After consulting with various Porsche and Tire forums and yielding to my frugal nature, I replaced the threadbare rear Pirelli P Zeros on my 2004 996 Turbo X50 Cab with Sumitomo HTRZ5's. While I didn't see any threads regarding the HTRZ5's on 996TTs specifically, there seemed to be a general consensus that the predecessor HTRZ III's were a reasonable budget option on 996's. I believed these posts and assumed (danger!) that the updated tire model would be even better. What a mistake!

With the new tires, the rear immediately felt loose during lane changes and mild cornering. More spirited cornering resulted in the feeling of the rear end swinging out -- like the rear suspension was broken or the tire sidewalls were folding over on themselves. My first suspicion was that the tires were dramatically under-inflated. The pressures were at about 38lbs cold, so I inflated to 44lbs cold as dictated by the manual. The hip-swinging behavior was unimpressed by appropriate air pressure.

After several hundred miles I finally found an opportunity drive around a bend at considerable speed, and before achieving remotely interesting G's, the "nannies" kicked in, engaging the front ABS, forcing the car to straighten out. It felt very unsafe.

So I returned to Discount Tire, where a very professional service guy negotiated a full refund from their supplier (Tire Rack!). For a mere $50 per tire we upgraded to the Pirelli P Zero, and all is well in Porscheland again. Live and learn.

Additional information.... This is our 5th Porsche, and we've run hundreds of thousands of incident-free miles on non N-rated tires, many of which were on non-premium brands such as Hankook and Dunlop. Given my druthers, I'd always run Michelin PS4s's (as are on the front of this car and on all corners of our other car), but they are not available in 295/30/18, and the PS2's seemed crazy expensive for non-matching tires that only last about 12K miles. I don't track this car, so the Pirellis seemed/seem fine.

 

Good info. I started a thread on the new Z5s over on 996outpost.com, but no one had tried them yet. I have ZIIIs on my car now, but they are due for a change. I came to the conclusion that I'd give the General GMax a shot until some user commentary on the Z5 was available. So, although I haven't bought the Generals yet, your comments reinforce my decision.

Even though I like the ZIIIs, when I bought my '99 996 C4 back in 2013, it came with a new set of ZIIs, and I had the exact same experience with them. I ended up replacing them with a good set of all seasons that were way better handling tires than the ZIIs. It is odd how a change of generation in a tire can make such a noticeable difference.

Just curious, and even though you live in a warm climate, given that your experience was over the winter, was any of the squirrelly behavior at ambient temps of 40 degrees or less? What kind of temps were you driving in?

 

Go for the genrals. A little more expensive but last longer on the street and just as good as ps2 for the price.

 

i replace just the rears of my PS2 set with more N rated PS2s and experienced "some" of what you described. The 996 turbo seems very susceptible to mis-match in front/rear sidewall stiffness and tread squirm. I bet if you had done a full set of the Sumitomos it would have not seemed broken, just mildy loose. Replacing just the rears with the same tire is mildly off for handling, putting mis-match brands especially cheaper tires on the rear is just bad.

 

If you're looking for a solid performing budget-conscious tire, the General G-Max is a great tire and will compete with many tires that are double the cost. I have them on my car right now and I'm very pleased with them.

 

+1. I have about 2K miles on the gmax and I'm very happy with them.

 

i also went with the generals and have been very happy with them...

 

Thanks for the report.

G-Max it is.

 

G-Max for the budget win.

 

GWIT996F -- I drove in temps ranging from 45-80 degrees (always dry) and the feeling was the same each time. Good luck with the new tires!

 

Got it. Thanks.

 

I have now put over 8,000 miles on my General G-Max RS tires and have nothing but good things to say about them.
I don't track or carve up the nonexistant Michigan canyons, but they're great around town or on the highway during the 4 weeks of summer we have here.
Native Floridians don't belong in Michigan!
P.S. Please send spring soon!

 

I am hoping for some track experience testimonials. Sounds like track performance might be the only thing PS2s do better. For the price difference I could get a set of track rims. Then go for some NT01s and shave several seconds.

 

Do some searching in the Corvette forums. The G-Max has been pretty popular with them for a couple years now, I bet you can find some threads about people using them for track events.

 

But then you'd have to...read stuff posted by Corvette people