The tyre on my car was getting quite bald, so it was time to change them. It was a little overdue too. I went to the same tyre shop that I had gone to the last time, and changed a set of 4 Yokohama 205/65R15 94H tyres. The price seems reasonable, at S$120 each.
I had in the past patronised Autobacs, but I found that their prices weren’t competitive. The wait at Autobacs was also awfully long. This other tyre shop, on the other hand, was fast, and besides that, they had a McDonald’s just a few minutes walk away.
The new Yokohama tyres feel great. They are new, of course, so perhaps they feel better simply because they are new. The old Pirelli had become quite noisy and heavy to handle. With just a new set of tyres, the car feels quite a bit more enjoyable to drive now.
Have you wondered what all those numbers and a couple of letters on the tyres mean? Mine basically reads “205/65R15 94H”. The front part, I knew, basically referred to dimensions of the tyre. In my case, the tyre is 205 mm wide, the sidewall is 65% of the width (or about 133 mm), and it’ll fit 15-inch rims. You can read this guide for more details or a quick refresher.
More interestingly is the next bit of the numbers and letters. I had not attempted to decipher them before. The 94H, in my case, is the service description. It specifies the maximum weight the tyre is designed to safely carry, and the designed speed rating of the tyre.
The 94 load rating specified 670 kg of load, and on a car with four tyres, it means a total maximum load of 2680 kg. My car’s curb weight is under 1360 kg. So fully loaded with 7 big-sized adults, these tyres will still do ok.
The H speed rating is good for 210 km/h travel, comfortably more than the top speed of my car.
Read this guide for more information about the service description.
Though you probably can trust your tyre shop to recommend the right tyres, it’s always good to know the details yourself. It’s a good thing in Singapore we don’t need to know about all-season tyres and winter tyres like others in more temperate regions might need to be familiar with.
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