ChrisF

For all those who lamented their cars being fitted with the "crappy" Dunlops, well...enjoy



Text as translated by a friend:

AutoBild Sportscars May 2015

Haftprüfung (Griptest)
Which of the OEM tires is faster? In comparison: a street tire.

Tested:

245/35-20, 305/30-20 ZR

Dunlop Maxx Race (NO) 1:12.1 min
Michelin Pilot Super Sport 1:12.5 min
Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 (NO) 1:13.7 min

OZ Racing provided Ultralegerra HLT CL center lock wheels in 20 inch for the tire test in Papenburg. The test car supplied by Daniel Hofman (www.fit4track.com). The center lock nut needs care and patience.


If you’ve ordered a 911 GT3, you’ll receive specially developed sport tires (German magazines often refer to semi-slick/track tires as “sportreifen”, sport tires) from Dunlop or Michelin. According to Porsche both tires deliver the same performance. That’s exactly what we wanted to test with the Dunlop Sport Maxx Race (NO) and Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 (NO) on the recreated Hockenheim short course on the ATP Papenburg proving grounds. In addition we brought along and conventional street tire from Michelin, the Pilot Super Sport in GT3 dimension 245/35-20 and 305/30-20 ZR.

Let’s start with the Cup 2. The new Cup, with its broad shoulders, makes an impression even standing still. As is usual with sport tires, the rubber needs a warm-up phase. In comparison to its predecessor the new tires need a few kilometers more to reach optimum operating temperature. But when they do, everything fits. No noticeable understeer, a rear end with lots of bite and predictability. However after the 3rd lap the rear tires start to overheat, costing time in the faster corners with oversteer.

The Dunlop utilizes a similar profile but achieves temperature quicker and is, subjectively, faster in the first curves. Grip on the front end is a tick better, the limits a bit higher. In addition they deliver constant times even into the 5th lap. In the end they’re even four tenths faster than the Cup 2 from Michelin. However, after the tests ,we carefully inspected the tires. While the Michelin were visually fine, with only slight wear, the Dunlop exhibited noticeable torn up in the center of the tire such that we wouldn’t use them in the wet.

And the street Michelin? As expected, it understeered more, however the rear end had similar grip to the semi-slicks. Consistency was also good. However, at these speeds, when the car doesn’t turn in well you lose your trust and speed. Regardless, amazing that the Pilot Super Sport is only 1.2 seconds off the pace of its higher performance brothers.


Conclusion

Two OEM Porsche sport tires at the same level? Not quite. The tires from Dunlop and Michelin are similarly fast, the Sport Maxx having more heat resistance, however with higher wear. The surprise being Michelin’s street tire which is not much slower than the Cup tire.

WSH

I have the Dunlops and like them a lot
No regrets here....

Bill

ipse dixit

Interesting.

Thank you for posting. Much appreciated.

nlpamg

Very useful information. Thanks for posting it.

I had Dunlops on my GT-R and I actually preferred them to tires like the R888's.

My GT3 came with PSC2's and I would have honestly been fine with either tire.

Dr.Bill

Surprising the Super Sports did so well. I've tried them before and was not impressed.

Kobalt

Thanks for sharing!

It was a small error in the translation:

The table should be:


Dunlop Maxx Race (NO) 1:12.1 min
Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 (NO) 1:12.5 min
Michelin Pilot Super Sport 1:13.7 min

orthojoe

Cool! Thanks for sharing, Chris. I agree with Bill that I would have expected the MPSS to be even slower, but maybe it's because it's a pretty short track

Manifold

I've used all three tires, on various cars.

I can believe that the Dunlops will turn about the same lap time as the SC2 for a few laps, but as the article notes, the Dunlops tend to disintegrate quickly. So far I'm finding the SC2 to be much better in that regard. No way I'll ever buy the Dunlops again.

Also, I suspect that the true delta between the SC2 and Super Sport is larger than they report. Pressures and temps for the SC2 may not have been optimized.

DMoore

FWIW, I've just completed two track days (Chuckwalla, Thermal Club) on Dunlops. A total of 4100 miles, including two AX events. The front tires were toast and all 4 were replaced earlier this week. Tomorrow I go to Fontana (the roval) for two days on my brand news MPSC2's. I'll get a back to back comparison, a week apart, between the two tires. I can't wait to see what I think.

I ran MPSS tires on each of my last 3 911's - a 997.2S, 997.2GTS, and 991S. In each case I thought the Michelin was significantly better than the OE tires, which were MPS2's on the 997's and Pirelli P-Zero's on the 991. I too am surprised at how well the MPSS did compared to the much softer GT3 tires.

DMoore
'15 GT3
'13 Panamera GTS

ZZinger

I was bent out of shape when my car arrived with Dunlops. Now, after 1000+ miles I love the Dunlops, great tire!

Mech33

You must not be getting the tires very hot on track?

sccchiii

My experience after using a set of both is that the Dunlops are quick but fall off much quicker than the MPSC2s and need to be replaced much sooner..

Alan C.

I put a set of MPSS on for the street.

Rovman

Ha, interesting read. I have the Dunlops on my car and observed exactly what they state along the lines of wear. I participated in one track afternoon and the Dunlops were pretty badly worn from that one day. They were fairly consistent through the 30 minute sessions we were running that day , only toward the last 5 to 10 minutes they would start to drop off. By the 3rd session I would run hard for 10/12 minutes than pull back to 6/10's let the tires recover (cool down) than push hard the remaining 10/12 minutes. Using this technique they were pretty consistent when I was trying for the quick laps.

mdkim

I'm fairly certain he wasn't saying he had 4100 track miles on his tires if that's what you're thinking.