Bridgestone launches Dueler A/T 002

Tyres, like 4x4s, SUVs and the latest brace of dual-cab utes in general, are an inherent compromise – make a gain in one aspect of their performance and you’ll likely take away from another. So the key, therefore, is to match the right vehicle to your intended usage. So too with tyres – match the right tyre to the right application, and you’re set.

That’s where the new Bridgestone Dueler A/T 002 comes into the picture. An all-new all-terrain tyre model in Bridgestone’s off-road tyre family, it’s a move by the global tyre giant to capitalise on the substantial growth in recent years of SUV, 4x4, and 4x4 ute models, which these days account for a massive slice of the Australian new car market.

However, and as explained to the assembled media at a recent launch event on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast, the Bridgestone Dueler A/T 002 is also part of a reshuffle on Bridgestone’s part to better serve the broader spectrum of its off-road tyre customers. While the Dueler A/T 697 in a light truck construction remains as the brand’s off-road flagship, the new Dueler A/T 002 effectively supersedes the passenger-car-construction version of the A/T 697.

That’s because the new Dueler A/T 002 also adopts a passenger car construction for a more comfortable, compliant and quiet ride, while catering for SUV/4x4/ute owners who want to push a little further than a standard (and often OEM-fitted) highway tyre, into the sphere of light off-roading.

It’s the latest Dueler model in a dynasty that stretches back to the 1980s, and it now complements the Dueler A/T 697 in a light truck construction that is set to surpass four million unit sales later this year – not bad for a tyre that first arrived here in 2012.

According to Bridgestone’s National Sales Director, Claudio Sodano, when it comes to choosing the right tyres, it’s vital that vehicle owners dig deeper than how a tyre looks.

“If you look at the tyre and its construction and how it’s put together – its tread, its sidewall compound, the tread compound, to the belt and the body ply – each component we can make in a way that has a performance characteristic, but usually you’re trading something off,” he says.

“So you can have an all-terrain light truck tyre and it will behave like this, but it will also do this – it’s about explaining to the consumer that are they trading something off. So the consumer looks at a tyre and thinks it looks really aggressive, and that’s great, but a tyre isn’t bought for visual aesthetics – a tyre is a key functional piece of a vehicle. Do you also want to be able to stop well in the wet? You have to go beyond the looks.

“It’s about matching the tyre to the application and that’s what we’ve done with this product – not for everyone, but I reckon for a large proportion of SUV buyers.”

Bridgestone says the new Dueler A/T 002 offers all the comfort of a regular passenger car tyre in an on-road setting, with the ability to also handle a bit of rough stuff off the bitumen. According to Bridgestone, it’s skewed to an intended usage of roughly 80 per cent on-road, and 20 per cent off-road.

The tyre features a hexagonal block tread pattern and has been optimized for traction and braking across a range of surfaces, including sealed roads, gravel, sand, and light-to-medium mud applications. Meanwhile, a high silica content is said to deliver excellent grip, especially in wet conditions.

The Dueler A/T 002 also represents a step up from the tyre it effectively replaces, Sodano says.

“The key advantages are roughly 30 per cent better wear life, roughly four or five per cent lower rolling resistance, and lower noise by a couple of dB [decibels],” he says, adding that the price of the A/T 002 compared to the older model has essentially remained unchanged.

“So all the stuff that’s important for on-road behaviour it does, but then when we benchmark it against our two major competitors in the all-terrain and in the light truck areas, it performs as well as they do off-road. So we’ve really got a tyre that’s the best of both worlds.”

To showcase the new hoop’s talents, Bridgestone Australia set us on a varied course that saw us take to a fleet of 4x4 Isuzu D-MAX utes and MU-X SUVs, with a mix of 17-inch and 18-inch rims.

We set off from Noosa’s busy urban streets before crossing the Noosa River via the punt for a run up the beach. We pushed as far north as the southern end of Rainbow Beach, before finishing with a stretch of motorway back to the Sunshine Coast airport.

These tyres feel and behave just as you’d hope a typical passenger tyre would in built-up environs, and even though conditions were sunny and we didn’t get to test the tyres’ wet-weather grip, we can say they were quiet on the road and played their part in helping to soak up some of the shock from road imperfections.

With fine and dry weather also preceding our run, conditions on the beach were also ideal, and we only aired down from the standard road pressures to a relatively high (for sand) pressure of 24psi. But the fleet pushed on for the day without issue, with our nine or so cars making it back onto the blacktop without a worry, even over the soft and choppy sand where the trail exits the beach back onto the hinterland.

In short, if you want on-road comfort but also the ability to seek out a bit of adventure, the Dueler A/T 002s appear well up to the task.

The return run down the highway, meanwhile, highlighted how these tyres remain comfortable and quiet at speed. On some surfaces there was little road noise to speak of, while some course-chip surfaces provoked a bit of road noise but certainly nothing excessive.

I think Bridgestone has produced a smart ploy in bringing the Dueler A/T 002 to Australia. People buy SUVs, 4x4s and especially 4x4 utes in massive numbers these days, and we have the country and lifestyle to encourage many of them to head further afield. But not everyone wants to tackle monster bog holes or see just how sticky an off-road situation they can conquer. And while that market is well catered for with Bridgestone’s A/T 697 as well as its mud terrain options, and many are happy to stick with highway tyres, the Dueler A/T 002 will do well to serve those who fall somewhere in-between.

The Bridgestone Dueler A/T 002 is on sale now. There are presently 19 different different sizes available with another 11 coming next year, including four or five 20-inch models. There’s a Dueler A/T 002 size to suit the vast majority of modern SUVs, 4x4s, and utes. The tyres are available through the national Bridgestone dealer network and from leading tyre stockists.

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