im surprised you say this... just one look at the 50A's and you can see the tread grooves are alot bigger... I just have a hard time believing they are a faster tire than the RE-01R's which are claimed by Bridgestone themselves as their top of the line 140 TW tire... but then again I have not done back-to-back testing.



n

 

I just have never seen the 615's being fast at any events I have been at.. not even regular track days.

Im curious about the new Hankook 140 tw tires....

n

 

I was suprised too, until I realized that my RE01Rs are marked 180 treadwear. The RE050A also has a AA traction rating while the RE01R has an A traction rating, leading me to believe that its just marketing and a better tread pattern that make the RE01R seem like the way to go.

 

Traction rating is for "wet roads."

"Traction Letter
This letter indicates a tire's ability to stop on wet pavement. A higher graded tire should allow you to stop your car on wet roads in a shorter distance than a tire with a lower grade. Traction is graded from highest to lowest as "AA","A", "B", and "C"."

http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/cars/rules/.../brochure.html

Bigger tread gaps = better "wet" traction. Generally not so good for dry race track...

JW

 

^^^Ahhh good to know. I had heard it was based off of the tire's ability to stop a car, but they must have left out the wet part. Thanks that actually makes more sense to me now.

Also, here is a shot of the new Toyo R1R...

 

I read your blog, how much time do you think you lost by lifting for sound? I think even though you have a 5" exhaust tip, you should be able to shove a 3" turn-down into the smaller inner muffler core. We did that at Quallcom by by wrapping heavy wire (coat hanger) around the muffler hanger, then hose clamped the wire to the turn-down.

You mentioned the toyos were better gripping than than the RE-01Rs, first lap or for the session due to heat tolerance? How do they compare to your Yok A048s?

Thanks

 

As for RT-615s winning Redline events in street class, look at the # of competitors - very, very low. If you put 15 competitors in that class with half on RT-615s and half on RE-01Rs, you're not going to see many RT-615s at the top unless the cars (or drivers) are just that much better. No one even thinks about running those tires at the National level in SCCA street tire classes.

I'm surprised to hear EgoKiller say his RE050s were so much better than the RE-01Rs, because the RE050 is no competition in SCCA street tire classes either.

 

Isn't it difficult to compare tires when you are running them on two completely different cars? If you want to talk in those terms, I've run the 615s on my Camaro and found that they stuck very well for street tires at VIR and Summit Point Shenandoah, and they also didn't seem to overheat at all. By comparison, when I ran those tracks in the RTAs on RE01Rs in my Evo, the tires started fading after 1-2 laps from heat and there was a lot more understeer and lack of good turn-in response compared to the Camaro.

But, I was way faster in the Evo than the Camaro due to the overall grip level of the whole combo. I wouldn't attribute much of what I felt to the tires due to the two completely different platforms though.

Anyhow, I hope there is something better than the RE01Rs since they are pricey and nowhere near an R compound.

 

The R1R will be interesting to watch...

 

I don't know how much time I lost from sound. I was probably lifting a lot more than I should have, but I had no practice to play around with trying to fool the mic so I was playing it safe. I was literally coasting from the exit of the turn until about halfway down the straight. I didn't want to risk it because if you got flagged for sound in your time attack session it was over. Looking back on it, we probably could have rigged something up to make a 3" or 4" dryer duct or something work on the 5" tip, but when we were at Home Depot looking around Saturday night, we just couldn't think of something that sounded worth trying. Besides, from what we saw, the Home Depot specials were only dropping sound levels by 1-2 db which would have still put us well over the 92db limit.

The Toyos had a little better heat tollerance than the RE01Rs do and the overall grip and feel was better as well. They are not as fast as the A048s obviously, but they are not as far off as you would think I am guessing. I am hoping to bring all 3 sets of tires to a track soon, or at least the two sets of street tires, to do a back to back comparison. I would also like to get some tire temps, mess with pressures, and do a big write up soon.

 

Not when the cars are relatively the same weight and you are only comparing general characteristics of the tire, not the car, or lap times.

 

Am I missing some other Hankook? The 214s on my car for the Evo vs Sti shootout were listed on the website as 200tw:

http://www.hankooktireusa.com/product/Z212.pdf

 

someone at the track told me they were 140.... its a street tire & the manufacturer assigns its own treadwear number so it doesnt mean much, but thanks for the clarififcation

 

Nils,
I'd like to think the Hankook were the new best thing (cause they are pretty affordable). Hope to see someone test them in a comparison to Bridgestones and Neovas.

 

Hankook has an un-released 140 treadwear street tire as well that was at SEMA.