Performance tires vs Comfort Tires?

[Nick1994]

With FWD and a peppy V6, I'm not sure it'll make a huge difference.

My grandma's 14' Grand Caravan with the 3.6L and Cooper CS5 Ultra's breaks them loose really easy. And that's on a heavy van.

 

[y_p_w]

I've been through 2 sets of them - more or less. My 2004 WRX has a problem with the alignment that nobody seems to be able to fix, but I'm OK with it if I can get 30k miles out of a set of tires anyways. I think without this problem (uneven inside shoulder wear on the left side) I could even get up to the 45k mile warranty period for the Michelin Pilot Sport A/S 3.

I had a set of the original Pilot Sport A/S 3 for my WRX bought maybe late 2013. Kind of an overused term, but "game changer" is pretty accurate. They're quiet. I do find they tramline a bit on grooved pavement, but it's not too bad compared to other tires I've used. I took it through some light snow before, but mostly parking lots that hadn't been cleared. The grip is ridiculous for an all-season tire and they're great in wet. I came from Continental ExtremeContact DWS which were smooth but would chirp a ton even taking a wide turn at 20 MPH.

My first set was the W-rated version, but my replacements were V-rated on the suggestion that they might last a little bit longer. I think they were also about $3 cheaper as a result. I kind of got lazy and didn't rotate them, but now I've got my olds rears to the front and a pair of Pilot Sport A/S 3+ on the back. The installer didn't seem to be too concerned that they were the slightly updated version. I'm also looking to have them rotates soon to try and even out the wear. The installer refused to put the new tires anywhere except that back. I guess it was their policy.

 

[litesong]

Originally Posted by d00df00d
...... a few all-season tires have come out that are seriously competitive with summer tires for non-winter use...... one of those tires.....(is) the Bridgestone Potenza RE980AS.....
Someone gave me a free used Bridgestone Potenza with a little tread left. Coupled with a greater tread Hankook tire on the fronts of my Hyundai Accent, they made a good pair of drivers for 15,000 miles till replacement.

 

[SteveSRT8]

Interesting comments given that my new Plot Sport 4S ride smoother than any of the many sets of all season tires I have had. Modern summer rubber is extremely forgiving at low temps, too, although there are still limits to be observed.

 

[Leo99]

I'm jealous. I have CS5 tires on my 4cyl Camry and can't find any roads to push me past its limits. There's always some slowpoke in front of me slowing things down or I don't want to push much more above the speed limit. I keep it in double digits.

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by SteveSRT8
Interesting comments given that my new Plot Sport 4S ride smoother than any of the many sets of all season tires I have had. Modern summer rubber is extremely forgiving at low temps, too, although there are still limits to be observed.

The main issue most will have is shorter wear as well as well as more than likely higher cost. I've heard of some older generation summer tires selling fairly cheap, but as a general rule I've found that the summer tires I'm considered cost more than all-seasons. I don't know if they necessarily cost more to make, but A/S tires are definitely made in much greater numbers. While I suppose it might be possible to make a summer tire that lasts as long as a similar all-season tire, I haven't seen it.

 

[carguy996]

I've been reading up how old is too old for brand new tires. DOT is 0116 so they are 3 years old. Tires should be good for 6-10 years. These have been in a climate controlled facility and look fine. They look perfect with no sign of aging. I'm not one to wear down a tire to its limits anyways so I'm assuming I'd be ok? One of my buddies thinks I'm nuts for even considering these A/S 3 due to age

 

[das_peikko]

Why not the General Altimax RT43 ? They sure ride smooth and quiet.

 

[HangFire]

Originally Posted by carguy996
I've been reading up how old is too old for brand new tires. DOT is 0116 so they are 3 years old. Tires should be good for 6-10 years. These have been in a climate controlled facility and look fine. They look perfect with no sign of aging. I'm not one to wear down a tire to its limits anyways so I'm assuming I'd be ok? One of my buddies thinks I'm nuts for even considering these A/S 3 due to age

We just had the tire age conversation here: https://www.bobistheoilguy.com/foru...-winter-tire-age-at-mounting#Post5028254
While the thread title is about Winter tires, the info is all good.

