blau928

Um,

What about the load ratings of the tires guys...? Anyone ever look at those to determine which tires to buy? Maybe I'm a bit silly, but I usually look at the load rating, speed rating, and treadwear before buying...

Personal hydroplaning tests can only be done (by me) in the mild Central Coast CA Winter, or renting skidpad time at Laguna... (I opt for winter weather)..

I personally think current Michelin and Pirelli street tires are WAAAAAAAYYYYY overpriced for what you get. Conti's are a bit cheaper, but have similar load, wear, and speed rating. If only the Kumho's came in my size.... Cheappppppppp and good... 40,000 miles on a set of kumho's (18 inch) Same mileage on Continental Sport Contact 2.

I got 25,000 miles on a set of Pilot Sports on my 740i in Germany, and had to open my wallet... I know, different car etc. etc... I think the treadwear was the same (280) though, and I am pretty good about monitoring pressures.. Also 18 in wheels on the 740.... Granted, the BMW saw more constant high speeds than any of the US cars, as I would keep the pedal down between Hamburg and Berlin where most of my mileage on this car occurred.. In addition, the 928 was tracked, while the BMW was not...

I go for the street tires being overpriced and underperforming... I will say though, that when I drove in Germany, the speed and load rating were very important, as the police could give you a serious ticket if you were speeding without properly rated tires..

my .02

Cheers,

Sierra Shark

Hey Thad I tried to warn you. 100 differnet tires, 100 differnet opinions. Jim B. hit it on the head. The majority of us don't drive anywhere near the limits of the tires we all have. And like I said in the PM if you're driving in the rain at, or over, the limits of adhesion you're an idiot. Everyone here has decent points to be made for their favored brand. At the end of the day it gets down to wear, noise, and dry adhesion vs. the dollars spent. Why spend big bucks when you can get what you need for less. Don't confuse NEED vs. WANT. (Guilty as hell here but still learning) All this said without mentioning a single brandname.

mark kibort

Im just giving you a hard time. this racing stuff, really hardens you , if you know what i mean. as you start beating on your car on the track, its amazing what you find that really is important. On my street cars now, its just oil changes and the cheapest tires i can find. amazing how long things last on the street. sold my chevy tahoe with 50,000miles on the original tires and they still looked good! (one set of pads and a bunch of oil changes!)

after trashing on the T1S toyos in speed GT and on the street, (and they were shaved first!) i thought,if i ever need street tires, ill use them. pretty slick compared to Hoosiers, but then i would think that all street tires are. so, thats the reason i dont really think there is much of a difference between street tires. they are all poor as far as grip!! I guess its really a matter of what is the "least" bad.

Mk

James-man

Thaddeus,

Do you ever drive in the rain?

If not your primary transportation and the car stays comfortably in the garage on wet days, it would seem that wet performance should not have much bearing in your decision.

That said, why not consider one of the "Street Legal" DOT racing tires. With the mileage that you are looking at in addition to the dual sets of wheels (which I presume you may swap between), you just might be able to get nearly 2 years out of them.

I haven't looked in a while, but 2 years ago when shopping around, I noticed that Victoracers were @ $130 to $140 each. I was considering it as I was only been driving a couple thousand miles a year at the time.

Conceptually, I like the idea of tires wearing out while still "fresh" rather than letting tires get old, hard and brittle with with plenty of remaining tread life. Also, isn't it the compound rather than the fancy tread patterns that matter most for high performance driving in dry conditions?

Good luck.

sweanders

When somebody says that Pirelli, Dunlop, Michelin or any other tire brand is the best I wonder what tire you using. Even Michelin Pilot Sport comes in several different types and most tire manufacturers do several revisions of each type and even different compunds for different markets.

I shake my head when I read about people raving tires like the Khumo 712 - it's only good side is the price, it's cheap.

If you want a street tire with close to R-compound behaviour I'd get Dunlop Supersport Race or Falken Azenis.

Thaddeus

I'm very, very confused now.

Has anybody done a test of these tires side by side on a skidpad?

