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Originally Posted by goofygrin
Yeah, these will just be for daily driving, and maybe a Chrono-X event or two. Hmm… at $127 a tire if I can get 10k miles out of them than it’ll only cost me an extra $150 a year over the Sumitomos. That seems reasonable… well, reasonable by my twisted priorities, anyway.
Where are you getting them for $127 each?
Iain
"We don't stop playing because we grow old, we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw
I sent you an email.
OK I wanted to update my earlier post regarding the performance of the Star Specs in the rain. These tires seem to work well in steady rain with little to no standing water on the road such as this morning. However combine a steady rain such as we had last night around 6:30 with a fair amount of water on the road, highway speeds of 60mph and they do hydroplane a bit even at full tread depth. It made me miss my Toyo's, but I feel it is a fair trade off given the amount of rain we normally get and how fun they are in the dry.
"Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional." Haruki Murakami
I'll do the same follow up for the NT05s.
Light rain, no problem. Standing water, with the width I'm running (275) causes some skittishness at highway speeds when plowing through the deep puddles (little stuff is ok).
Today on the way to work on the DNT no issues. Yesterday coming from Southlake to Frisco at 1:30pm on 121 there were a couple spots that gave me heck, but that was it.
i'm looking at yokohama S tires! anybody got an opinion on those? does that just open it up!
Yokohama whats? The only thing Yokohama makes that would compare to the Star Specs are the AD08s, and they're way too spendy ($244 each in the size - 245/40-18 - I'm looking for).
Iain
"We don't stop playing because we grow old, we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw
he's likely looking at the Yoko S Drive. I've heard mixed reviews of them.
They are NOT a performance tire though (an all season).
yeah, i meant the Yoko S drive, kine of dropped that off the end and i thought we were talking about daily drivers, 205/50r 15's
did you actually read the thread though? Even the first post? Iain wants grippy daily driver tires since he drove his grippy tires around for a while. SDrives don't meet that qualification.
Yeah, I called Sean & Ken's tire guy yesterday and ordered a set of NT05s. They should be in some time next week
As usual, fun won out over practicality.
Iain
"We don't stop playing because we grow old, we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw
yeah GOOF i read the whole post like this too:
"These will be dedicated daily driver tires. So things like longevity, ride comfort and resistance to hydroplaning are a little more important to me..."
just trying to forum mingle and get some info from others with more experience with these things!
Larry,
The operative phrase there was “a little more important”.
Long story short, I’ve been running sensible daily driver tires on the RX-8 for the last three years. I decided I wanted to run one of the new batch of “extreme performance” tires instead. So while I am concerned about longevity, ride comfort, and resistance to hydroplaning, I was looking for responses in the context of comparing those extreme performance tires to one another.
Iain
"We don't stop playing because we grow old, we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw
thanks altain, understand. i'm new with my NA and i'm trying to learn a bunch quickly. i usually just read the posts and try to get something from them. i don't think i'll do any auto-xng but i'd like to get a good set of dd tires, that will perform reasonalby well and won't bring down the rath-o-the-wife with the price.
Quick update:
So I ended up buying the NT-05s. At ~$127/tire for 245/40-18s the price was too good to pass up. I’ve put roughly 1000 miles on them so far, including a road trip to Austin and some track time. Here are my thoughts:
Pros:
If you are looking for a track capable street tires, these should be on your short list. These tires were extremely confidence inspiring last weekend at Harris Hill, and exhibited really progressive breakaway. Turn in was sharp (even with 245s mounted on relatively narrow 8” wheels) and feedback was good. The tires seemed to be pretty heat tolerant as well. Ambient temp was in the 60s, but at one point I ran the car for most of a session (15-18 minutes), then Wags took the car out five minutes later and ran it for another 15 minutes without the tires dropping off. Wags best lap was actually about 3/10ths faster than mine (insert frowny face here).
Cons:
- If you’re looking for the most comfortable street tire, these probably aren’t going to be your best bet. Granted, since I mounted them on the car it’s been in the 30s or 40s most of the time, but at those temps they are stiff and somewhat rough riding. They felt a bit better driving back from Austin on Sunday in the 60s, so I’m hoping this won’t be as pronounced as we get into spring and summer, but they aren’t comfy in near freezing temps.
- They can be a little sketchy in the rain, at least in a cold rain. Again, I have no idea how they’ll fare in an 80-degree spring shower, but they were a bit sketchy driving down to Austin in a 40-degree rain, at full tread.
- These tires are only molded at 7/32nds of tread when new, so I don’t expect them to last forever.
Overall I like them, although I’m looking forward to some warmer weather to really get a feel for them as daily driver tires in more typical Texas weather. This winter has been exceptionally cold and wet for Texas, but if I lived somewhere that it did get cold and rain/snow often, I don’t think these tires would be a good choice. That said, I am actively thinking that I may buy another set of these to replace my R888 track tires when they finally give up the ghost.
Iain
"We don't stop playing because we grow old, we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw
part of the rough ride (and quick turn in) is because they have a pretty stiff sidewall. I'd be interested to know the mounted width of them vs. the R888's.
Right now it's not a fair comparison, because I have 255/40-17 R888s on 17x9 wheels, and 245/40-18 NT-05s on 18x8 wheels.
Iain
"We don't stop playing because we grow old, we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw
ah ya. One of the local Evo guys/instructors is running 255/40/17 NT05s on 17x8 wheels and says they are fine, so they are pretty narrow I'm thinking.
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