 

[Nick1994]

Originally Posted by das_peikko
Why not the General Altimax RT43 ? They sure ride smooth and quiet.

The RT43 is the absolute opposite of a performance tire.

 

[benjy]

performance orientated tyres handle + brake better because thats what they are. think about a lower profile for better handling +use a size that has similar OD to your OE tyres, lots of choices for sure.

 

[das_peikko]

Originally Posted by Nick1994
The RT43 is the absolute opposite of a performance tire.


It is ? Somebody forget to mention it in my daily briefing.

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by benjy
performance orientated tyres handle + brake better because thats what they are. think about a lower profile for better handling +use a size that has similar OD to your OE tyres, lots of choices for sure.

I've tried different tires in the same 205/55R16 size. All were nominally called "high performance" tires, but there were distinct differences even with the same size and even though they were nominally in the same "category".

 

[Wolf359]

Originally Posted by carguy996
Any experience with noise level on the A/S 3? Can I expect them to be quiet like other Michelin's have been, or can I expect them to have a "hum" to them on the road.


Well I've only had Michelin and Pirelli on the car. The Pirelli's were quieter but got too many flat tires with those and got rid of them.

 

[litesong]

Originally Posted by y_p_w
I've tried different tires in the same 205/55R16 size.
I had 205/55/16 alloys/tires on one of my cars. The stripped version of my car had 195/65/15 steel wheels/tires, which are fractionally taller than the 205/55/16's. I've put worn 225/55/17 alloys/tires on my car. It was good that they weren't new full treads, because the worn tires just touched the wheel wells while turning.

 

[SteveSRT8]

Originally Posted by y_p_w
Originally Posted by SteveSRT8
Interesting comments given that my new Plot Sport 4S ride smoother than any of the many sets of all season tires I have had. Modern summer rubber is extremely forgiving at low temps, too, although there are still limits to be observed.

The main issue most will have is shorter wear as well as well as more than likely higher cost. I've heard of some older generation summer tires selling fairly cheap, but as a general rule I've found that the summer tires I'm considered cost more than all-seasons. I don't know if they necessarily cost more to make, but A/S tires are definitely made in much greater numbers. While I suppose it might be possible to make a summer tire that lasts as long as a similar all-season tire, I haven't seen it.



They are expensive, but warranted to last 30k miles! Anyone with a high performance car will know that 30k miles is a looooong warranty on a summer tire.


These are not the PSS's I had on my old Vettes that only lasted 6-8k miles.

 

[dailydriver]

Originally Posted by carguy996
Any experience with noise level on the A/S 3? Can I expect them to be quiet like other Michelin's have been, or can I expect them to have a "hum" to them on the road.


These are the no cost, factory optional tires which I have (ordered) on my car in sig, in a 205/40-17.

They are dead quiet to me, on ALL road conditions/scenarios, but I may be the wrong one to comment on this given that my summer setup (200 tread wear 'cut slick' 215/40-17 Federal RSRRs on a 17x8 wheel) SCREAM like 150 db banshees at any speed over 25 MPH (but stick like super glue to the road

), as a comparison.

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by SteveSRT8
Originally Posted by y_p_w
Originally Posted by SteveSRT8
Interesting comments given that my new Plot Sport 4S ride smoother than any of the many sets of all season tires I have had. Modern summer rubber is extremely forgiving at low temps, too, although there are still limits to be observed.

The main issue most will have is shorter wear as well as well as more than likely higher cost. I've heard of some older generation summer tires selling fairly cheap, but as a general rule I've found that the summer tires I'm considered cost more than all-seasons. I don't know if they necessarily cost more to make, but A/S tires are definitely made in much greater numbers. While I suppose it might be possible to make a summer tire that lasts as long as a similar all-season tire, I haven't seen it.



