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Hi, I have about six HPDE days under my belt on a 911 C2S. My tires still seem to have plenty of tread, albeit with some melted in marbles and the like.
i’m not pushing for any personal best, just trying to have fun and bring the car home in the same condition as when I brought it to the track.
My question - do I need new tires? I’ve been thinking about cup 2’s, but have been waiting to use up the ones I already have before springing on the $2k it’s going to take.
I spent my first PCA DE year (Green) on PS4S tires. Six events and about 15 track days. Last two-day event they did give out, not by tread wear but I think by heat cycling. Grip went down noticeably.
My two cents is to keep track driving until you approach a point where you notice grip degradation. You can still drive but you’ll have to manage the track more carefully. And that can actually help you improve.
I hope you’re in an instructed group, so talk with him/her about the tires (amongst many other things).
I think the PS4S is a great track beginner tire. Try not to worry about them and focus instead on yourself. You can upgrade next season as your driving improves commensurately.
Excellent advice from SteveP911, especially if you are in a HPDE group or Porsche DE that has an Instructor. Ask him/her what they think but it sounds like you are using your first year to learn the lines, technique, and teach yourself some good habits!
Agree with the other respondents. As long as you have tread, they are fine. There is no standard number of days as longevity depends on car, track, tire pressure, and driving style. PS4S and most other 400 TW tires usually wear out on the track by cording or chunking the outside edges before the center tread wears out. They have a lot of lateral tread/grooves to channel rain and these don't hold up to well under track cornering forces. Such wear will be will be visible and obvious to you; have someone more experienced in the paddock look at your tires after every few sessions. You have to be driving pretty hard to start chunking/cording tires. When that happens, you're ready to step up to 200 TW tires.
One of the first upgrades you should do in your car is camber plates plus or minus lower control arms. Adding negative camber up front not only makes the car turn in better, but also lowers your running costs by reducing tire wear. Camber plates alone (with labor to install) run about $1100 - 1200 and will pay for themselves in less than one season. You will get twice the life out of your front tires along with better handling.
Finally, do yourself a favor and look at other tires besides Cup 2s when you upgrade. They tend to heat cycle out quickly (i.e. no grip even though plenty of tread left) and are very expensive. I'm a Bridgestone RE71-RS fan, but there are a multitude of other 200 TW tires that people like better than the Cup 2s. Lots of threads here about that.
Good luck - I was where you are a couple of years ago. It's an addictive sport.
Dgood, if you take your car to an indy and do a tech inspection before your track day, they will be able to tell you how much tire you have left. But as you get faster in the car, and if you get hooked on tracking which is very easy to do, you will eventually get to the point that you will start looking at faster tires.
Best advice I can give you is to get another set of wheels so you can run one set with 200w or 100w tires and the other with Sport Cup 2s or a good street tire that can handle lousy track weather. That way on a sunny day you can drive on the 200w or 100w tires to the track and on a questionable day, you can drive the sport cup 2s which are decent in the wet and a reasonable street tire.
Sure, the faster you get, the shorter the life span of the tire. If you are looking for a 200w tire that you can drive around town as well in a little bit of wet, try the Bridgestone RE71RS. Had a couple of track days with them over the last 2 months and I like the feel of them.
Sticky from the begining, but very sticky after the first lap, stiff sidewall, don't get greasy at the end of the day on a 90 degree plus day, and they are very quiet on the street which is surprising. Biggest complaint i have is they don't really talk to you so i dont know their limit yet. Been playing with air pressures and grip so it will take one more track day to button it down. Don't know how durable they are either, but they have been thru 8 heat cycles and are probably good for 8 more that I have coming up. Very good all around tire versus toyo proxies and sport cups. I would buy them again. I haven't yet tried the Nankang CR or AR, but tests and feedback seem to be very good as well.
My first set of PS4S lasted nine days (252 laps) as an HPDE student, most of which was at Sebring. Now I'm lucky to get three days without cording the outside shoulders. Bone stock 2014 911 C2 MT with maxed out "track alignment".
The best advice I've received is "buy a GT3/4 and run Hoosiers". But I'm just finishing my second year of DE and the vast ocean of skills I don't have makes that seem irresponsible (for my level of experience). Safety, for myself and every driver around me, is far more important than tire wear.
Until then my plan is:
Bought a trailer which allows for dedicated track tire options.
Bought another set of wheels with Pirelli P-Zeros already on them. I'll run those until they're done and then go to a new dedicated track tire.
Figuring out the right tire to try next is complicated as shown by the hundreds on RL posts on the subject. All the other variables (experience, driving style, track, car, alignment, mods, etc.) make it nearly impossible to compare just tires. All I know from personal experience is that the PS4S isn't sufficient for my current level of driving. I'll add however that they have been excellent in the rain other than a code brown hydroplaning episode going into Turn 10 at Sebring...no spin or wheels off but it sure got my attention.
Do some front end work on the 911. Figuring out what to do is as complex as choosing tires. Leaning towards Elephant offset camber plates as a start.
I'll share results as I have them.
Last edited by lgusto; 08-14-2023 at 09:49 AM.
Reason: clarify "irresponsible"
From: Durham, NC and Virginia International Raceway
Some good posts here, but again, there are too many variables to say arbitrarily how long or how many events tires should last at any experience level, but particularly during the steep upward performance curve of a novice driver. Even that progress curve varies from driver to driver.
