Best grippy tire with performance through life of the tire?

[CSM]

Can anyone recommend a tire with a good combination of wear life and performance? When I first got my Fiesta I picked up a set of 16x7 wheels and new Dunlop ZIIs through a forum find...nearly 30k miles and a few winter basement storages later, I'm at 5/32nds all around and the tires are noticeably more slide happy...like a skating rink. Honestly the grip performance fell off drastically after the first season, i presume I "heat cycled" them out.

I'm looking for something Grippy that will hopefully perform throughout the life of the tire. I intend to occasionally autocross. Not too worried about price. Thanks!

 

[DaveG99]

205/45/16 firestone firehawk indy 500's are pretty awesome. Just installed 4 the other day. Very highly rated on tirerack

 

[FiestaDave]

I love my conti extreme contact sports in a 205/45 16, been on them for about 1500 miles and no complaints. Cant tell you how the wet traction us, since i have not had the car in the rain, but dry grip is amazing.

Sent from my SM-G386T using Tapatalk

 

[ericr]

To answer your original question regarding grip through the life of the tire, I've had good experiences with Toyo R888's in 225/50x15. They don't seem to heat cycle out and maintain really good grip throughout their life. I just replaced 2 of them with R888R's because I didn't rotate them enough front to rear. This was at 12K miles of really hard driving at -2.25 neg camber. If I had rotated more, I think I could have gotten close to 20K from the set before they hit their wear bars at 2/32. For a street only car, I think -2.00 camber would be perfect for most. For a DD/DE car, -2.25 gave me even tire wear. This is a great tire/wheel combo for this car. The grip matches the chassis' potential. If you bought the car for it's handling, these tire's transform the car up astronomically in total grip and balance. Just get a body shop guy to pull the fenders - it takes about an hour and it's easy. You don't even need a hub mounted roller to get clearance with stock springs for this setup. I'm on stock springs - lowered, it would probably take more work in the rear. It's a great setup - I highly recommend it.

 

[M-Sport fan]

^^^I will take your word for it, but, I do find it hard to believe that you got that kind of mileage out of those 100 tread wear gumballs on the street, and open track use.
(But ALL THE MORE power to ya if you actually did, and it's like those tires were paying YOU to use them with those mileage numbers!! )

I did get similar mileage out of a set of 100 tread wear rated Nitto 555R2s on my old LS1 Z28, but the compound on those tires was nothing even close to as sticky as the R888's/888R's compound, despite them having the same tread wear rating number.

 

[ericr]

^^^I will take your word for it, but, I do find it hard to believe that you got that kind of mileage out of those 100 tread wear gumballs on the street, and open track use.
(But ALL THE MORE power to ya if you actually did!! )

I did get similar mileage out of a set of 100 tread wear rated Nitto 555R2s on my old LS1 Z28, but the compound on those tires was nothing even close to as sticky as the R888's/888R's compound, despite them having the same tread wear rating number.

Lotus Elise/Exige owners can expect 20K miles out of R888's according to this YouTube video -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Pq0iuBvWiY

 

[CSM]

Thanks everyone. I picked up a new set of wheels/tires.... 17x7.5 Sparco Pro Corsa with 205/40/17 Firehawk indy 500. Should be here tuesday!

 

[M-Sport fan]

Lotus Elise/Exige owners can expect 20K miles out of R888's according to this YouTube video -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Pq0iuBvWiY

That IS pretty amazing, but aren't they also about 500 lbs. (or more?) LESS than the lightest factory version of our car?

 

[ericr]

That IS pretty amazing, but aren't they also about 500 lbs. (or more?) LESS than the lightest factory version of our car?

Yes, it is a lighter car. And yes, you can take my word for it that you can get 16-20k miles out of a set if you rotate them. You can continue to believe that they're only good for 2k miles as you have stated multiple times before. Believe what you wish - I'm only trying to pass on my experiences, rather than just bench racing conjecture, with this community.

 

[M-Sport fan]

Yes, it is a lighter car. And yes, you can take my word for it that you can get 16-20k miles out of a set if you rotate them. You can continue to believe that they're only good for 2k miles as you have stated multiple times before. Believe what you wish - I'm only trying to pass on my experiences, rather than just bench racing conjecture, with this community.

NOT trying to argue with, nor disprove/disbelieve you!

In fact, I will now consider the 100 tread wear Toyo lineup for my next set of summers, as long as they make a size I can use.