pascalemod

Winter tyres question here. Has anyone tried using 255-40 18 on their 997s stock 10x18 in rear wheel? If not, have you gone to a narrower rim, different tyre width, or anything else? Any one with 255-40 18 tyres fitted on rear please share - does it look massively stretched? What about 275-40 18 on 10x18 rim? Too tall and wont fit?

I ask this because I cannot find a proper cold winter non studded winter tyre in 265-40 R18 Porsche recommends - options only include stuff like Michelin Pilot Alpin and so on, but Im looking for something closer to Continental Winter Viking 7 or Yokohama IG60A (a much softer nordic winter tyre for very cold temps). So in some way this is a question to northern bit of USA and Canada guys who face -20C degree weather, ice on roads, slush, compacted snow, etc. Proper winter.

Ofc I can get the Pilot Alpins and they might be fine when roads are dry, wet and not icy, and weather is not below -5C. Problem with these mild winter tyres is they are like summer tyres once temps fall below -10C and Id rather be able to drive the car then, not park it for the weeks.

All idea welcome for perfect 18in winter setup.

PS. Does 2009 997.2 car need TMPS in Europe cars also?

roadie13

I was facing a similar dilemma but decided to go with N-rated Pirelli winter tires in the original recommended sizes. Granted, this is New York, not Alaska, plus I have not driven on them yet

Still, when I looked through the numerical test results on tire rack between the latest breed of high performance winter tires and hard-core studless winter tires, the test results are actually very close.
In other words, my impression was that tire technology has advanced so much in the last decade that the gap between these two categories has narrowed significantly.

Anyhow, Kudos to you for putting your 911 out there! We will need snow pictures! Reminds me of the old Beetle commercial "how does the snow plow driver get to the snow plow"...

AIrey1507

I've got the Pirelli Winter Sottozero 2 tires in the OEM recommended winter size (265/18 rear). I'm in MN and so far the tires have been great down to 10*F, but I haven't had them out in the snow yet.

shyamvenky

On my 997 I have Nokian Hakkapeliitta R2 tires - basically studless snow tires. I run 225/45/18 in the front and 255/45/18 in the rear.
I've been quite pleased with the tires and have driven in light snow a few times, but mostly cold, wet near-freezing temperatures a lot here in the PNW.

GoldenGorilla

255 width will fit fine on a 10" rim as long as the tire mfg says it is within their rim width range. 10" = 254mm. But if you have a c4, compare the ratio of diameters to stock sizes. The system is designed for some variance within reason, but if you go too far from the spec sizes you can damage the front diff.

I run the 265 pirelli winter rear on my C4S but they can sell out early in the fall.

pascalemod

After speaking to POrsche I was strongly advised against going on softer cold winter focused tyre and stick to the medium so to speak winter tyres (Michelin Pilot Alpin PA4). Reason being cars traction control is tuned for certain tyre compliance and the very cold climate winter tyre tends to be soft, and can throw off the finely tuned stability control software. So id go with recommended sizes now.. Ofc it goes a bit agains the variety of choices enthusiasts put on their cars but this isnt really about size of tyre, but rather about how super soft the nordic winter tyres are and how thats not great for the cars software, potentially. Go figure.