Downgrading tires to make your drive more fun?

What a daft idea!

Intentionally impair the performance of a car so that it has lower limits and you have to drive harder?  Not only is that a silly thing to do (especially on the occasions when you meet with challenging road conditions when the tow truck is dragging you out of the scenery, or worse, when the ambulance guys are picking up your remains because you could only make 90% of the grip needed to stay on the road in that dangerous corner) but it could even be used against you in an ensuing law suit.

I can pretty much guarantee that if you buy a high performances sports car that came with Z rated tires and you replace them with Costco specials it will be used against you in any law suit you end up being involved in, as evidence of negligence.

Don't think so?  Look up the accident cases where the driver and/or their passengers were in an accident and weren't wearing seat belts - usually a reduction in claim of 10-15% - a 'stupidity tax'.

The exaggerated hand  wringing by some of the respondents here is quite simply much ado about nothing. If any of them ever drive any vehicle on the street in in a manner that is even slightly more enthusiastic than that of the most conscientious and risk adverse non-enthusiast, then they're simply being hypocrites. In fact, good UHP-AS tires could easily be argued as an overall safety upgrade, as they have more predictable and consistent performance over a wider range of street use temps. And let's not willfully ignore that a Cayman on good UHP-AS tires is still one of the most capable and safest performing cars on the road, including vs those that just about every person here trusts their families lives to on a daily basis.

In reply to Driven5 :

So you're saying his Cayman on generic tires is more capable then my magically thrust vectoring Outback? Heretic........

In reply to wspohn :

You drive the car that hard on the street?  Now that is silly.  Take it to the track.

Gettingoldercarguy said:

In reply to CAinCA :

I understand this, it's essentially what toyobaru did with their rwd 86 platform.  You may want to try it before you buy it if possible.

 

Regarding the dws06+

One of the best tire review channels out there.

That was my thinking. When the GR86 was released a few of the reviewers made the comment that the PS4S was better objectively but they'd still prefer the AS tires on the street.

I just watched that video the other day. His content is top notch.

porschenut said:

In reply to wspohn :

You drive the car that hard on the street?  Now that is silly.  Take it to the track.

No, I use high performance tires so that I have more of a safety margin when driving within the legal limits (haven't had a ticket in 20 years). And I did take it to the track - I raced for  a couple of decades and it made me a safer street driver, less likely to do stupid things on a public highway.

dps214 said:

I still have mixed feelings about it as a concept. I did do pretty much exactly what you're describing though...

Thank you dps214. Your thread here was one of the reasons I purchased this car. 

This set of tires has 0816 (F) and 0717 (R) date codes. They still seem to have plenty of grip but I wonder if a fresh set would ride better and or be quieter. I took a couple longer drives over the weekend. It was mostly comfortable but there were a couple sections of highway where the noise was pretty obtrusive. On one section my dB meter app registered 80dB at 45mph. It was easily 2 or 3x louder than the smoother sections of road.

I didn't really read through this thread, but seemingly relevant to the title - I stuck some crazy leftover mixed 40000tw tires on my exocet and had a blast one time. 

 

z31maniac said:

In reply to CAinCA :

This is blunt, but it's not meant to be mean or dismissive.

It sounds like you had already made your mind up and were looking for validation vs actual input on the idea. 

So, buy the 18s and DWS's and enjoy!

I've made up my mind on moving back to 18's. I'm still on the fence about moving from a max summer tire to a UHPAS tire.

I was honestly curious what the hive thought. I see that there really isn't a hive, we're all individuals with our own take on what's an acceptable risk.

Someone on another forum suggested something much simpler, just play with the tire pressures. That sounds like a good plan and it's free. I could also swap out for a stiffer rear sway bar to get a little more rotation. 

FWIW: Porsche has lists of approved summer tires and winter tires. It's interesting to me that they don't have a list for AS tires. It seems like there's a huge gap in between their recommendations. 

In reply to CAinCA :

I think that gap is because AS tires suck equally at everything and Porsche likes maximum performance. Ergo summer tires for summer and winter for winter. AS tires aren't as good as either focused option in the intended conditions. 

thatsnowinnebago said:

In reply to CAinCA :

I think that gap is because AS tires suck equally at everything and Porsche likes maximum performance. Ergo summer tires for summer and winter for winter. AS tires aren't as good as either focused option in the intended conditions. 

I think there is a lot of truth in that and it mirrors my experience.  I run high performance summer only tires on the sports cars and for winter driving (not a huge issue where I live) insist on pure snow tires, not all season on the family beater.

