Hi all. I'm new to this forum and also a relative novice when it comes to cars! 

Bought a brand new Ford Fiesta Zetec ecoboost 1.0l in 2016. No issues with it and to my surprise last year it failed its first MOT. The nearside rear coil spring had fractured. Wasn't something I could tell when driving so was annoyed to say the least. My 2 front tyres were close to the limit too so had the coil spring replace and 2 new tyres. The 2 tyres I had were Landsail. Again presumed as they pushed them on me they'd be OK. 

Literally that night, we had torrential rain and I realised when pulling out a junction I wheelspun, my ASB light came on and juttered away. Thinking it was just a wheelspin I carried on. Now pretty much everytime it rains, soon as I go round a corner the steering fells light, back end has spun out a few times and sometimes the ASB light comes on. Now I've taken it back to garage, they've checked tyres and said nothing wrong. I've had a tyre check at kwik fit and they too said nothing wrong and maybe just my driving (I'm not a bad driver so don't think it's me!) 

I've spoke to an old friend about this, who's a mechanic and said straight away it's just the tyres, which coincides with me only having this issue since I had my new tyres. Planning on getting some Michelin next week, but wondering if anyone else has had similar issues and whether it could be something else before I splash out £200 on tyres which might not even be the issue. 

 

Thanks in advance. 

Jamie

Tyres are rated from A to G for wet road grip, this will be marked on your tyre wall, A being the shortest stopping distance under braking in the wet and G being the shortest, this rating affects the grip efficiency of a tyre as well. Other things to consider that affect grip are, make sure the tyres are fitted in accordance to the direction of the arrow on the wall, direction of rotation. Tyre pressures, a tyre that is over inflated will not grip as efficiently as one that is inflated to the correct pressure according to the owners hand book or slightly under inflated, all pairs of tyres should be inflated to the same pressure. Tread pattern and depth of tread will influence the way in which and the amount of water that will be displaced on wet roads. Obviously though, a car will aquaplane on a minimal depth of water on the road if driven too fast for the road conditions. I would change your tyres for ones with a much higher rating than those fitted at present, it's definitely your tyres that are the problem.

How fast are you going round these corners?

Just remember at this time of year when the rain comes after a long sunny spell, the roads will be extra slippy til the rain washes away the road grime / rubber deposits.

Landsail tyres - I wouldn't even entertain the idea of. I had a set of Prestivo tyres on my Focus when I bought it - they'd wheelspin at junctions including in the dry on occasion - they were very quickly replaced with a decent brand of tyre and the issues stopped.

***** tyres. But back end stepping out will be rear tyres. So check your rear tyres for tread depth. 

6 hours ago, Micro said:

How fast are you going round these corners?

Just remember at this time of year when the rain comes after a long sunny spell, the roads will be extra slippy til the rain washes away the road grime / rubber deposits.

Landsail tyres - I wouldn't even entertain the idea of. I had a set of Prestivo tyres on my Focus when I bought it - they'd wheelspin at junctions including in the dry on occasion - they were very quickly replaced with a decent brand of tyre and the issues stopped.

Literally looking at 20mph max going round corners. Was going round a roundabout once so probably 10mph on that occasion. I'm going to get some tyres the weekend and hopefully should sort it out, thanks for the advice 

Budget Tyres are not a good idea, might be cheaper, but will not perform very well.  My Focus came with Event, but first thing I did was put on a set of Michelin.

And I think your best tyres should be on the rear, Understeer is preferable to oversteer.

 

Never even heard of Landsail, but cheap tyres are hit and miss.  I've had some that perform fine and some that were absolutely terrible! 

Now I'll only buy a reputable brand of tyres, may cost an extra £10-20 per tyre but it's worth it to have that reassurance that you have good quality rubber, since that is your ONLY contact with the road.

11 hours ago, Paulkp said:

Budget Tyres are not a good idea, might be cheaper, but will not perform very well.  My Focus came with Event, but first thing I did was put on a set of Michelin.

And I think your best tyres should be on the rear, Understeer is preferable to oversteer.

 

I sell dozens of budget tyres every month. I’ve got 4 budget tyres on the van and it handles unbelievably well round sharp bends for what it is. 
I wouldn’t knock cheap tyres until you have actually tried a few is my opinion.

My Focus ST came with brand new budget tyres on it. And any hint of wet roads and the tyres slide about and spin.
Horrible. I really want rid of them, but they are brand new. I wish Arnold Shark put better tyres on it b4 selling it.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

12 hours ago, stef123 said:

I sell dozens of budget tyres every month. I’ve got 4 budget tyres on the van and it handles unbelievably well round sharp bends for what it is. 
I wouldn’t knock cheap tyres until you have actually tried a few is my opinion.

The problem I find with budget tyres is that they're usually fine on a dry road but you have to drive to the conditions...slowing down at the first spot of drizzle...which is fairly regularly in England, and must be almost constantly in Scotland?  

I have inherited some Landsails in the past.  As the name suggests, they make the car handle like a boat...but there are much worse budgets about!

Have had Wanli's and LingLongs and Tigars and all sorts of ridiculously named budgets, some worse than others, you really can't automatically assume all budgets are crap...or indeed that all 'Premium' brands are good...  Goodyears original 'EfficientGrip' were only one of those two things, and not the one that you actually need in a tyre!   Equally, P2000s that were fitted on loads of cars in the 90's were shocking in the wet.  And don't get me started on the T1-Rs that everyone raved about 10 years ago...  Horrible snatchy grip with sudden breaks in traction and they wore out within a month.  Easily the worst set of tyres I'd actually bought myself back in 2010!

 I must admit though, I've been on Nexens for the last couple of years, not my choice, inherited on the Golf and they were brand new at the time...haven't had any issues with them.  Maybe I'm just old and boring now though...

5 hours ago, TomsFocus said:

The problem I find with budget tyres is that they're usually fine on a dry road but you have to drive to the conditions...slowing down at the first spot of drizzle...which is fairly regularly in England, and must be almost constantly in Scotland?  

I have inherited some Landsails in the past.  As the name suggests, they make the car handle like a boat...but there are much worse budgets about!

Have had Wanli's and LingLongs and Tigars and all sorts of ridiculously named budgets, some worse than others, you really can't automatically assume all budgets are crap...or indeed that all 'Premium' brands are good...  Goodyears original 'EfficientGrip' were only one of those two things, and not the one that you actually need in a tyre!   Equally, P2000s that were fitted on loads of cars in the 90's were shocking in the wet.  And don't get me started on the T1-Rs that everyone raved about 10 years ago...  Horrible snatchy grip with sudden breaks in traction and they wore out within a month.  Easily the worst set of tyres I'd actually bought myself back in 2010!

 I must admit though, I've been on Nexens for the last couple of years, not my choice, inherited on the Golf and they were brand new at the time...haven't had any issues with them.  Maybe I'm just old and boring now though...

It’s more consistent here for sure lol.

There are some cracking ‘brands’ of tyres out there at the moment, we’ve had a good chuckle at some of them.