Saw this on Pistonheads and KNOW how much we all enjoy a good what tyre thread!

Un-biased opinion of the best braking tyres :

http://www.tyrereviews.co.uk/Article/2012-Autobild-50-Tyre-Braking-Test.htm

Apologies if it's a repost!

Nexen N3000's in 30th spot. And I thought they were my worst set of rubber! In fact, of all my road sets, they were the only one!! No inclusion of Falken 452's, Goodyear Eagle F1's or Toyo T1-R's.

So it certainly seemed to be biased on asymmetrical tyres, although that maybe due to that specific tyre size availability?

Falken 453 are 25th though
Eagles are 2nd (how'd you miss that?!)
Toyo Proxes are 13th

???

Falken 453 - asymmetrical
Eagle F1's - asymmetrical again
And the Toyos... Yep, asymmetrical



Where are their directional V pattern relations?

That is a good showing for the Nokian, didn't realise they were good especially at the price they are. That particular test doesn't rate them on handling though - fairly important factor!

I bought some Falken FK-452's a couple of months ago after reading a lot of positive reviews and they were only £65 a corner for my VXR.

I can honestly say, they are the worst tyre I have ever owned. I've noticed a huge loss of grip compared to my old continental tyres which had 2.5mm thread. They're really noisy too.


I'll be replacing them with either Continentals or eagle F1's next time. I just wish the F1's still had the V thread pattern.

Think they have all been, or are in the process of being discontinued unfortunately.
Certainly the Eagle GSD3 and T1Rs are no more and stock of the 452's seems iffy at times.

From having them on my 147 I reckoned the Fulda Sporcontrol and Marangoni Mythos were pretty good tyres.

What I've noticed though is that tyres can behave extremely different on different cars. The Kumho Ecsta was not much better than fitting a child's balloon to my Alfa.

Winter tyres the same: on a 159 the Pirelli Sotto Zero was excellent, the Continental Wintercontact 830 (generally considered to be superior) was certainly not as good.

So I don't consider these tyre tests to be the ultimate in reference material. Much of it is down to personal preference as well and you will see this depending on which magazine is testing them: some will say tyre X is great because it's comfy and neutral, others will say that same tyre X lacks feedback and understeers too easily. Add to that the fact some tyres are better in some sizes than others (I've always found the Goodyears good in lower profile sizes but not impressed with the larger sidewall models).

Anyway. What oil should I be using when running on 18s?

Oi!

On a related note, what on earth have blackcircles done to their website. It's a horrific user experience now!

Instead of leaving the user to decide what they want from a great selection, it seems they have struck a deal with Toyo.

Basically if you want Toyo or Blackcircles own 'budget' brand tyre, you're fine. Otherwise you're best going elsewhere.

I think it's important to note that this is just a brake test carried out on a BMW on 17"s. It not directly related to our applications, but I think I kind of shows what we suspect - more expensive tyres tend to be better and the cheap ones tend to be crap. Everything else sits in between and largely a matter of taste/price

If you click on a tyre you get a far more detailed view of each tyre and the goodyear beats the No.1 overall by a long way.

I have just had a couple of GSD3's fitted today - so there are still some about.

More concerning is that the Asymmetrics in the test are not available in 16". The only Y rated tyre I could buy today was the GSD3.

It seems 16" is no longer considered a 'performance' size, so Y and Z rated tyres are no longer being produced.

Where does this leave us, as FIAT recommended a Y speed rating?

The falken 452's on my FTO are noisy and crap. Bugger all grip.

The Good Year F1 Assymetric are certainly good even on my Coupe (225/35-18), but they did wear out fast.

I like Danthemanc and Howardmagoo had the Falken 452 and thought they were noisy and the grip was avaerage. People rate the alot on here and I basically think they are overated. Before that I had the Nankang ns2 and in the dry they were a tad better than the falkens, but in the rain they were shockingly bad.

Now I have Conti sport contact 5 all round, one word, amazing!

912's on the rear and regular Ultrac's on the front is a mega-brill combo

Toyo T1-R are being replaced with T1-Sports I think.