Re71r or S04
 

The age old question... I have a 2016 FRS. I just got some 17x8 +35 wheels for it and looking to put on some gripper tires. I do about 5k miles a year as DD use. I just did my first autocross this past weekend and looking to do some more and need something better than those Prius tires. My questions are:

1) are re71r too hard core for my purposes? Like I want to have more grip for autox days but don't want to make the car annoying for 95% of its use
2) anyone run s04 pole positions? Thoughts?
3)sizes... should I go 225/45 or 235/40? I was leaning toward the 225/45 as it will have slightly more sidewall and maybe be a little more comfortable

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How many autox events per year, how many runs per event? I get about 130 good runs out of mine before they fall off, I don't put many Street miles on them, maybe 3k-4k max, but with less camber you'll get more edge wear and less tire life. They're loud on the street compared to say stock tires but livable for 5k/year imho.

S04 won't be much better than the Michelin primacy tire.
I'd pick 225 but I don't like pinched tires.

https://m.tirerack.com/tires/tests/t...y.jsp?ttid=239

So literally I have run 1 event. So I don't know how many events I will be doing. I'd like to say several but I also don't plan to be super dedicated as it will be my first season. My big concern is it losing its daily ability. Heck the autocross course is a 90 min drive away. I don't want to be exhausted by the time I get there lol.

The think tire noise would be your biggest downside with 225/45R17. I don't feel tires like the Dunlop ZIII and RE71Rs are that much rougher of a ride than most other tires you might have on an 86.
I currently daily/autocross with the Dunlop ZIII.
None of these tires like sub 40F temps though.

235/40R17 is hard to find. I used to run that on the front of my 91 MR2 and it really limited my tire choices and they were always on the expensive side.

Any reason you're limiting yourself to these tires?

Well I ended up with neither. Settled on some Continental ExtremeContact Sports

You can get the Z3 in that size, they are only 165/ea. Last year I got them and a $70 rebate from tire rack.

I am going to the A052 next, 223/ea at 235/45/17 :(

Good choice. I liked the ECS on my car.

These two tires are not even in the same category, but given how little you drive, RE71R. Any "longer lasting tire" will just age/dry out before you get to truly enjoy them.

How are you liking the Continental ECS so far? It seems like a good tire option for DD'ing with some occasional track and auto-X use.

Actually I like them alot. Massive improvement at the track plus good road manners. Really good balance between DD and autox use. Am I giving up a little time at the track? Probably, but only like 0.5 second and I'm not worried about them getting damaged from sitting out in the cold.

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What's your tire experience? I picked these up a few weeks back, few thousand miles on em so far.

Sidewalls are soft, probably the softest I've put on the car, I actually firmed up the dampers a little until I got used to them moving around more then the old Firestone Indy's I had on the car. Kind of like a softer, grippier OE Primacy or Firehawk.

Other than that good street tire, probably won't ever track/autox them unless I get lazy or in a pinch and then I won't be too critical of them, they'll just need to survive some casual lapping.

Thanks for the feedback. I am currently tire shopping for my BRZ. I have a set of 17X9 TC105X's currently on order and going to install (during the winter) my Eibach Multipro R2's coil over set as well. My BRZ is my weekend/nice day toy with an occasional autox session or track day mixed in with back roads driving. I'm not sure if I just want to do an extreme summer tire (ie. Bridgestone RE71) or a max performance summer tire (ie. Continental ECS). Maybe another option in between...

I ran Conti ECS this year cuz I thought I was gonna run in a slower class (wound up getting Hoosier A7s and running 2 classes up tho!).

2.5 seconds slower at Palmer (very twisty-turny) and 1.2 seconds slower at Watkins Glen (speeed track) on the ECS vs. RE71R last year. They are *a lot* slower! They did get relatively a lot better as they wore, though. At NHMS I was as fast on them as I was on a friends Hankook RS4s.

I wouldn't assume ECS are less susceptible to damage from being stored in cold, but I've done this with multiple summer and even competition tires before and not had issues...