Cooper Discoverer vs Mastercraft Courser tires

New wheels and tires coming soon... like as soon as I decide on the tires. I've had my heart set on Ballistic Jester wheels for a few years now, so it would take some serious persuasion to go with a different set at this point, but tires are another question. As for the wheels though, I've been asked if I want them with a zero offset or a +12mm offset. I know that @tcBob states in his Wheel Backspacing and Offset Info thread that Tacomas have a positive offset, but with wider wheels going on, do I need to factor that in?

As it stands right now, I'm looking at two options for tires in a 265/70/18 size

• Cooper Discoverer A/T3's or
• Mastercraft Courser AXT

I can get the Cooper's for $159 each or the Mastercraft's for $137 each, and according to a good friend who's in this business, he says the Mastercraft's are made by Cooper, just sans the Cooper name (interesting side note... the title of the webpage for the Mastercraft tires shows up in IE as "CooperMastercraft"... I guess lends some credibility to that statement?)

Has anyone had experience with the Mastercraft tires? the $86 price difference is fairly significant for me and is a tempting alternative. Bear in mind that currently I rarely ever go offroading, largely due to I haven't had a truck capable of doing much so most of my driving is on-road and highway, though now that I've got my OME lift on and about to pull the trigger on wheels and tires, I'm hoping that changes.

FYI - I'm going this route because I've got a buddy who's in the tire and wheel business and can get me wholesale prices on all this, mount and balance and all that good stuff, which is why I'm looking at these options and not really looking at other (more Tacomaworld popular) options.

 

Right now cooper is running a rebate for $70 off a set of Cooper Discoverer AT3's. That make the price of the Coopers 159 x 4 tires= 636-70 rebate= 566 The Mastercrafts are 137 x 4 tires= 548. I got my rebate from Cooper in about 3 weeks.

Here's the link.

http://us.coopertire.com/Offers/Spring-Event.aspx

 

I assume you meant $70, not $79... but thank you for pointing that out, b/c if I'm still eligible for the rebate (considering where & who I'm getting the tires from - wholesale vs retailer), that would settle the decision.

 

Woops yep fixed my math, no idea where I got the extra 9 from.

 

AT3's all the way. Get them in a C-load, not the P-metric. They ride great and do well off road

 

Mastercraft is in fact made by Cooper, and they are great tires that I wouldn't hesitate to recommend to anyone. However, if you are able to get Coopers for nearly the same price, that is the route I would recommend going.

 

This is all somewhat new to me... C-load? Here's the screenshot my buddy sent me:



I'm looking at the one's second from the bottom if I go the Cooper route, or the 3rd from top Mastercraft (probably only if for some reason I'm not eligible for the rebate)

 

After far too much surfing (sux when you are pathologically cheap) I got 4 Coopers A/T3s for 119.00 each total, tax tags, etc thru S*ears (hate unwanted links) including installation, balancing., the whole bit.

This includes a 'friend and fam discount' , shop my way points, the cooper $70 gift card and 24 month 0% financing on my s*ears card which also gets me more points.

I don't carry a balance so this is gravy.

As my daily commute is now 6 miles one way instead of 60+, I should enjoy many years from these.