Best Tires / best price and performance

[mountainman]

I have a 986, a 987, and a C 4 and I buy Hankook from Discounttiredirect to run on all of them. They hold wet or dry just as good as any of the others, my tire mounter says they are rounder than most and balance better and they are half the price of michelins. I drive mountain roads every day HARD and I rarely get more than 10K out of any tire on either car. I was a loyal michelin guy for 30 years, but for these cars I think they are over rated and way overpriced. Driving a porsche means buying tires regularly---if you really drive it like the performance car it really is.

[Overdrive]

Kumho makes a great UHP All-Season, so I imagine their summer version would be even better grip wise, though I can't state anything on mileage. My sister bought a set of their UHP A/S for her 99, and I have to say they feel pretty close in comparison to the Michelins I got for the 97, especially for being $300 less purchased and installed. I'm talking all-seasons of course, but I figure the savings can be similar for the summers compared to the Michelin Pilot summers.

[tnoice]

I have the RE-11's on my Boxster S and they are great. I have not tried the others metioned above, but these tires are much better than the Yokahama's I had on before.

[Perfectlap]

Originally Posted by tnoice

I have the RE-11's on my Boxster S and they are great. I have not tried the others metioned above, but these tires are much better than the Yokahama's I had on before.

I like these too. It's the closest I felt to an R-Comp. Not cheap though but since I split the year with a winter tire I know I'll get at least 2 maybe three summers out of them. The extra $300 seems worth it.
Although in the wet my old Eagle F1's were much better but those are no longer made in Boxster fit.
p.s.
If you live where it snows all season tires are a waste of rubber. You can get caught out in just enough snow to lose all traction and summer peformance on all season tires makes no sense on a car like this. Makes the steering feel like pushing a corpse, unless you've gotten used to leaving all that goodness on the table.

[Overdrive]

...a Fiat?

How can one draw the comparison for a Boxster there?

I'm not trying to criticize, Ghostrider, I'm truly just looking for a little more clarification/elaboration.

[Ghostrider 310]

Originally Posted by Overdrive

...a Fiat?

How can one draw the comparison for a Boxster there?

I'm not trying to criticize, Ghostrider, I'm truly just looking for a little more clarification/elaboration.

They flat spotted quite easily and felt out of round from the start of each trip, just my experience, others liked them.

[blue2000s]

Originally Posted by Ghostrider 310

They flat spotted quite easily and felt out of round from the start of each trip, just my experience, others liked them.

So your issue with them is flatspotting. Fair enough. Your first 2 posts didn't explain why you had that opinion about the tires.

From a performance standpoint, I think they're excellent. The grip is great on the road and they get impressively sticky on the track. So much so that my S had trouble breaking the rear loose after a few laps when the tires get sticky. They also seem to be holding up really well as far as tread depth goes, even with a couple of track days in them. I've been thoroughly impressed and would buy them again. But yeah, after sitting they do flat spot which goes away after about 2 miles.

[tonycarreon]

Originally Posted by Ghostrider 310

They flat spotted quite easily and felt out of round from the start of each trip, just my experience, others liked them.

count me as one of the ones who hate these tires.

can never get them balanced. the flat spots don't bother me too much because they work themselves out after a short period (5-10 minutes) but they are impossible to keep balanced. i've had them balanced 4 times now and after every long road trip it's time to do it again. never had the problem from the other tires i've used. they have plenty of tread left on them so they wear a lot better than others, but when the car comes out of winter hibernation i'll be replacing them.

i've spoken with sumitomo cust. svc and they keep paying for the rebalance, but it's not worth it.

as far as the ride, (when you're not wobbling all over the road) they're okay. cornering is decent but very spongey feeling. if you want a cheap tire then the htz iii are a good choice, but if you want a good tire with good performance i'd look elsewhere.

[Deserion]

I have Michelin Pilot Sport All-Seasons on mine, have been great so far. A plus is that they have a 45,000 mile treadlife warranty to boot.

[Overdrive]

Originally Posted by Deserion

I have Michelin Pilot Sport All-Seasons on mine, have been great so far. A plus is that they have a 45,000 mile treadlife warranty to boot.

I'm not sure that warranty can apply to our vehicles since you can't exactly rotate the tires (at least not easily) on a regular basis like you can with cars whose wheel sizes are not staggered, and I'm sure that's the kind of warranty that only applies when the tires are "properly maintained and rotated every 5-6,000 miles, blah blah". I have the same tires on my car (awesome), but I don't know if the warranty applies...think I'll look into that now that you've got me thinking about it. Guess it works out fine for people who put 8.5in wheels on all the way around, though.

[nefarious986]

Just throwing this in the hat .. Nitto NT05 .. kinda new but looks like a real good option.

[ekam]

Exactly. The cost to rotate the tires at the tire manufacturer's specified interval will end up be the same cost as buying new tires. Not to mention they require 4-wheel rotation which will make warranty invalid for our cars unless you're running same tire size all around.

People should read the fine lines more often.

[BYprodriver]

Originally Posted by ekam

Exactly. The cost to rotate the tires at the tire manufacturer's specified interval will end up be the same cost as buying new tires. Not to mention they require 4-wheel rotation which will make warranty invalid for our cars unless you're running same tire size all around.

People should read the fine lines more often.

If you did read the fine lines you would see that the mileage warranty is halved for cars with different sizes front & rear.

[Overdrive]

I'm all for getting good value at better prices, but when it comes to tires I am much less inclined to skimp on cost, it's just too important a part of the vehicle to me. I'm the same with my riding gear for the motorcycle, I'm willing to spend the money. When it comes to tires and brakes I'm willing to spend the money to be able to drive (spirited or otherwise) safely.

[teamwenz]

17 inch rims limit your choices. The best rubber for 17 inch is the Michelin ps or a better choice mentioned earlier is Bridgestone RE11 s. if you move up to 18 than the hankook rs-3 and Dunlop z star spec all are available.

[ekam]

Originally Posted by teamwenz

17 inch rims limit your choices. The best rubber for 17 inch is the Michelin ps or a better choice mentioned earlier is Bridgestone RE11 s. if you move up to 18 than the hankook rs-3 and Dunlop z star spec all are available.

You got it. That's part of the reason why I went to 18"s...

[Topless]

Originally Posted by ekam

You got it. That's part of the reason why I went to 18"s...

I don't know what you guys are talking about. Essentially every tire is available in both 17 and 18.

[ryanwise]

Topless: Not really. Ive been in the Tire business for 40 years and am the Director of Sales for a large Tire Distributor. The 17" is going the way of the 16". 18's are now the standard for most performance cars with 19"-20" the options. Tire manufacturers want to build tires that people want and every 6 months, more and more 17" performance tires are eliminated.
BTW, don't you guys forget about the Yokohama Advan AD08. I run them Auto-crossing and I would put them against the Pilot Sport or RE11's any day of the week.

[ekam]

Originally Posted by Topless

I don't know what you guys are talking about. Essentially every tire is available in both 17 and 18.

Tirerack result for 205/50/17 & 255/40/17 = 30 results.
Result for 225/40/18 & 265/35/18 = 40 results.

More importantly Z1 Star spec is not available in 17"s for our fitment...

[ekam]

Originally Posted by Overdrive

I'm all for getting good value at better prices, but when it comes to tires I am much less inclined to skimp on cost, it's just too important a part of the vehicle to me.

Besides, how else would we play frogger on the highway?