What brand of tires should I get?
 

I think I'm going with Enkei Draco 18x8 with offset 45.

Tire Rack has the rims and i'm looking for all season tires (i'm in california). There are many options and I am new to buying tires. All the options from their tire package guide says it's gonna be 225/40/18. Is that going to give the tire wall a straight look? I've seen some tires that bubbles out and I don't want that look. But the main question is what's a good tire?? Does it matter which brand i get as long as the numbers are the same?

Question: since you are in California, why go for all seasons instead of straight summer tires?

I know its not sunny every single day of the year but seems like summer tires is the norm there.

true, but we do have times where it just rains and rains and i don't know how well summer tires will do in that situation.

My friend told me contentintal and yokohama is good. is that true?

Thing 1: Don't assume that a specific name brand is always "good" or "bad". Pretty much all the big brand names make some great tires and some that are not so great. You aren't guaranteed a good tire sticking with either Continental or Yokohama or any name brand.

Thing 2: "All-Season" does NOT imply superior performance in the rain. It rains in the summertime! Most good Summer tires perform extremely well in the wet. Max Performance Summer tires should have wet grip better than Ultra High Performance All-Seasons since they have softer tread compound (and lower UTQG treadwear rating).

Tire Rack has a lot of good objective test data on a lot of different tires, check out their website: www.tirerack.com

Here are some test results for UHP All-Season tires: https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tests...y.jsp?ttid=200
Wet braking distances range from 50mph range from 110.0 to 120.6 feet.
Max Performance tire test: https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tests...y.jsp?ttid=190
Wet braking distances are much shorter for the Max Perf Summer tires, 96.9 to 106 feet.

the only answer i have for you is another question.


what are you going to do with the car?
just drive daily?
autocross?
drift?
canyon carving?
laundry basket?

+1 to what ZDan said.

After I burned down the stockers, I had Bridgestone Potenza s04 PP mounted and drove in the rain. My gosh, those tires slide through puddles like knife through butter at high speeds.

I live in a place known for its rain and still on summer tires. Only trouble is when there's conditions for black ice. Thats when I take it easy on side streets.

just daily driving, not gonna be doing anything fancy, but maybe laundry basket:D

wow thanks for all that info, but with lower UTQG, doesn't that mean I have to change tires more often with the summer tires?

http://www.1010tires.com/Tires/Miche...port+AS+3+Plus

If looking for a high performance all season this is it.

I got these last week and will never buy a different tire again. Ever. The ratings are accurate and I would even give them a 6 in some categories. They were tested against a number good summer tires and outperformed them all.

After considering all the responses, along with some input from coworkers, i'm going with Michelin Pilot Super Sport 225/40/18.

thanks everyone!

Just to add to your sense of security with your choice, yesterday I was driving in some biblical rain conditions on my MPSS and they didn't aquaplane or even lose traction for half a second. Water displacement is quite good on the MPSS and in fact that's one of their known strengths

Could you post the link to that test?

i have heard great things abt the toyo proxes line

You'll be fine year round with MPSS unless you take your car up to Tahoe or something else snowy. I drove around on 200TW Dunlop Direzza ZII Star Specs for over a year with minimal issues (tire noise and big puddles were the only concerns).

There are a number of good summer and all season tires at around +300TW rating from Michelin, Bridgestone, and Continental if you don't mind paying a bit extra over the cheap stuff.

Would you run these in the snow? Light snow maybe until the real snow hits?

Just curious as I may someday have to deal with this thing called 'weather'.