Ime due some new tyres on my car soon, and ime not that sure how tyre sizes work. I.e can a bigger diametre tyre be bought for the 17" wheels on the Zetec s.

At the moment i have the factory fit "Bridgeston Potenza's" which are really good spec tyres, but looking at the different options, as there not a cheap tyre !

Can i have maybe a more chuncky tyre fitted to the wheel?

Let me know your opinions please and what tyres you have changed to.

Many thanks

get pretty much whatever you want. If you wanna keep the same width, but have chunkier tyres, then just change the middle number on the tyre size. e.g. 205/45/17 to 205/50/17.

The first number is the width of the tyre in millimetres, the 2nd number is the profile of the tyre as a % to the first number and the last if the alloy size. so 215/45/17 is 215mm wide, then 45% of 215 profile (215x45% = 96.75mm) and on 17" wheels.

The bridgestones arent cheap but they are what keep you on the road so i would stick with decent tyres and not skimp and buy budget tyres... ie ditchfinders. Especially coming in to winter.

There are only 4 things that stand between you the road and everything else around you. Given how important those 4 tyres therefore are its one thing I never skimp on - Bridgestones are one of the best and its worth the extra money.

Avoid budget tyres, but some of the mid range tyres can be very good. Kumho and Falken are highly thought of amongst BMW owners. The Falkens that I had on the back of my BM were much better than the Dunlops they replaced.

All the 16" Zetec wheels from Ford come with Hankook's . Now, previously i would have avoided them as I always classed them as a budget tyre, but WOW i am so impressed both in the dry and the wet. I will certainly be concidering these next time.

Hope that helps

Bri

i found the zetec hankooks to be awful in the snow. Fine for everything else but not great.

I thought the Bridgestones that came on the car were ok - but I expected a lot more, especially considering their replacement cost.

My second set of tyres were Marangonis - which I was persuaded to buy on the basis that they are made by Pirelli. They were roughly equivalent to the Potenzas for me but at significantly less cost, so I was happy.

However - my most recent set are Kumho Ecsta Le Sport KU39s (£265.12 for 4 fitted from Blackcircles) and they are much more what I would expect from a tyre. They've been on for around 2000 miles now and have significantly improved the overall feel of the car - wet and dry.

I thought the Bridgestones that came on the car were ok - but I expected a lot more, especially considering their replacement cost.

My second set of tyres were Marangonis - which I was persuaded to buy on the basis that they are made by Pirelli. They were roughly equivalent to the Potenzas for me but at significantly less cost, so I was happy.

However - my most recent set are Kumho Ecsta Le Sport KU39s (£265.12 for 4 fitted from Blackcircles) and they are much more what I would expect from a tyre. They've been on for around 2000 miles now and have significantly improved the overall feel of the car - wet and dry.

I ran some KU31's on the back of my 325 and was really impressed - they gripped well in most conditions. My only negative with the Kumhos was that once they got towards the end of their life, the performance really fell away. Up until that point, they were great and were loads cheape than the Dunlops etc. After that, they were replaced with Falken FK452's which are popular with a lot of BM owners.

Sam - how low do you run your tyres? I tend to swap mine out quite early, so hopefully won't experience the drop off - you're not the first to mention it.

Because they cost so damn much for the BM, I did run them for as long as I could. The rears last around 20k which I thought was ok with 200 ponies going through them. I would say the performance started to drop off around 3/4 worn.

I still think they are quality tyres though, especially for the money.

I would highly recommend Continental ContiSport 3's. They are the standard tyre on the Focus RS so can easily handle the Fiesta's low power output. After 20,000 miles, my front tyres still had 4mm of tread left and the rears had 5mm. I would say 30,000miles would be easily achievable from the set. They are an expensive tyre (£150 each) but definitely cheaper in the long run as the wear rate is excellent. Grip in corners is also amazing.