Switched from Kuhmos to Bridgestone S03's
08-13-2002, 12:52 AM
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Switched from Kuhmos to Bridgestone S03's
My replacement SO3's came in from Tire Rack today and I had them swapped in for the Kuhmo Ecsta 712's that were flat spotting. During the road force testing one of the Bridgestone's came back as marginal so I may send that back to Tire Rack for another after I put the car through its paces and see if I can tell or if it creates a vibration, etc.
Here are my initial thoughts from a very brief test drive:
The S03's are more rounded, not a squarish shoulder like the Kuhmos so turn-in seemed easier/smoother, in fact handling all around seemed improved. I took the car to my favorite cul de sac to turn circles at faster and faster speeds until I started to slide and was able to push it another 5-8mph more than the Kuhmos before the tires started to lose grip and grip loss was less sharp and less noisy than the Kuhmos.
This is NOT to say that the Kuhmos are bad tires, other than the flat spotting I really had no complaints about them, they handled fine and were certainly less expensive that the S03's.
Road noise was about the same volume level from both tires, but the S03's were a different pitch and one that wasn't quite as noticeable to me as the Kuhmos, although BOTH tires were less noisy than my previous Pirellis.
I haven't tried them at high speed yet, or in wet conditions, but first initial impressions are very favorable. I won't know about flat spotting until after I leave my car for a day or two to see if the S03's do the same thing or not, certainly I am hoping "not".
One thing I didn't expect was the overall "look" of the tire. I much prefer the "look" both sidewall and tread design of the S03 over the Kuhmo. I know I know, entirely subjective, buy hey, if you are going to pay more for a tire shouldn't it look better too?
I'll update this report as I get more time on the S03's, but so far they seem to be everything everyone says they are. I'd also like to point out that others have Kuhmos and have not had any flat spotting issues (although some have), so it could well be that I got a bad tire or bad multiple tires with the set I originally purchased. For me I am sort of one of those once bitten twice shy types so while I could have swapped for another set of Kuhmos I opted to pay the difference and upgrade to the Bridgestones. I'll know soon whether or not the move paid dividends.
One other interesting point of note, I stacked all 4 Kuhmo tires on my garage floor next to my stack of 4 PZeros and the Kuhmo stack is a good 1/2" taller, which I suspect may come from the tire protector ridge. The Bridgestones also have a tire protector ridge which the guys who mounted them said make it a real royal pain to mount these low profile tires on 18" wheels. They asked me to please be happy with this set as they don't like struggling with tire so much and this was on a brand new Hunter 9700 machine!
Here are my initial thoughts from a very brief test drive:
The S03's are more rounded, not a squarish shoulder like the Kuhmos so turn-in seemed easier/smoother, in fact handling all around seemed improved. I took the car to my favorite cul de sac to turn circles at faster and faster speeds until I started to slide and was able to push it another 5-8mph more than the Kuhmos before the tires started to lose grip and grip loss was less sharp and less noisy than the Kuhmos.
This is NOT to say that the Kuhmos are bad tires, other than the flat spotting I really had no complaints about them, they handled fine and were certainly less expensive that the S03's.
Road noise was about the same volume level from both tires, but the S03's were a different pitch and one that wasn't quite as noticeable to me as the Kuhmos, although BOTH tires were less noisy than my previous Pirellis.
I haven't tried them at high speed yet, or in wet conditions, but first initial impressions are very favorable. I won't know about flat spotting until after I leave my car for a day or two to see if the S03's do the same thing or not, certainly I am hoping "not".
One thing I didn't expect was the overall "look" of the tire. I much prefer the "look" both sidewall and tread design of the S03 over the Kuhmo. I know I know, entirely subjective, buy hey, if you are going to pay more for a tire shouldn't it look better too?
I'll update this report as I get more time on the S03's, but so far they seem to be everything everyone says they are. I'd also like to point out that others have Kuhmos and have not had any flat spotting issues (although some have), so it could well be that I got a bad tire or bad multiple tires with the set I originally purchased. For me I am sort of one of those once bitten twice shy types so while I could have swapped for another set of Kuhmos I opted to pay the difference and upgrade to the Bridgestones. I'll know soon whether or not the move paid dividends.
One other interesting point of note, I stacked all 4 Kuhmo tires on my garage floor next to my stack of 4 PZeros and the Kuhmo stack is a good 1/2" taller, which I suspect may come from the tire protector ridge. The Bridgestones also have a tire protector ridge which the guys who mounted them said make it a real royal pain to mount these low profile tires on 18" wheels. They asked me to please be happy with this set as they don't like struggling with tire so much and this was on a brand new Hunter 9700 machine!