This is a topic I've been debating for the last couple of weeks.

I recently bought a Triumph TR8 and the previous owner sold it with two sets of tires: Yoko R888R and Nitto NT-05.  Both in 205/50-15.  It's a convertible, so I'm not entirely sure why he ran the 100TW track tires on the car (that is what he sold it to the broker with).  I had the broker swap on the Nitto tires for the drive home from Ohio to SE PA and they are still on the car.  

This past weekend I did a long weekend drive and occasionally had a chance to push the car (part of the drive included some paced laps at Summit Point).  I pretty much discovered the NT-05 (a 200TW tire) is really overkill for the car.  Cornering is completely without drama to the point where the limiting factor is really the seats rather than the tires.  I could turn into a tight corner at speed and the most difficult part was literally hanging on to the steering wheel.

So what I am wondering is how much stress are these tires putting onto suspension components designed for tires from the 70's?  While the grip is fun, is that level of grip fun if I have to replace wheel bearings and suspension bushings every few thousand miles?

With that in mind (plus, a desire to not have to swap wheels for cold temp winter storage) I am considering switching to an all-season tire that would have less grip than the NT-05, but is debatably more appropriate for the car.

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

How will you sleep at night, knowing of the murderous fiery death that awaits you and anybody else unfortunate to be caught in your path of all-season tire induced destruction? 

Edited for clarity.

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

Plenty people have race these, I'd find the weak points from them, but I doubt it's anything that dramatic.

Driven5 said:

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

How will you sleep at night, knowing of the murderous fiery death that awaits you and anybody else unfortunate to be caught in your path of destruction? 

Did you read my post? Where did I mention anything about failing? 

CAinCA said:

FWIW: Porsche has lists of approved summer tires and winter tires. It's interesting to me that they don't have a list for AS tires. It seems like there's a huge gap in between their recommendations.

This could be partially related to the fact that winter/snow rated tires are legally required in Germany. 

Therefore all-season tires (or "no-season" tires as my dad likes to call them) are probably not very popular there...

accordionfolder said:

I didn't really read through this thread, but seemingly relevant to the title - I stuck some crazy leftover mixed 40000tw tires on my exocet and had a blast one time. 

 

https://www.youtube.com/embed/sXQhmYjGk_s?rel=0

 

This looks like good practice for driving Mid Ohio when it's wet

Ian F (Forum Supporter) said:

Driven5 said:

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

How will you sleep at night, knowing of the murderous fiery death that awaits you and anybody else unfortunate to be caught in your path of destruction? 

Did you read my post? Where did I mention anything about failing? 

How familiar are you with satire?

In reply to CAinCA :

What you want is consistency and predictability combined with a relatively low grip threshold, most any 'performance' all season tire fits this bill perfectly.  You're not doing lap after lap at 10/10ths, you're doing a fun short sections of empty curvy road, coasting in the straights, grabbing little moments of safe fun here and there when it's appropriate. 

If a little bit of slip angle or wheelspin here or there is the end of the world then I dunno, maybe public transport is the only option.

If a 200 something hp, 3000 ish lb vehicle is a deathtrap on good 205-225 tires, then nowadays the road is filled with them, and again public transport is the way to go.

It's not clear to me how experience with tires several thousand miles past wear bars, or mix/n match behind the shed tires relates to fresh, name brand tires that are narrower than OEM spec.  I assume TireRack or someone like has done tests using winter tires in summer conditions, and the results for sure are not catastrophic, nor are they wildly different, as long as they're not testing at Road America or Daytona with high hp cars.

Driven5 said:

Ian F (Forum Supporter) said:

Driven5 said:

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

How will you sleep at night, knowing of the murderous fiery death that awaits you and anybody else unfortunate to be caught in your path of destruction? 

Did you read my post? Where did I mention anything about failing? 

How familiar are you with satire?

I've been on this forum for over a decade, so very familiar.  It's just frustrating that one of the few times I actually ask for advice on this forum and this is the response I get. 

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

So you understand that I was actually endorsing the AS tire idea you put forth for consideration, in direct opposition to some of the anti-AS (un)safety commentary elsewhere in this thread, and you find the expression of that supporting opinion to be frustrating?... Huh.

In reply to Driven5 :

Honestly, no I did not understand. Your post did not come across that way at all.  I see it now that you mention it, but somewhere the context got lost.  Probably because I glossed over the posts about AS tires being unsafe.