra-based KX-S does not suffer dash rattle with cold or on the bitumen at any time ... but there is an annoying dash rattle when driving on gravel roads. My rattle is somewhere just to the left of the steering column - might mention it at the 40k service next week.

In terms of 245/55R19 tyres , only ones I could find are the Bridgestones Dueler D400 (OEM tyres) which IMO suck, and the Toyo Open Country tyres which I have fitted.

There are other tyres in 255/55R19 that will fit the 19" rims. Plenty of choice in the US - see here but not many of htese are available in Aust. There are several other threads discussing the 255/55R19 options.

I have only had the Toyos for 2,000km so its a bit early to say whether they will last better than the Bridgestones, but they are made from a harder compound and have more tread depth ... so they ought to last better. So far I have not found any great difference in handling or road noise generally, although on rough bitumen at slow speeds the Toyos seem a little noisy.

.... and you can then resell rims...?

Which rims do you believe could be resold? Not the Kluger rims, I trust ... with all the tyre issues for the 19" rim, who's gonna buy these?

I guess the smart move would be to replace rims and tyres immediately after Kluger purchase, and then store the OEM rims/tyres in your garage until time to sell Kluger ... and then put the mint condition OEM rims & tyres back on, and separately resell the aftermarket rims & tyres.

Aaagh ... why didn't I think of that 18 months ago?

FYI for anyone looking. Payless tires gave me the Bridgestone Dueler 400 for $350. Cheapest I found.

http://www.paylesstyres.com/

Probably palatable if replacing just the one tyre ... as in your case.

In my case, I had to replace a set of tyres worn out at 38,000km ... and keep best of the 'bad bunch' as the spare. No way I was going to get another 4 x Bridgestone D400's .... which incidentally ranked 59th out of 60 in its class in a US online customer review/survey - see here

Preferring to retain the OEM rims, I reluctantly parted with $380 per tyre for 4 x Toyo Open Country's. I do hope these last longer than the Bridgestones!

After 21 months and 36000kms my total average is 11.47l/100km

Curious as to how you know your total average economy over 36,000km ... my dealer resets the display every 10k service? Is your calculation manual or from the display?

I recently did a late night round trip Melb/Bendigo/Melb to pick my 16 year old daughter from a concert.

The total distance was 565km - using BP 91 octane - mostly 110km dual lane freeway driving - set at 110km on cruise control but using the GPS speed (which shows about 116-117 on the speedo) I got 10.6L/100km.

Not bad considering going to Bendigo is all uphill and it included driving through the city to get to the freeway etc.

Same freeway consumption figures here for KX-S AWD, including 116kph speedo for 110kph GPS. Average over last 9,000km is 12.8l/100km which includes a lot of urban driving and a fair bit of up and down hills - 95% of driving with transmission in sequential mode.

My remote control and keys inadvertantly went for a 30 minute swim in the surf last month.

Remote still opened the car. When I got home, I opened up the remote and was pleased to find that the water-resistance rubber membrane had kept water off the electronics. Nonetheless, I carefully cleaned and dried (using a hairdrier) the insides. Been working fine ever since.

Remote is water-resistant, but not water-proof.

Just got myself the following (yesterday);

10/2008 Toyota Kluger KX-S

Glenn

Good choice of vehicle ... but do you really mean a 10/2008 build?

As an aside, my 10/2008 build KX-S (bought in 12/2008) is quickly approaching 40k km ... and a replacement set of tyres! Not a single problem with the vehicle, however.

I just took a quick look at the Pirelli website and the ATR tyres appear to be aimed more at all terrain meaning a mixture of on and off-road.

Yep, that's correct. However, I regularly take my Kluger off the bitumen, exploring places and tracks that 'soccer mums' perhaps would not contemplate ... and where the Bridgestone H/L400 doesn't 'pass muster'.

But I also read (from the US tirerack site) that the Pirelli ATR is pretty good on the bitumen too (as long as there is not too much snow ... not likely to ever be a problem in my case) - I get the sense the Scorpion Zero is perhaps more suited to those SUVs that like to go very fast on bitumen but never venture off the bitumen.

The Bridgestone Dueler H/L Alenza is the best rated tyre on tirerack in the 255/55 range:

Tirerack.com Dueler Alenza rating

I think this is called the Dueler D683 H/L in Australia.

But it is not supplied in the 255/55 R19 size in Australia :(

Just been checking the tirerack site and Bridgestone Dueler H/L Alenza currently has an overall reviewer rating of 8.48 (~880 reviews).

However, the Pirelli Scorpion ATR has an overall rating of 8.7 (from ~440 reviews). JaxQuickfit quoted $485 per tyre (although none in stock).

Current price on Bridgestone Dueler H/L400 (OEM tyres) has come down to $469 per tyre (still way too high for what you get IMO). Anyone know of a better price for these?

If choice is between OEM tyre and Pirelli, I am tempted to go the Pirelli (extra 4/32" tread, longer wearing [uTQG530 vs UTQG400]). Any thoughts welcomed.

I've only got a few thousand kms left in the original Bridgestone tyres (done 33000km) so I'm doing some research now, just in case.... I don't like making decisions under pressure ;)

I've started a spreadsheet.

With 36,000km on the odo, I too am facing the imminent prospect of replacing tyres ... but so far, the only other tyre available locally in 245/55R19 seems to be the Toyo. I guess there are also a couple of choices of 255/55R19 ... but I would prefer to stick with original size.

With the amount of advertising Cooper Tyres are currently doing on our local TV showing the benefit of their tyres for Toyota Prado and Rav4, I feel like starting a petition to them to say "how about doing a tyre for the Kluger KX-S/Grande!"

Good luck with your research ... keep us posted.

My N95 8GB connects 95% of the time - sometimes I need to restart the phone - but this happens with all handsfree kits.

My Sony Ericsson K750 connects without fuss 100% of the time :P

We just put a set of Maxxis HT-750's on. I have found no difference in handling or road noise over the Dunlops, and at $220 a corner they are a damn sight cheaper!

Good to hear ... but sadly of little comfort to those of us who are looking for replacement 245/55R19 tyres. Maxxis don't do this size.