Goodyear has announced a new version of the company’s EfficientGrip tyre, specifically for SUV and 4×4 vehicles. The company estimates that the European SUV/4×4 market will reach ‘several million’ vehicles by 2014, which makes it a serious area for sales growth, hence the new range. This new launch also coincides with the new EU tyre labelling programme which is coming into play; all tyres made after July 2012 will have to have the new labelling system and from November this year, labelling will be mandatory for all EU member states. The labels will have ratings for each tyre covering, wet grip, noise and fuel efficiency. The Goodyear EfficientGrip tyre has performed very well in these areas, especially wet grip and is OE fitting for Range Rover Evoques. Goodyear now has an impressive 4×4 tyre range from these ‘normal’ 4×4 road tyres to the more extreme Wrangler Duratec tyres. This magazine was with Goodyear in Portugal this month testing the full range and will report on our findings in a future issue. The photograph here shows that the testing was indeed, a lot of fun!