Thaddeus

Found a posting where some dude scraped together a bunch of stuff off of TireRack and other places... good read.

http://forums.audiworld.com/wheel/msgs/61011.phtml

mark kibort

Dont worry, again, they all stink!!!

however, you can get some Toyo RA1 and get them full tread and they will smoke any of the street tires you are thinking about. usually the difference is 4-5 seconds a lap in a race condion. you all know how long my last set lasted and they were used to begin with. round trips to LA, thunderhill, sears , laguna and some normal street driving too, and it was still a shame to toss them out for the newer , used tires from the Caddie team at the last SpeedGT race. now, these are allready shaved to 3/32nds. just think how long they will last full tread. much better than victoracers Kuhmo, and i think about the same cost. full tread, they are a serious wet tire too. the soft compound helps a little in the rain as well.

as far as the street, again, pic a tire that looks cool and is the right price, and you are ahead of the game.

MK

blau928

Hey Anders,

FYI, I use Conti Sport Contact2 N2 235/40-18 Front, and 295/30-18 Rear. Both ZR rated, and treadwear 280.. XL versions were not available at the time.. In addition, as I mentioned, I agree with Kibort, that in general, street tires offer little grip. As I drive my car on the road, and also on the track, IMHO I can comment on both situations of driving..

I did rave about Kumho 712 precisely because they are cheap, and for the street getting 40,000 miles for about $500 for a set of tires including 6-8 track days, I can do the math. Let's see.... $500 vs $1200 for street tires that will not be used to 95% Hmmmmmmmmmm. Driving over 100mph in all of the states in the USA gets you arrested very quickly... Ask me how I know.. Most people do not do that on public roads without consequenses, and as Jim B mentioned, why pay more for something you'll not use..

In the USA, there are not many places (highways) that one can use the limit of the tires, compared to Germany or a track.. Even in Sweden, you can't.

Thaddeus also asked about regular tires, not race tires. If he did, he certainly did not specify.

For clarification, in case you did not understand my scripting....... For street tires, in my opinion, it is not worth the extra money for any brand of tire, if you can find a less expensive one with similar safety ratings that will do the same job. I mentioned brands with which I am personally familiar, and have knowledge of by actually using the products.. Mentioning products with which I have no familiarity is paramount to oral diarreha.

I've never suffered from this... Maybe you....?

Jim bailey - 928 International

As I recall there is no standard for tread wear numbers and they are only meaningful to differentiate between two tires by the same manufacturer so BFGs 200 is not the same as Toyos 200 etc....

T_MaX

Has anyone mentioned Porsche's side wall rating requirements?

blau928

Jim,

I think the DOT has the Tire Mfg. put the wear number on as a standard of comparison, so they should be some similarities even if a bit subjective. Marketers following the "herd" mentality will likely group products in like markets for presence and a chance to obtain marketshare and boost the Wall Street perception...

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tiretech/general/utqg.jsp

Bill51sdr

I'm with Mark K. on this one. NO street tire can even begin to compare to ANY R compound "street" tire & some Hoosiers fall into this catagory, believe it or not. They just warn you never to drive them on the street due to the fact that you WILL hydroplane in light rain. I would buy the best rain tire you can find, and yes, I have the Kuhmo 712's just for that reason. The fact that they are inexpensive is nice. I'm a firm believer that you should NOT be trying out the limits of your vehicle on public streets, by the way. Save it for the track. Go buy some R compound tires for those extra rims and take it to an autox or DE. It's safe and no damage occurs when you find "YOUR" limits and spin out. You will simply not believe the difference in grip between the R compounds and the so-called "ultimate" street tires.

Dennis K

Supposedly the secret weapon street tires (UTQG treadwear rating >140) amongst autocross guys are the Falken Azenis Sport and the Falken FK-451. They're both cheaper than Michelin Pilot Sports and supposedly stickier. All the coneheads at the Solo2 Nationals running in the street tire classes were running Falkens or Kumho MX's.

If you wanted to get crazy and run sticky race tires, Dunlop Super Sport Race and Pirelli P-Zero Corsas are on sale right now for about half price at Tirerack. Not sure if they have 16" sizes though.

And yes the UTQG treadwear rating is not consistent from manufacturer to manufacturer.

Tony

thanks for the tip of Dennis!