New tires and long trip

[JayG]

What is the date code on the tires, they could be older than 5 years. Old tires can be dried out and dangerious
Also remember, you will typically go through 2 sets of rear to a set of front tires

Sumi HTR ZIII is a great street tire that is low cost and great performance
They are OK on the track

For track on street tires
Dunlop Direzza Star Spec, Bridgestone RE-71R and Hankook RS-3 are all good tires
The RE-71 do not last very long.

Personally I think Michelin are overrated, but they do have great customer service. They just did a generous warranty adjustment on some AS /3's I had on my 996 that were on teh car when I bought it. From their published warranty, because I was not the original buyer, there was no warranty. Note that most of their tires do not have any mileage warranty.

Take a look on TireRack for their testing and drink whatever kool-aid you like

[10/10ths]

...they are a great resource.

I like the new Michelin All Season 3 for an all around street tire.

[JayG]

Originally Posted by 10/10ths

...they are a great resource.

I like the new Michelin All Season 3 for an all around street tire.

My experiance with them was they are pretty good performing tires, no complaints for canyon carving, but really really noisy.
With the new rear tires, just a little noisy. I guess as they wear, they get noisier

They do have an advantage that they have a 45k mile treadwear warranty! However, if you have staggered setup (as generally we do) they cut that in half to 27,500 miles. My rear tires on the 996 were spent @ 11k miles, fronts at least 60% left. They adjusted them so I had to only pay 40% of the replacement cost for a new set.

[gpope]

JayG got me thinking because of his comment about the back tired going faster. I got the age from the date code on one of the tires. So I thought are all the tires the same? They were not, 2 have date codes 8 weeks a part late 2010, early 2011. The other two have what look like bar codes? Anyone know how to decode those? For reference I have Yokohama ADVAN NEOVA now.

[10/10ths]

....you should just buy another set of wheels and put track tires on them.

Run an all season on the street, because they will last longer, work better in the rain, and deal with Boston winter temps.

Use an "R" compound on the track.

Dual purpose tires don't really survive track days.

Good luck.