Bridgestone Dueler H/T tires product review
Most people don’t pay much attention to the tires when they buy a new family vehicle. The fact is that unless you’re well into the luxury car category, it’s pot luck for the buyer, what the manufacturer slaps on the wheels as it rolls off the assembly line is what end ups making tire prints on your driveway. It’s when you buy replacement tires that you take the time to shop, assuming you have the opportunity.
If you’ve bought a small or mid-size SUV based on a car platform within the past decade, you’re likely ended up riding on a set ofBridgestone Dueler H/Ttire. The list of SUVs and light trucks (plus a few minivans) with H/Ts as OEM (original equipment manufacturing) is long, including Honda’s CR-V and Pilot; Toyota’s RAV-4, Highlander, Sequoia, Tacoma 2WD, Tundra 2WD, and Land Cruiser; the BMW X5; and more vehicles from Mitsubishi, Chevy/GMC, Lexus, Saturn, Infiniti, Acura, and Hyundai.
Though many SUVs are built and sold as part-time 4WD vehicles, the vast majority are essentially passenger cars with big cargo spaces and high seats. This is the style of driving for which the H/T is designed. It’s built to give you a quiet ride, which it does by keeping the grooves that cross the tire body narrow and at a high angle. If I compare the H/T to the all-terrain tires on my 4WD pickup (Wrangler AT/S), I see that the lugs on the truck tires are much blockier. The gaps in the tread are wider and deeper, and they’re closer to being at right angles to the direction of travel. An all-terrain tire also has bite along the edges of the tire to pull the vehicle through sloppy stuff and put traction surfaces out where something is always in contact with the ground. The Dueler H/T, however, is designed for a quiet ride, since the target vehicles are mainly used for every-day transportation. So the Dueler H/T has a rounded profile, which keeps the noisier tread edges off the road, and a tread pattern of small blocks oriented parallel to the direction of travel.
Bridgestone designed the Dueler H/T as essentially a passenger tire, which pretty much precludes regular use of H/T-equipped vehicles on rugged surfaces (off-roading, for instance) or to power through heavy snowfalls. There are plenty of other tires--and, more to the point, other vehicles--out there for doing that. These tires are made for on-the-road touring, and though they function well in all seasons, they’re best on dry roads.
Through several years of driving a Honda CR-V equipped with the Dueler H/T as OEM, I got familiar with these tires. They are, indeed, quiet – that’s especially noticeable on any day that I drive both my vehicles. They have good straight-line traction, and I’ve not had problems with control due to loss of traction on a dry surface. I’m less impressed by wet traction; however, since the CR-V’s inherent tendency to torque steer occasionally overcomes the tires’ grip when starting from a standing stop. I’ve not, however, experienced hydroplaning or skidding on wet surfaces, just average straight-line traction. Handling in snowy and icy conditions was also average.
Wear-wise, the set of H/Ts held up OK. They lasted about 56K miles before we replaced them, slightly less than the warranty.
SPECIFICATIONS:
•Speed Rating: S•Warranty: 60,000 Miles•UTQC:Treadwear180,Tractionrated B,Temperaturerated B
Though mainly sold by Bridgestone-Firestone as OEM tires, the Dueler H/T is available from many retailers, both on-line and brick-and-mortar. Competing models include the Yokahoma Geolander or Michelin Cross Terrain, as well as the Bridgestone Dueler H/L.
Though the OEM tires are quiet and durable, I’d rather have better traction on wet roads.
