TYPE911

Thanks for the great replies.

I have read some reviews that claim the Contintental Extreme Contact DW sidewalls are too soft. Opinions on that?

Hankook's (despite the name) seem like a good bargain, but have also read that they wear very fast.

Anyone running the Bridgestone Potenza RE-11 ? These tires have received good reviews from Porsche owners on Tire Rack.

german steel

I just ordered the RE-11's from Costco today, $70 off a set through April 1st up here. Getting the wheels powder coated as well.
I'll update once they are installed.

hamah

+1 on the Conti DW. These are more tire than you legally need on the road I suppose one could argue the sidewalls are too soft if you're on a track day but I wouldn't know because I don't race. I do drive pretty aggressively on mountain twisties (for a cab) and love these tires. So much so I might even try the DWS next time to see how they compare for performance vs. wear.

They are so reasonably priced I'd just say go and try them but the downside is they wear so well you're going to be stuck with them awhile.

newsboy

I have Yokohama S-Drive, and like them. R-compound, so, not advisable to use below freezing. Reasonably priced, also. You might want to think about going to a 225 in the front?

Geoffrey

I'll take a contraian view here and say that I buy from Tire Rack the least expensive tire from a major manufacturer (Bridgestone, Dunlop, Michelin, Pirelli, etc.) that I can find. I usually find 17" tires in 225 front and 255 rear for less than $500 per set shipped to my door. It has been my experience that they all have similar performance on a normally driven street car, and a car driven to the potential to notice the difference exceeds what is "reasonable and proper" for the street. The areas of difference between the tires that I notice are noise and wet weather performance when the tread life is < 50%. I use my car as a daily driver and go through 1 set of fronts and 2 sets of rears every year. Currently I don't even remember what is on the car, but I think they are Dunlop Direzza (SP?).

I think people get over excited about tires for street cars.

DWS964

^^^^^^
A dose of sanity from a guy that I respect his knowledge and opinion.
For my daily driver, I think the answer is 3 sets of tires+wheels (my wife will not understand this) - inexpensive street tires for summer, winter tires, and a set of R compound tires (that will work for dry and some wet) for track days.

BGLeduc

This ought to be a sticky.

When I read posts about tire performance from folks that do not track or AX their cars, my first thought is, please tell me where you are going to be driving like that so I can be somewhere else. :-)

Brian

993James993

This advice sums up perfectly the conclusion that I've finally come to after years of buying the most expensive tires I could find for my 993 while my son purchased excellent tires for the 964 at half the price I was paying. For street driving there is little if any difference.

Shamus964

The nice thing about this approach is that two of the cheapest tires are also two of the very grippiest tires... 'cheater' tires designed for auto-x and track days: the Dunlop Direzza Star Spec and the Hankook Ventus R-S3

Amazing grip for very little money - they're not quiet and they're not soft or long wearing, but they're excellent in the dry/summer and at the price you can replace them more often.

I did an auto-x yesterday on my R-S3's (excellent all-around handling characteristics by the way) and as I staged for the next run one of them lifted the large gauge extension cord off the tarmac (luckily someone noticed as I went to roll forward) So yeah, they're sticky for a 'street' tire.

RSAErick

Exactly. Inexpensive tires with maximum grip - even in the cold. They probably don't wear well, but if you aren't putting a lot of miles on the car, they're a great value. They grip surprisingly well on the track too, but don't handle excessive heat well.

Recommended.

90_C2_Cab

Again, Dunlop Direzza's are the ticket for cost + grip in wet or dry. We don't drive Camry's! I don't mean that we always drive at the limits but with a tail heavy car let's get the greatest amount of grip we can buy at a reasonable price for the times we do drive hard.

Most of us are not using our cars as daily drivers. I put 3-4k miles max on my car per year which means 3 years out of a set of sticky Dunlops. Life is too short for sucky tires. Spend the extra $200 folks.

Goughary

I kind of agree with Geoffrey - in that any 'good' tire from the majors will be fine for the street. Under any normal circumstances, you wont have enough heat in the tires to get them sticky enough to make a real difference from one to the other, and with full tread, they are slippery anyway in relative terms to a "sticky" tire...but - that said - in terms of my choice, it's not a question of price, it's a question of relative grip under normal driving, grip in the wet, which for me is very important since I drive everyday and it rains alot, and over all those by far - is sound - the tires have to be quiet. I had a set of older bridgstones on the car when I got it, and the inside of the car was so loud you couldnt hear anything. So I got a set or Michelin PS2's and have been happy ever since. Good quiet tire, good grip, wear well.All that said, I'd love to sit in someone else's car and hear and feel a set of tires that cost 200 dollars less. If they werent much different, I'd just buy those...

So did I just say buy the cheepest tires? Maybe - but buy the cheepest 'good' tires is what I meant...

And one parting note. - in terms of "sticky" street tires...When I was a kid, there were these hard as a rock tires that people were using that were considered "sport" tires...and then Yokahama came out with a tire that had a racing compound and we shaved them down to the legal spec for showroom stock...("We", means my dad - I was a kid) - anyway - I remember only how impressed he was and that his laptimes were much faster...and I also remember lots of rocks getting thrown into the paint because they were so sticky...Street tires are a compromise between dry,wet, tempurature, noise, etc for a reason....

993James993

How does the lay person figure out which tires are going to give the best grip when looking at tire rack.com or discount tire.com? I would imagine that there are multiple considerations.

I could be wrong but I assume that the lower the UTQG rating, the sticker the tire. By my reasoning, a tire rated at 180AA should be stickier than one rated at 500AA. It will also wear much faster.

Is this correct? I'd like to know the real answer.

Thanks!

Goughary

Honestly - a lay person should take some good advice from here, and buy a set of reasonably inexpensive tires suggested by some people they trust, and if you dont like them, when they need replacing - try another set...Cuz in the meantime, they'll be fine...

I'm still trying, and will probably try the Continentals next, or maybe Pilot Super Sport...depending on budget and availability at the time...

Earlydays

...very happy with Yokohama Neova AD08's. In my sizes (16") the AD08's were lighter tires than the Direzza's and RE11's.