well the title sums it up well.

i live in california on the beach so snow is zero concern. (granted were having weird weather, it snowed on saturday and its about 80*f today/monday... wtf?)

i need a tire that will grip like glue on dry road and hopfully do the same in rain.

ill be using a 17 or 18" wheel, ive yet to buy wheels so i cant say for sure the specs. ill likely move to coilovers with the wheels too. either way(17 or 18) im not sure what tire looks best. i hear lots of rave reviews from org'ers about the toyo proxes4, but theyre all season, wouldnt there be better summer only tires?

on tirerack the goodyear F1 GS-D3 was rated #1 in the max performance summer section by a pretty large margin. reviews said the tire is amazing in anything but snow and the only down side is a slightly flexible sidewall, which leads to a slightly lower steering responce, and a bulged sidewall, but a very comfortable and quiet ride. the other downside is the F1's are pretty pricey.

so... whats REALLY the best or a very good tire for the money? right now i have no brand loyalty so im just looking for whats best for me.

with that said.. let the bias opinions fly!

 

First, you decide on the wheels you want to buy, the size of the wheels, then decide on the size of the tires, and then the brands of the tires. Please come back with those info.

 

most likely 17x8 or 17x7.5

shouldnt i be able to get most any tire in a 17 or 18 version in the size i need?

 

if you are going 17x7.5 or 17x8 then 235/45/17 would be your perfect match!

most tire companies offer this size...as it is a very common size!

 

yeah, thats why i didnt think it would be an issue if i knew exactly what wheels i have or not.

so.. WHAT TIRES?!?!?!?!

 

the absolute best tire i have ever had for non winter months was the Fuzion Zri.

*edit - dunno why i'm being so verbose.. i just realized this is a very long post.. its just that i was THIS impressed with the tire. granted its on a 2500lb car... i've also liked tires that tested well on lighter cars, but ahd very different characteristics on heavier ones. How much do the 4th gen max's weigh?

Anyway - my review and driving condition:
They saw mixed street (nyc), highway and road course driving. I got tired of constantly changing out rims , so i got these as a temporary measure, when i needed new street meat, and didn't want to lug along my azensis to course events... i don't compete really, so for me, road course events were mainly for fun and hobby... and azensis are spendy, spendy tires given their life span. So i needed another solution.

however, to be fair, my ONLY complaint about these, the fuzion i mean, is tire life lol... street use, i got about 30k miles out of my first set. my second set, which saw mixed use, i got less than 15k. Mind you, i dont mean thats how long they lasted until there was zero tread, and steel belts showing.. but rather i mean until i noticed an increasingly diminished traction capability on wet roads.. and tread life was down to about 40% of their original depth... but given their use, they wore no more quickly than a set of proxes i had for the exact same mixed use.. road course racing really eats through them...

anyway - in the dry - lateral traction was phenominal, on par or besting my toyo proxes, kuhmo 712's falken ziex, and yokohama avids. straight line traction on the drive wheels could have been better.. i'll say straight away this is not a drag suitable street tire... however sharp apex exits,mashing the accelerator, they'll chirp but not break free.

braking traction is also excellent. i am running upgraded calipers and larger rotors, all around, and i found the braking lockup threshold to be a bit higher with these than most of the other tires i've had.. azensis and drag radials excluded, obviously. wet braking is excellent. day to day driving, even in the wet season.. with crazy nyc cabbies all over.. i rarely get my abs to kick in.

They give GREAT feedback, and feed you a lot of information about the road surface.. scrubbing audibly, but not a squeaky whiny tire, as you approach their limits.. they exibit none of the snap breakfree characteristics of some other tires i've had.. and crossing their limits, they'll scrub and wail at you, but give a fairly generous margin of error.. i've never had them feel "slippery", even when exceeding their traction (usually driver error on my end)

obviously not as wide of a margin as a "comfort" tire on a family sedan, but also with much, much higher limits than those.

street driving, they are a tiny bit noisier than my ziex's were, at cruise speeds...but not terribly so. Definitely not a steel belt hollow howl... but they do transmit road surface changes more audibly than the falkens (a very quiet tire IMO). compared to the other tires.. i'd say it falls right in the middle. It was in no way obtrusive during daily driving, passed the mom and gf test, and i am nearly obsessed with a fairly quiet vehicle (in terms of everything from engine ticks to rattles, etc)

So, so far a tire more or less on par with some very very good dry performers...

this is what really got me on these... and until something better comes out for a similar price, is the reason this tire will be my tire of choice on any of my cars... the wet traction blew me away.

even on a misty track day, with a dewey track, they held incredibly.. and on the street, they were comparable with the aquatreads i had years ago. other than when they start getting low on life.. which perhaps is their one shortcoming, they always had very predictable responses to both wet and dry roads, and always had ample traction in either.

Regarding the end of their usable tread life.. my one complaint... since they use multiple hardness compounds in staggering layers, you notice the changes quickly once you wear down below them.. i'd say over the course of that last 500 miles or so, they go from being great to feeling like a tire with very low tread... in total that took about 30k of (hard at times) street driving for me.

 

very nice review. where can one pick these tires up?

tirerack tells me the goodyear F1 GS-D3 are the best they have, has anyone used these before?
how would they compare to others. i love the remarks people had about the F1s and the stats they are given. but i do want to know how they hold up to what ever else is out there.

edit: idunno why im so stuck on the F1's...... i want someone to tell me they know X tire is better or something

 

Can't say anything about the F1s, but I got the ZRis as my summer set. Got them at a local B'stone shop, but Tirerack carries them too. My experience is pretty much on par w/ goat, though I've not experienced any wear issues yet (I guess I haven't gotten down to the Uni-T... I did see a guy who tracked his Spec V and his ZRis were pretty much on the cords, so wear's still a concern). My complaints so far about the ZRis is the low speed noise and the tracking on ruts/cracks. Still, a damn good deal at about $130 a piece out the door.

 

i have had good experience with the kdw and kdw2

 

how about the TOYO T1-S tires? Well actually the T1-R's now.
I had the t1-s's and they were GREAT. awesome int he dry, awesome in the wet. they lasted me one year.....22,000 miles worth of hard driving. I've tried the T1-R's on my friend's car and it's EVEN better...stiffer sidewalls giving it better handling. the BEST thing about these tires are that they are QUIET...until it gets reallly low in tread.
btw....these are on Honda preludes...I haven't had to change my tires on the max yet..but you better believe i'm putting some TOYO's on them!