Federal MS357 Tyres

I got some new boots for the Terracan. Sponsored by my local tyre shop, as they are a main distributor of the tyre. From 1st looks it seems to be a good un. I have not found a review on the internet so Im posting one on ere.

Federal MS357, Mud + Snow rated, 245 / 75 / 16. 116N White out wall.

Here are some pics:













It looks to have a decent tread pattern, the rubber looks of high quality. The tyre has a good amount of sipes, the central sipes are full depth which will be useful when the tyre wears down. The central tread depth is 13mm and the shoulder tread depth is 9mm. The shoulder tread extends down the sidewall which will hopefully help in the mud and snow.

TJ

Look on the website tyrereviews.co.uk.

Assassin wrote:

Look on the website tyrereviews.co.uk.

I do use that alot but I could not see it. - Might do a review on there or atleast a link to here....

Had them fitted this evening. Not bad at all on the road for a budget tyre brand. Still holding my opinion until I have used them abit, and road based tyre is a massive improvement over a Mud Terrain tyre on road.

Pics:





On the plus side, they needed very little to no wheel balancing. 38psi front & rear, cornering is good and braking is 50% improved over the MT's.

TJ

A lot less rumble I'd guess?

Assuming you haven't got access to a skid pan, a good test is cornering on a big sweeping wet roundabout - pushing it of course, can't test it properly chugging along so it would have to be empty of traffic - as 2+ tons of Terra/RR/whatever tends to find even the most hyped-up of tyres seriously wanting.

Tom Mc wrote:

A lot less rumble I'd guess?

Assuming you haven't got access to a skid pan, a good test is cornering on a big sweeping wet roundabout - pushing it of course, can't test it properly chugging along so it would have to be empty of traffic - as 2+ tons of Terra/RR/whatever tends to find even the most hyped-up of tyres seriously wanting.

Yeah I know what you mean.

They are very quiet, no longer any rumbling and pulling away is slightly swifter.

The benefits of driving like an old man in a Terracan is not only getting better fuel returns but you tend not to have many issues with aquaplaning and you have plenty of time to react...

Still a day out on a skid pan would be good. The Michelin test track has several hills and descents where it tests both tyres and vehicle. There are a few good vids on you tube. Most of the tests, you start off in 2wd on a water fall type hill and try to pull away etc. Quite interesting stuff I thinks......

TJ

Got them muddy this afternoon, had to go tow out a buddy who managed to get stuck. Here are pics of tyres.







They performed better than I thought they would. Control was limited due to not being very aggressive but they are a very good self cleaning tyre. The mud was the usual green lane stuff, some shallow, some deep, bits sloppy and gloopy bits hard and dry.


Then It rained................................

Towed out my buddy and drove back, it was very slow going, I kept moving forward but there was not a lot of choice in direction, things got sideways then this happened...



The front bumper was not in the best shape before this happened, now the sideways impact with the hedge has lead to a nice wider crack.

Oh well, Overall Im very happy with the tyres, as good as the Toyo Open Country AT's and General Grabber AT's in the mud IMO.

TJ

Not good for climbing out of ruts then? IMPOSSIBLE!!! Still, if they spend most of their life on tarmac, then they seem okay for the odd occasion. You still have mud tyres waiting in the wings I assume?

Wouldn't be an off-roader without some sort of battle damage ... such is life!

Tom Mc wrote:

Not good for climbing out of ruts then? IMPOSSIBLE!!! Still, if they spend most of their life on tarmac, then they seem okay for the odd occasion. You still have mud tyres waiting in the wings I assume?

Wouldn't be an off-roader without some sort of battle damage ... such is life!

Gota love the battle scars......

Ive still got the MT tyres but to be honest I probably wont put them back on, If you would have seen the amount of mud that I was driving in with these Federal tyres on you would have been impressed, getting out of ruts is a no, no, but they do have the ability to keep my 3 tonne Terry moving....

As I am planning to do more touring and actual travelling from the 19th of December, I think that these tyres are perfect, should allow for easy comfy driving and the ability go most places with in reason.

IMO this tyre would be well suited if you do alot of towing on various terrains. Wet farm fields, snow covered roads etc. So far its been very good. I did a run from Southampton to Swindon @ 55mph and returned 38MPG Average. Which I am very happy about.



TJ

Winter Performance:

For the last week or two the exterior temperature has been around -5 Celsius and conditions have been reasonably dry. Even though the temp has been below 7 degrees Celsius where most road biased all season rubber compounds turn in too "hard plastics" these Federal MS357's have shown no difference in cornering, braking or fuel economy.

Yesterday evening after a nice snowfall, the roads were turning to slush due to the grit. These tyres did not seem to have a problem powering through the slush, they were self cleaning and had a good solid responsive feel to them when turning the steering wheel. Braking and cornering was also very good mainly due IMO to the full depth sipes in the tyre tread.

This evening after a few hours of snow the local town and surrounding area has had just over 50mm of snow fall. Again these MS357's had no real problems finding grip, cornering, braking and accelerating in 2wd. Up the straight hill on the return to base doing around 20mph I did feel some wheel spin, the LSD kicked in, switching power momentarily to the other tyre and all drama stopped, forward momentum was maintained at around 15mph until I reached the top.

I have no doubt that these tyres will do very well in severe winter road conditions with 4wd engaged and the correct speeds applied.

On the road driving in winter conditions, they are equal to the General Grabber AT2 and better than the Avon Ranger AT, both very accomplished tyres IMO.

On a quick turn around in a field I did need 4wd hi to keep moving, either due to the deeper snow on the frosty/wet grass and/or due the the vehicle turning.

No report on serious Icy conditions to date, but they do well on general un-salted UK roads when driving between 20-30mph.

For my mixed on/off road needs, I will defiantly be buying these again.

Jason

LOOK! Someone used my pics for their own tyre website! Im not bothered, at least It helped someone!

TJ

Am I just being dim, surely they're not the same as yours?

Yeah, the top 2 pics are. You can even see my yellow shocks!

TJ