Marshal’s Matrac FX ‘Firmly Established’ in UK UHP Market

The new flagship uhp tyre in the Marshal range is the Matrac FX MU11, a product now firmly established in a wide range of sizes on the UK market. This replacement for the KU17, says Marshal, has been designed to offer especially high levels of wet weather performance and resistance to aquaplaning. Two more of its outstanding characteristics are high resistance to uneven wear and low noise generation.

For the technically-minded, the new tyre owes its performance to a combination of an optimum silica compounding matrix, advanced construction design and the application of sophisticated simulation technologies. It features asymmetric grooves that prevent heel and toe wear by minimising the movement of outside lateral blocks. The water drainage performance is enhanced by slashed lateral grooves. Aesthetically, Marshal comments that the sidewall design has deliberately been kept clean and simple and the lettering used is readily legible, thanks to the use of a noticeably bold font.

The Matrac FX is available in a spread of sizes to fit wheels from 15 right through to 20-inch in diameter and the range now includes the popular 205/45R17 run-flat size.

The first asymmetric high performance pattern to join the Marshal range, the Matrac XM KH35, was commended in Auto Express’ 2007 Product Honours.  Ranked third overall in the original 2006 test, its main strengths were judged to lie in the key safety related disciplines of wet braking, an area in which it finished first, as well as wet handling and cornering.  The Matrac XM’s strong performance in the 15-tyre test ranked it ahead of most major brands.

The Matrac XM’s tread pattern is designed to give well balanced performance in driving conditions ranging from dry to light snow covered roads. In the wet, the tyre’s wide circumferential grooves give optimum driving safety and water drains rapidly through its many lateral channels. A further important feature of the tyre is its high degree of driving stability. Two solid type ribbed blocks are designed to increase stability at high speed and the stiff outer shoulder blocks to maximise grip when cornering. Noise, adds Marshal, has been minimised by tuning the size of the tread blocks to improve uniformity and the shoulder blocks are specially designed to resist uneven wear. New polymers have been used in the tread compound to increase wet handling and aquaplaning resistance.

The Matrac XM line-up now covers 53 H, V and W speed rated sizes from 165/60R14 to 255/35R18, including several new to the Marshal range.