More tyre impressions - Continental SportContact 5 and Michelin Pilot Sport 4

[GoNz0]

I stuck a pair of cross climates on the wife's mini, same dry grip as the energy savers they replaced, better in the wet mind you.

[Xlucine]

I'm pleased with my nokian line's. They're a summer tyre from finland, so handle southern england all-weather very well. They don't notice puddles at all, and wear is excellent - they're about 3mm down after 10k miles, so should get to almost 20k before they need replacing.

[Noxvayl]

Nokian are the best winter tyres as far as I could tell from my research, not surprised that they do well in UK conditions

[Dashers]

I had Nokian WR G2 for winter tyres on my last car, but they were too focused for winter I found in the UK and fell apart very quickly when the temperatures got up a bit. I think I've got Goodyear winters on at the moment, seemed pretty good last "winter" (the slightly chilly damp period we had).

I'm running PS4 on my RS at the moment in 19" form, bad timing on my part, PSS was on the way out and these were billed as an improvement on PSS, but seems that the PS4s is now that tyre. That said, I'm very happy with the PS4. When I checked them a few months ago the wear wasn't as alarming as I had feared.

I was going to go for Goodyear Eagle F1 Asymmetric 3, but they hadn't started manufacturing my tyre size when I needed to change.

[Butcher]

I'm running Yokohama V105s tyres at the moment, mainly for their durability under significant heat loading (I can melt the tread surface slightly on track and they'll live). The also have excellent dry grip, good wet grip (though not up there with Michelins) and fairly stiff sidewalls for good feel. They also manage around 20k and 4-5 track days before wearing out, which is *very* impressive.
I'll probably try PS4s next swap though, see what I'm missing.

[kalniel]

Update time!

First (which I may have mentioned somewhere else) I replaced my rears (were continental sportcontact 5 AO) at about 50k miles, so the conti's do wear well on the rear as expected, though the grip balance was such that old contis gripped a fair bit less than old Michelin PS4s so I was getting occasional oversteer on off camber corners in greasy conditions. I was going to go with cross-climate+ on the rears but at the time I think I needed a quick replacement and Michelin Primacy 4 was more available, plus I thought the slightly better grip would sort out oversteer, which it did. They'll be on there for the life of the car though judging by their wear rate!

Then not so long after the PS4 fronts got replaced at about 24k miles of use. With another set of PS4s. Well actually, kwik fit cocked up and put one PS4 and one Primacy 4 on, and yeah, the PS4 side gripped better than the Primacy side in the wet They were very good about correcting the fault and I can see how it must have happened - Michelin P 4 next to Michelin PS 4 on the rack.. The worn PS4s were actually gripping pretty well - dry grip was down compared to new, but wet grip was still surprisingly good, though obviously aqua-planing resistance would be reduced. Either way worn grip was a lot better than worn grip on the contis, even if the conti's lasted a few k more.

So now I have fresh PS4 on the front and nearly fresh Primacy 4 on the rears and the car feels lovely. The rears should keep tread depth, so safer in bad conditions, while grip otherwise is a tad higher at the front which has to deal with traction as well as turning. It also seems to roll very smoothly too.