Both the Continental PremiumContact 7 and the Bridgestone Turanza 6 stand as giants in the tire industry, offering reliable and high-quality options for drivers. As I venture deeper into their world, I will help you navigate through their features to decide which one might be the better companion on the road.
When it comes to choosing between these two, you’ll find distinct benefits with each. The Bridgestone Turanza 6 is a value proposition, offering a quieter ride at a competitive price, alongside proficient aquaplaning resistance and improved rolling resistance that enhances fuel efficiency. Meanwhile, the Continental PremiumContact 7 takes the lead in performance-centric aspects, boasting superior handling and braking in both wet and dry conditions. So your ultimate choice would depend on whether you prioritize a quieter, cost-effective ride with the Turanza 6 or exceptional grip and control with the PremiumContact 7.
Table of Contents
Tread Design
The Continental PremiumContact 7 tire has an uneven setup with a total of 5 ribs. As all of them are very different from one another.
Starting at the shoulders of the tire’s asymmetric tread pattern, here the ribs on both sides have deep cuts in them.
These cuts help grip the road well, when it comes to cornering, in both wet and dry conditions.
Moving to the middle, you’ll find 3 main ribs, each with its own special pattern.
These ribs have wide side-to-side cuts, helping the tire grab onto dry roads and soak up water on wet ones.
Plus, one rib has extra slits to make wet road grip even better.
Together, these ribs make 4 water channels that help resist water-logging.
Also worth noting is that these channels have varying lengths form one another.
Bridgestone Turanza 6 on the other side, comes with a symmetric tread pattern, so its more streamlined.
So this tire although also features 3 ribs in the middle, they all make circumferential grooves of similar widths.
Moreover, all these ribs also have similar tread features, where you see wave like siping on them.
(If you look closely, you’d note that these sipes are further made interlocking due to their smaller zig-zag pattern. Such siping pattern hit all angles to provide enhanced wet traction).
Moving towards the shoulders, they are although not so aggressive compared to Continental’s tire, they get they job done.
This is because they are still equipped with uniform in-groove notches which are joined up with the siping.
But yes, handling performance is still better on the PremiumContact in comparison, as you’d see in its respective topic.
Road Vibrations
The feeling of a smooth ride is heavily influenced by a tire’s ability to lessen the impact of various road surface inconsistencies, or as some like to call road imperfections.
Anyways, typically, tires made with softer materials significantly improve the driving experience by effectively absorbing road vibrations and bumps.
And so while analyzing the Continental PremiumContact 7 in this regard, it appears to exhibit certain limitations, primarily stemming from its less adaptable internal cap plies and a generally harder composition of the tread compound.
While it promises improved steering response and robust handling, it seems somewhat deficient in dampening capabilities compared to more flexible alternatives. I am saying seems, because its the calculation of subjective comfort.
However, it’s important to recognize that this very property of a firmer rubber compound allows this tire to have a longer tread life, thus presenting a favorable balance between comfort and longevity.
Performance on Wet Surfaces
To perform optimally on wet surfaces, a tire needs a tread pattern that can ensure strong wet grip while also offering resistance to hydroplaning.
So basically, a tread is required which can throw water out as quickly as possible.
Now, upon closely comparing, it’s evident that both boys here showcase remarkable capabilities. However, delving deeper, it’s observed that the PremiumContact 7 still holds a slight edge, particularly with regard to wet traction and control.
What I mean by that is, this tire employs a sophisticated siping system that actively soaks up water molecules with more efficiency, consequently offering a marginally drier road surface for the rubber to grip on.
On the flip side, the Bridgestone Turanza 6 distinctly shines in hydroplaning resistance tests, proving superior speed abilities in both linear and curved water tests.
Tread Life
The lifespan of tire tread life mainly depends on three key factors: rolling resistance, tread depth, and the make-up of the tread material. Therefore, tires with deeper treads usually wear out slower, and those made with tougher materials show better resistance to fast tread wear.
Examining these important elements shows why the Bridgestone Turanza 6 is better in this area.
But why?
Well because, this tire features a strong rubber make-up that wears out less quickly.
Also, its slightly more profound tread depth takes longer before hitting the legal tread depth limit of 2/32 inches, thus extending its usage time.
Dry Performance
The overall dry performance of a tire is characterized in to two sections, handling and directional/longitudinal grip. Let’s start with handling.
Dry Handling
How well a tire can hold onto the road when taking turns, depends a lot on the solid build of its outer areas, including the sides and edges, basically shoulders.
This quality comes from how the weight shifts around when the car is turning, making the force push towards the outside of the tire.
In this category, the Continental PremiumContact 7 clearly beats its rival, as its more sophisticated build allows for better contact with the road.
Basically the tire offer less cuts/notches overall, and allows for a more rubber to road meetup (from shoulders), and this is a characteristic that makes it more stable during both light and heavy steering, leading to quicker control reactions.
On the other hand, although the Bridgestone Turanza 6 lacks mostly due to its more flexing lugs (on shoulders). These basically cause greater under and over steering in comparison, leading to longer lap times (as seen on tests), and greater turning g forces.
Longitudinal Traction
In the tire world, “longitudinal traction” means a tire’s capability to keep a good grip on straight and dry roads, often seen as dry grip.
And this is mainly visible on highways during straight driving, where the middle part of the tire faces the most pressure and therefore gives the highest friction levels. So how well the central rubber meets the road is pretty significant.
Now, in this sector, the Continental PremiumContact 7 is a leader. I mean it outperforms a lot of top-notch summer tires out there and not just Turanza, where it distinctly showcases great dry stopping powers, as seen on tests.
Contrarily, the Bridgestone Turanza 6 shows a bit of a lesser performance, owing to its wider tread voids.
However, it’s important to note that the difference is still pretty small.
Tread Noise
Air is what creates noise in tires.
Most of this air flow happens through the edge channels, where air particles hit the surrounding walls, making noise through these hits.
In this case, the Bridgestone Turanza 6 does better with its modern design that although is more voided, still has smaller tread openings around the edges, effectively cutting down the main source of noise.
Moreover, it also uses a more advanced pitch sequencing technology, where its tread is made in a way, so as to form different pitches as the air particles strike around on different (tread) parts.
And those varying sound frequencies try to dampen down each other, reducing overall noise.
Fuel Consumption
Fuel is directly related to rolling resistance of a tire.
So in a way one can say, typically, with more grip comes greater fuel consumption.
Though this metric can be controlled with the help of tread composition, and construction.
Having said that, the PremiumContact 7 does better here, showcasing lower rolling resistance values on average, despite having more grip.
The tire’s tread is basically stiffer, and comes with shallower tread depth. Both these features resist the lugs to move around too much and flex/mold as the tire rolls.
And so less energy is consumed in to the molding of the tread, and more is focused in to the rolling.
To Sum Up
The Continental PremiumContact 7 stands out notably in several categories including its ability to offer superior grip on wet surfaces owing to its efficient siping system, and remarkable dry handling and longitudinal traction attributes which are attributed to its robust build.
Moreover, the tire is also better when it comes to fuel economy.
On the other side, the Bridgestone Turanza 6 offers commendable hydroplaning resistance, with an edge in speed capabilities during water tests. Moreover, it promises a quieter ride, thanks to its innovative design (pitch sequencing tech.), and it showcases superior tread life, characterized by a strong rubber composition.
However, it is imperative to note the Bridgestone Turanza 6 falls slightly short in terms of road vibration dampening and dry handling capabilities, primarily due to greater flexing lugs, it faces.
