Race wheels and tires
 

Hey guys,

For the past 2 days I have been searching the forum on what would be the best wheels and tires.... I really got beat by the 350's in my club Sunday since they all got race tires this year.... I'm sure you all will agree, we cant have them beating us RX8's...LOL

I will either go with the BFGoodrich GForce R1 or the Hoosier A6.. Yes? No? Other options I dont know about? Help =)

As far as wheels, I'm soooo confused... Looking at Rota P1, Enkei.... Other options? Help =)

I have about $2000-$2300 to spend on both.....

Thanks,
Beth

When you say that you have $2000-2300, is that total for both wheels AND tires?

yeah =(

The tire of choice for the 3-time national champion is the Kumho 245-35-18. Additionally, the Kumhos tend to last a bit longer than the Hoosier.

I think the Rotas are becoming popular wheels and are relatively light.

A set of OZ Ultraleggera wheels is about $1300...add a set of Hoosier A6's or Kumho V710's (as soon as they are available) and you'll have a great set up for just a little tiny bit more than your budget. :)

check www.tirerack.com

I'd look for somebody trying to unload some O.Z. Ultraleggeras used. Those seem to be the dominant wheel right now if you cant locate SSRs.

As far as tires go, I used V710s last year, switched to A6s this year, and am now switching back to the V710s.

710's out of stock? Wonder how long.... Peru National Tour and Toledo Pro Solo coming up end of next month....

imho I would go with the Rota P1, hard to beat the price VS weight. That is unless you find a set of used 1st gen SSR comps. :)

If you have $3k you could buy the P1 and then two sets of tires. Start with the 265-35-18 BFG R1, not as fast as the A6 or V710, but last a long time and way better than street tires. Then take the money you saved and buy a set of A6 or V710s just to use at the "big events" you hit.

I believe Tire Rack says they should have more today on their website. Hope you make it to Peru!

Got the last 4 V710's 245/35-18, so he said...LOL.. And Enkei wheels!


Thanks for all the help!!

Which enkei wheels are lightweight and fit BS requirements? I didn't know there were any.

You are correct, there arent any Enkei wheels for BS. And thanks to Chris Harvey for lookin out for me I have the right wheels now!

Here they are :)

http://www.tirerack.com/wheels/Wheel...t+Silver+Paint

So here is another question.... What tire pressures do I run the V710's on?

Thanks =)
Beth

There was somebody running illegal Enkei wheels at Topeka last year-I only knew they were illegal because I own them myself for daily driver use.

You'll love the O.Z.'s.

Beth -

Because of the ultra-high grip levels at Peru, you will want to run an additional 3 or 4 psi than you would on a normal asphalt lot. You will find the car will understeer a bit more at Peru as well, unless you adjust for it.

Aim for low forties "hot" at Peru to be safe. You will likely be able to lower pressures, but I would wait to see what the course design looks like. John and/or I would be happy to help at the event if we are not working the heat you run.

Others with more experience on the V710's can give you better info for the asphalt set-up, but upper 30's "Hot" are common.

Spraying the tires between runs on a hot day is also a good idea.


Chris H

Interesting that you were able to call up and get a set of 245's. Good for you, btw.


But I'm wondering why we haven't gotten a shipment confirmation for the set which we pre-ordered a month ago? Tirerack web site currently lists "fewer than 2".



edit: Apparently an unexpected shipment of 5 tires hit the Delaware warehouse yesterday. Lucky!

Both the GTC 01 and RPM2 come in a BS legal fitment, but these are not really light.

The old RP01 is light, but missed the offset range by about 1.6mm, a machine shop can fix that. :)

I will take a stab at, keep in mind I don't work directly with the tire purchasing side of things (thank goodness) brakes and suspension are my little piece of the Tire Rack world.

Beth's order was pulled from our East Coast warehouse, which happened to receive five TOTAL, 245 V710's on 5/28 and did not have any other customer backorders for this size. These are the first 245's, we have received in any of our 5 warehouses (all of which have backorders pending with Kuhmo) in the last 4 weeks plus. Your backorder is logged in our West Coast warehouse (along with a few others) . The customer orders are filled (oldest to newest) within a given warehouse location. The difficult part for us, is Kuhmo controls distribution of the tires. We (and all other distributors) are at their mercy as to what tires in what numbers will make up our next truck load from them to our warehouse. This makes it very difficult to predict the ETA to a given warehouse until Kuhmo invoices us for the product which doesn't happen until they are loaded on the truck.

I'm not trying to throw Kuhmo under the bus, they are not the only supplier that works this way. But, it's important you and others understand how this situation can happen because it's not consistent with the normal level of service we try to provide.

I have asked our tire purchasing department to ask Kuhmo again for any information regarding this size, I will post any additional information I receive.

Chris H

Thanks Chris... good info! The rep did get back to Neal with similar info right before you posted. We'll see how far past 100 runs the current 710's will go :lol: Got close to 200 runs on the miata before finally putting them to pasture.

Back to your regularly scheduled thread...

Thanks for all the help Chris.... Peru for me is still up in the air, I have to see who is going from my club. Dont want to be there alone... But I am signed up for Toledo Pro! So I'll see you guys there! And would love the help! I love watching you guys out on the course =)

I was shocked too that there were tires available after seeing everyone post there were none... Perfect timing? Sorry guys =(

This will be my first tome with racing wheels and tires on the 8.. havent raced on slicks since my Miata... Should be interesting....

Why not throw Kumho under the bus? They get a few more oem contracts, that's what they're going to do to all of us autocrossers, anyways...:lol:

Incidentally, if anybody gets really desperate I have something in which you might be interested...

I have four brand-new Hoosier A3S05s in the 245 RX-8 size. Got 'em for my Boxster when I was planning on running a lot of Solo events in '07... ended up doing more road racing than Solo. Stickers are still on them. $450 shipped anywhere in the country. They aren't as good as the A5 or V710 but hey, they are cheeeeeep!

Don't take this the wrong way----how do you know it's your tires and wheels and not your driving or setup?

yes, lighter wheels offer a very minimal benefit and usually only for the best drivers

better off just getting a low cost set of curbed OE wheels since you have to use the OE size in the Stock class

regardless of driving skill and setup, street tires are at a huge disadvantage over the best DOT-R tires, these make sense because even a hack driver will see a significant time i mprovement, moreso because grippy tire cover up a lot of bad inputs, the downside is for the same reason, some people hit a wall on improving their mad driving skillz because they don't recognize the mistakes being made overdriving etc due to high grip tires

Not taking it the wrong way at all....

I should have specified that I have beaten them 2 yrs in a row when we were all on street tires.

Those wheels are nice.

So, are the 710's better on this particular car than the A6's? The A6's worked best on my last car, but it was a front drive sedan. Just curious what the story is?