Two things about the idea that tires are dead when you start losing traction.
1) more often than not, the beginnings of sliding around mean you’re now going fast enough to challenge the traction limits of the tire. That is a GOOD thing!
2) more often than not, damage to the tire (chunking, tread separation, blistered tread surface) are due to novice and intermediate drivers over-driving the tire because they haven’t developed the sensitivity to approach the limit in a gradual, incremental way. Instead, they pitch the car into the corner and tire-grind going in and coming out. Presenting the tread pattern at too much of an angle in relation to the direction of travel is wanton abuse of the tire!
I know this because there are some real artists out there in WRL and AER endurance racing that can drive REALLY fast cars on 200 TW tires for hours at a time without severe drop off or damage. The moral of the story is that tire wear is driver-dependent.
It starts with proper pressure management and goes on from there.
No doubt mods make a big difference in presenting the tire tread most effectively to the road, accounting for the change in geometry with lean, pitch and slip.
To the OP, if you have tread and no damage, keep driving and have fun charting your next season.
P.S. I’m a big fan of sticky tires at nearly any level past first couple of events.
__________________ -Peter Krause www.peterkrause.net www.gofasternow.com
"Combining the Art and Science of Driving Fast!"
Specializing in Professional, Private Driver Performance Evaluation and Optimization
Consultation Available Remotely and at VIRginia International Raceway
no one will get NT01 unless they use an oddball size no one else does. i could find my fronts in stock earlier this year (245/40/18) but no luck on rears (285/40/18). i called nitto directly in april and was told they are only producing tires in the grappler line, nothing else, for 2023. they said it was due to supply chain restraints and they were only working on their most requested line of tires. everything else is on hold until at least next year.
agree with everyone posts on here. my first 2 years i used one set of tires per year doing at least 5 weekend events.
no one will get NT01 unless they use an oddball size no one else does. i could find my fronts in stock earlier this year (245/40/18) but no luck on rears (285/40/18). i called nitto directly in april and was told they are only producing tires in the grappler line, nothing else, for 2023. they said it was due to supply chain restraints and they were only working on their most requested line of tires. everything else is on hold until at least next year.
I have got 3 sets of 245 and 305 on 18's since feb with no issues. I get them off the internet sites with 10% off for $1239 delivered. Not sure what all this nonavailable talk is about?
i am only going off what they told me when i called them. they said production on the nitto line, and several others, will not be ran for the rest of this year. what is out there is all there is. i can only imagine that the 305 had a bigger run and therefore are still available. most likely the same with the 245. the 285 however is not in stock anywhere and will not be available until sometime next year. you can't even find that size on the nitto site.
I agree with ProCoach on the switch to a sticky set of tires fairly soon, and especially when the ones you are on wear out. This causes a debate whenever it comes up but my premise is from years of Instructing ( as I presume ProCoach's is ), and having students tell me all their friends told them to just drive on slow/basic/Oem tires until they felt comfortable. Love those generalized terms that tell a driver nothing, but to me the key is that you are learning to drive your car on a slower tire, so guess what, once you get something way more competitive you have to start learning all over again. Why not start with a quality, high performance tire with some grip and learn the slip angles, where the edge is, and how well your car will brake before a corner. Then you only have to learn once ( though in reality you will fine tune from then on in the sport ) and most drivers when they get onto a gumball rubber donut will not be at even 8/10ths initially.
Rule of thumb in my opinion would be to get a set of Bridgestone RE71RSs, Falken RT 660s, Yangkang CR-Ss, or other highly competitive 200 TWR tire the next go around and if you have a trailer and want to be super competitive, etc. do even consider a Hoosier A7, R7, Goodyear F1 Supercar 3Rs, etc.
There are some tires you might want to try that will be quicker, but based on your needs, if , for example you are only interested in HPDEs and not Time Trials or W2W.
First time I put on a set of Hoosiers i wondered why i wasted 10 years on 200w and 100w tires. But there is something to be said about learning how to control the car at the limit, step by step as you upgrade your tires over time.
Hi, I have about six HPDE days under my belt on a 911 C2S. My tires still seem to have plenty of tread, albeit with some melted in marbles and the like.
i’m not pushing for any personal best, just trying to have fun and bring the car home in the same condition as when I brought it to the track.
My question - do I need new tires? I’ve been thinking about cup 2’s, but have been waiting to use up the ones I already have before springing on the $2k it’s going to take.
Thanks for any input.
Getting back to the OP's original post, I think some responders may be projecting themselves on this guy. He's only got six DE days and his next set of tires need to be Hoosiers? I know that's not really what was said, but it still sounds a little premature. IMHO, I think that stickier tires for a newbie may be an enticement that can get you in trouble. It just seems logical (to me) that your car should progress along a roughly similar path as the driver does. Another aspect I would be concerned about is not addressing potential oil starvation issues in a 911 before exposing your car to higher lateral g's (but I don't know what year your 911 is). Lastly, the usage cost of Hoosiers is significantly higher than most 200tw tires (except maybe the Cup 2's).
Anyway, I wanted to comment after I went back and read what the OP had set as a goal - "have fun and bring the car home in the same condition". Doesn't seem to warrant that much in the way of tires.
08-13-2023 | 04:29 PM
How many beginner track days on PS4S?
