In the market for best all around comfort & performance tires -- suggestions?

Those are indeed street/race track tires!  What size (profile) tires are you running currently. The don't seem to come in anything but 45/50/55 profile - so that would be a hard ride.  Many here like the Vredestein tires - not sure which models are available but they do come in at least 65 profile and in an all season tire - so a much more confortable ride.

#1 Pirelli CN36 175/80/15

#2 Vredelstein Sprint Classics 165/15

dont go for treadwear ratings, U wont be putting enuff miles on it.. go for comfort..

@WOLFGANG

I'm currently running 195/50R-15 TOYO PROXES R888R SL on Vintage 190 wheels.  They are absolutely fantastic, but again, hard, and require significant warming up.  That said, the performance is unbelievable on a Speedster.

@chines1

Thank you for the recommendations.  Seems like either of those tires are easy to get (and reasonably priced!).

I guess the real decision I need to make here is whether I can make space for a second set of wheels & tires in the garage. 

Appreciate the expertise, guys.  Thank you!!

Hi Tom.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "hard". The Toyo R888r have a 100 treadwear rating, which is SUPER LOW, meaning sticky as heck. The tires are specifically for autocross and racetrack use, which means they shouldn't require a lot of warmup. Autocross courses are usually 3 minutes long or so. Plus they should be able to stand some abuse as in duration of heat, you know, lapping a track.

Last fall I got an extra set of rims and tires for my Cayman, and I got some Falken Azenis at 200 treadwear rating. By lowering the pressures a bit from stock they were plenty sticky on the parking lot course.

Or by "hard" do you mean the ride due to maybe too much tire pressure? Or more importantly the short sidewall?

On my Spyder, the Pirelli "touring" tires were too hard for me. Not in ride, but they just didn't stick very well. They had very high treadwear rating, 500 plus.

I'm much happier with the Vredestein Sportrac 5, they are a 300 rating.

Every one of these tires is rated Traction "A" and temperature "A" if that means anything.

I store my summer tires in the basement on a rack I made. It's well worth the room(and extra expense) it takes to store them, if you ask me.

I'd be remiss if I didn't say how much I love Vredestein Sportrac 5s, but they are alas, apparently NLA. They're not on the Vredestein website anymore.

However, the replacement tire is the Vredestein Sprint+, which is a summer GT tire with a 300 treadwear rating, available from TireRack in a 195/60 R15, if that will fit your car. It will fit mine (I've got 6" wheels), and I'm super-excited about it.

If not, TireRack also has Vredestein Sprint Classics in other sizes besides 165R15. They're also available in 175/70 HR15 and 185/70 HR15.

Good luck.

I had the Pirelli P5's on the car when I got it.  I replaced them last year (before my 750-mile rally) with the Vredelstein Sprint Classics 165/15.  The ride is so much more comfortable. Simply love them.  

Exactly, Stan. If there was a 5.5" Vintage 190 with MORE backspace(like an inch) I'd run 195/60R15 front and rear on my car in Sprint+ when the Sportracs wear out.

I think Carey has the number switched around. https://www.lucasclassictires....-CN36-p1857015n4.htm

and here's another.

https://www.lucasclassictires....TO-CN36-1757015L.htm

if you only want to run one tire, then I would get the Avon CR6zz.  You can run them on the street and the track.

@Marty Grzynkowicz posted:

if you only want to run one tire, then I would get the Avon CR6zz.  You can run them on the street and the track.

Marty portrays himself as a normal, if somewhat overly refined product of the Chicago suburbs. A man with good taste and homes in Florida and "up north", certainly - but mostly a normal guy who likes a brat with mustard as much as the next guy.

But sometimes the mask slips, and reveals that he is (in reality) one of the Illuminati. Maybe THE member.

The tire in the picture has a tread-wear rating of 80, and costs about $400/tire, assuming you can find a set on this side of the Atlantic in these Troubled Times (give it up - you can't, plebe). A quick search revealed a dozen places in Great Britain selling them for 250 lbs sterling or some such thing, and a guy on eBay with 2 (not 4) for $340 each. He'll be happy to ship them to you for $220 each.

For $450 a pair in freight on top of a completely unaffordable purchase price, I want them delivered on elephants with gold-tipped tusks, sitting on a fringed pillow under a canopy, with shirtless guys in turbans and poofy pants dancing and playing flutes in front of them.

