Best tires for 2018 Honda Clarity Hybrid Touring

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Flower

Flower

New Member
Dealership said my tires' wear pattern are down to 4.
Wants to sell me the same tires I have now, w/32,000 miles on the car.
235/45R18 Eagle LS-2 (Goodyear)

It is not uncommon for my tires to go Low Air.

These tires lasted 6 years in Coastal Georgia (bought the end of 2018).
We have snow this week and that's not normal.
I've taken the car on maybe 6 roundtrip long distance trips (7 to 10 hours one way).
Mostly drive around town.

Should I stay with these tires?
Are their better tires that won't be giving off the Low Air notice.
Honda said Low Air is common in cold weather. But what's that doing to my drive?

Thank you in advance for your thoughts.
 
I replaced OEM tires (Michelin Energy Saver) with Yokohama YK740. No EV range loss, seemed quieter when I got them. No idea what difference may be with your Goodyears.

I've never seen "low air", only a warning some years ago when one of the OEM tires had a flat. The tires should be 36 PSI cold.
 
Your tread depth is 4/32”, that’s not a “wear pattern”.

Tire pressure decreases as temperatures drop. It’s physics. The solution is to add air when cold weather sets in. No tire is exempt from the laws of physics.

Low tire pressure can lead to:
1) Reduced fuel economy
2) Undesirable handling characteristics
3) Uneven tire wear
4) Premature tire failure

There are no benefits to under inflated tires unless you’re in the business of selling tires.

Yours may be the first Clarity reported to have anything other than Michelin tires as OEM equipment. Some owners have reported replacing their Michelins after 15K miles, due to premature wear. Others have gone 50-60k miles on the OEM tires. Similarly, some owners have reported less than desirable ride quality and handling characteristics from the OEM tires while others have had no such experiences.

Michelin makes excellent tires, they are also priced accordingly. “Better” is typically a matter of opinion and always comes with conditions. Given your driving patterns, primary around town, just about anything would be suitable, provided they are properly inflated and that you don’t drive like Ricky Bobby.

For occasional snow, drive cautiously or not at all. It certainly isn’t worth investing in a separate set of snow tires unless your driving in snowy conditions for weeks or months on end.
 
I want to add since my original post that the dealership service guy told me that they would replace the tires with the same tires I currently had. They gave me a Goodyear quote. After my original post, we later looked at the tires and they were Michelin. Geeze. Anyway, all good info here and I'm taking it all in. Thank you.
 
2018 Clarity tires:

First set, OEM Michelin EnergiSaver: Terrible. Short life, noisy, downright dangerous in snow.

Second set, Michelin CrossClimate+: (Discountinued, replaced with CC2). Fantastic in snow, good in rain and dry. Much better handling than OEM in all conditions. Excellent range, no change from ultra low resistance OEM tires. Tire life was excellent considering low rolling resistance (usually achieved by giving you less tread). The CC2 on my Subaru dramatically reduced fuel economy so I don't recommend for Clarity unless you don't care about range but it will have a long life.

Third set (currently), Michelin Pilot Sport All Season 4: These tires are amazing. They are quieter than OEM or CC+. They are amazing in the dry and wet and almost as good as my CC+ in snow. The grip has transformed the Clarity from frumpy to sports car. You won't believe the difference from OEM. You do take a hit in range though (about 15%) but it's totally worth it for the far better driving experience. Strongly recommended. BTW, cheaper than CC2 for the Clarity size.
 
I totally agree with your assessment of the Michelin pilot Sport all season 4. I replaced the OEM michelins 2 years ago, and was amazed in the improvement with the Pilot sports, even the ride was better. A bit of range loss for sure but small price to pay for the vast performance benefit.
 
PHEV Newbie said:
2018 Clarity tires:

First set, OEM Michelin EnergiSaver: Terrible. Short life, noisy, downright dangerous in snow.
Click to expand...
I have a different viewpoint. I got 77,000 miles out of my OEM energy Savers. They were not the greatest especially in rain but definitely serviceable. I don't have to deal with snow.

For an experiment I then installed $80 Walmart Blackhawk tires. They worked amazingly well especially for the price, but cut my range by 15%. And that resulted in me running on gas way more.

So at 114,000 miles I switched back to the Energy Saver tires and am happy to have 60 miles of around town range again. Note I used the cheaper Ford version of the Energy Saver, and noticed after I got them they have one much better feature than the Honda ones: A nice sidewall bulge to protect from wheel rash. My wheels are pretty bad already but they should not get worse now. Florida has horrible curbs that are actually vertical rather than sloped so quite easy to scrape.
 
@David Towle ,
Which Blackhawk did you use? I am running Blackhawk 275/45/21 Agility SUV tires on the rear of my Blazer EV RS RWD. They don’t seem to have impacted the range as compared to the OEM Bridgestone Alenza Enliten. I do run them about 44 psi. They have a maximum rating of 50 psi. That probably helps. It is interesting to me how much more wear occurs on the rear tires with it being RWD from acceleration and regeneration, even when driving moderately. By the way, the maximum pressure rating on the Bridgestone Alenza Enliten is 45 psi, I run them at 42 psi.
Also, I agree with you that the Michelin Energy Savers make a significant difference in the range of the Clarity. I tried a different tire for a while and switched back due to the loss of range. And, it is nice that there is a version of the Energy Saver that has more rim protection. Like you, I have essentially no snow to deal with.
Thanks,
Robert
 
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Robert_Alabama said:
@David Towle ,
Which Blackhawk did you use? I am running Blackhawk 275/45/21 Agility SUV tires on the rear of my Blazer EV RS RWD. They don’t seem to have impacted the range as compared to the OEM Bridgestone Alenza Enliten. I do run them about 44 psi. They have a maximum rating of 50 psi. That probably helps. It is interesting to me how much more wear occurs on the rear tires with it being RWD from acceleration and regeneration, even when driving moderately. By the way, the maximum pressure rating on the Bridgestone Alenza Enliten is 45 psi, I run them at 42 psi.
Also, I agree with you that the Michelin Energy Savers make a significant difference in the range of the Clarity. I tried a different tire for a while and switched back due to the loss of range. And, it is nice that there is a version of the Energy Saver that has more rim protection. Like you, I have essentially no snow to deal with.
Thanks,
Robert
Click to expand...
Robert, the Blackhawks I used were Street-H HH11 whatever that means. I also ran them at 42 psi just because they were so smooth riding it was easy and improved the response.

Some things that some may not understand about the effect of tires on range: If you drive an EV/PHEV at highway speeds most all the time, you will not see much range difference between the Energy Savers and other tires. That is because at highway speeds a much higher portion of the total hp required is used up by aerodynamic resistance, which increases proportional to the speed squared, versus tire and gearing drag which go up proportional to the speed. I drive mostly 35-50 mph. And even if you do drive slow but in a gas car, low rolling resistance tires will not make much difference because engines run so inefficiently at around-town speeds. Electric motors use power pretty much proportional to the load.

Oh and one more item. When I was considering the Energy Savers I saw that Michelin had other tires that were green rated, EV approved etc. I called Michelin HQ to find out if any of the other tires had similar efficiency to the Energy Savers. Their answer was none of the others come close, and neither do any tires from competitors.
 
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