They are expensive, but warranted to last 30k miles! Anyone with a high performance car will know that 30k miles is a looooong warranty on a summer tire.


These are not the PSS's I had on my old Vettes that only lasted 6-8k miles.

I've looked up Michelin's warranties. I'm still wondering how they manage to do a 30k mile warranty across an entire spread of different tire sizes and applications. However, the oddest thing I remember was in cases where the tires can't be rotated because of different sizes. They warrant the mileage for exactly half the mileage when they can't be rotated.

Kind of an aside but I'm wondering how it works with rear-wheel drive. I've got an AWD car and the fronts wear out faster than the rears because they're used to steer. FWD obviously wears the fronts much faster because they're the drive wheels and used to steer. But with RWD I'm not sure how that's supposed to work.

 

[CapriRacer]

Originally Posted by y_p_w
…… Kind of an aside but I'm wondering how it works with rear-wheel drive. I've got an AWD car and the fronts wear out faster than the rears because they're used to steer. FWD obviously wears the fronts much faster because they're the drive wheels and used to steer. But with RWD I'm not sure how that's supposed to work.


My experience says that drive tires tend to wear in the center and steer tires tend to wear on the shoulders.

So if you have a FWD car, where the front tires are BOTH, the wear is even, but 2 1/2 times faster than the rears. On RWD cars, the wear rate is about the same, front to rear, but on different parts of the tread surface.

On AWD, it depends on the F/R torque split.

The implications are that for pretty much all types of drive configurations, rotating tires is either going to even out the wear rates, or even out the wear pattern, or both.

And now the obligatory caveats: There are other things that affect wear rate and wear pattern, and those can change how this picture looks. Alignment comes to mind, and …. ah ….. let's call it "spirited" driving can have quite dramatic affects, which can overwhelm things.

 

[SteveSRT8]

Originally Posted by y_p_w
Originally Posted by SteveSRT8
Originally Posted by y_p_w
Originally Posted by SteveSRT8
Interesting comments given that my new Plot Sport 4S ride smoother than any of the many sets of all season tires I have had. Modern summer rubber is extremely forgiving at low temps, too, although there are still limits to be observed.

The main issue most will have is shorter wear as well as well as more than likely higher cost. I've heard of some older generation summer tires selling fairly cheap, but as a general rule I've found that the summer tires I'm considered cost more than all-seasons. I don't know if they necessarily cost more to make, but A/S tires are definitely made in much greater numbers. While I suppose it might be possible to make a summer tire that lasts as long as a similar all-season tire, I haven't seen it.



They are expensive, but warranted to last 30k miles! Anyone with a high performance car will know that 30k miles is a looooong warranty on a summer tire.


These are not the PSS's I had on my old Vettes that only lasted 6-8k miles.

I've looked up Michelin's warranties. I'm still wondering how they manage to do a 30k mile warranty across an entire spread of different tire sizes and applications. However, the oddest thing I remember was in cases where the tires can't be rotated because of different sizes. They warrant the mileage for exactly half the mileage when they can't be rotated.

Kind of an aside but I'm wondering how it works with rear-wheel drive. I've got an AWD car and the fronts wear out faster than the rears because they're used to steer. FWD obviously wears the fronts much faster because they're the drive wheels and used to steer. But with RWD I'm not sure how that's supposed to work.



Indeed it is amazing. No tire yet has lasted much more than 20k miles on my car. It has had Goodyear, Toyo, Hankook, and others I cannot remember. Then I got the first set of PSS's, the last gen before the 4S. Amazing tires that went much farther than any before. Plus they stuck like glue, and had nearly supernatural qualities in the rain despite an odd tread that suggested otherwise. This is a 275/35/20 size.

Now just imagine a 4S, it's like twice as good in every area. If it lasts as they claim I am sold. These tires may not work for everyone, but on a 4000 pound sedan with plentiful hp and an enthusiastic driver they are nearly perfect!