As for the tread-wear rating - for reference, I think Double-Bubble chewing gum has a tread-wear rating north of 100, and Big-League Chew bubble-gum is about 95. Driving around the block a couple of times scrubs about 50% of the available tread off the tires, which is OK, I guess, assuming you are your last name is Rockefeller or you happen to be the long-lost love-child of Bill Gates and Patty Hearst (which would explain a lot about Marty).

And here we have a picture of one of these $2000/set shards of the true cross tires on Marty's old car. He bought them (he told me) because "they just look right".

Well then. The rich are not like you and me.

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We won't talk about the wheels.

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What wheels? LOL!

Stan, $290 a tire ships from the east coast.  look at the price of the of the Pirelli CN36(also a great tire).  If you drive like Danny Pip you have to replace them in 2 years. For the other 90%, they will last 5-plus years.  I let Henry talk me out of keeping them when I did the engine upgrade because he wanted to go wider. They're so good it wasn't necessary.  I asked him send them back to me and I sold them within a week on the Samba for about 80% of the original cost. There's a street compound you can ask for as well. For the record, I love a $4 Brat with mustard, or and when the mood strikes a $25 Lobstah roll I'm multifaceted.

https://sascosports.com/tires_...re_manufacturer=Avon

And yes, they are expensive, but they are special. Kinda of like El Guapo!

had Avons on my British bike

You realize Marty, that those tires are bias-ply, correct?

I've not had them, so perhaps I don't know what I'm missing, but the "special" part looks like the price of them.

Is Patty your mom?

And yes, I drive like I stole the car. It says "Speedster" right there on the side.

@Stan Galat posted:

You realize Marty, that those tires are bias-ply, correct?

I've not had them, so perhaps I don't know what I'm missing, but the "special" part looks like the price of them.

And yes, I drive like I stole the car. It says "Speedster" right there on the side.

Yes, with with modern rubber and cord materials.  I only drive like Fangio when I am following you, Danny or Carlos. For me they were the best ever.  For the Alfa GT, I went with Michelin XAS.  185/70 14 VR rated.  Figured I would try something new.

I stay out of tire discussions.

In fact, I have to stay out of most technical discussions.  Not that I don't know much (in most cases, it's true that I don't)  but I feel like a stranger in a strange land with my car.

Not much here applies to me in that regard.

It's lonely where I am.

I know the feeling, @Bob: IM S6.  This tire discussion is one of the few that applies to mine.  Being a rebel has its cost, doesn't it?

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@Marty Grzynkowicz posted:

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...For the Alfa GT, I went with Michelin XAS.  185/70 14 VR rated.  Figured I would try something new...

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Marty, I think I mentioned before that I drove these for a number of years on three different BMW's I had, until they were discontinued. They were the hot ticket and OEM tires on BMW, Porsche, and other sporting machinery in the late '60s and early '70s, being the first assymmetrical design generally available.

They were known for having a bacon-saving gradual breakaway at the limit, allowing even those of us who were clueless to imagine we had the skills of a Fangio.

Of course, the Most Interesting Man On The SOC would never engage in such hooniganism, but thought you might like to know.

Note that the siping on the outer edge (right side in the photo) is much narrower than on the rest of the tread. The idea was that that would close up in hard cornering, creating what worked like a racing slick, while opening up and shedding rain on the straights.

I think you will like them.

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Early in the building of my CMC, I bought XAS tires for it.  But, the useful life of the tires lapsed before the car was drivable and I never got to use them.

Michelins and Pirellis were the go to sport tires back when I was a youth - too many years ago, I guess.

I once was able to afford a set of Pirellis.

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@Bob: IM S6 posted:

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...I once was able to afford a set of Pirellis...

If I recall, those Michelins were $100 in 165/70 - for a set of four.

Mounted and balanced and out the door.

Of course, it helped that the 2002 was on 13" rims.

Does anyone remember the 50,000-mile treadwear warranty?

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Mitch, those XAS cost a little more now (understatement)

@Sacto Mitch posted:

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If I recall, those Michelins were $100 in 165/70 - for a set of four.

Mounted and balanced and out the door.

Of course, it helped that the 2002 was on 13" rims.

Does anyone remember the 50,000-mile treadwear warranty?

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That’s what I ran on two Volvo 145’s I had, until I found Vredestein Sprints.

Have no idea how the modern compounds relate to the classic tires from BITD.