shane p

What are the differences and has anyone used the on the street? I need new tires and have always used R888s but they seem to never be in stock. I want a tire that will be comparable on the street and still be good at the road courses. It will be driven on the street 90% and 10% on the track. If Hoosiers aren't a good idea what would be a good tire to try that you can actually find? So if I go with the Hoosiers, which ones, R7 or A7?

argonaut

Both R7s and A7s are off road only (i.e. for use in race track and autocross only). They are not suitable for daily use. The rubber and construction are too soft to stand up to daily use not to mention they wear out very quickly and can be hazardous in wet conditions. The difference is R7 is formulated for road course/race track and in theory is a bit more durable. A7 is formulated specifically for autocross and is designed to come up to operating temp very quickly (lots of guys do use them on road courses though, including myself).

Look at Michelin Pilot Sport 4s and Nitto NT01 just to name a couple. I'm sure many others will chime in with suggestions.

Scooter70

So you always drive 110%?

shane p

Heck ya.

shane p

I understand all that about off road use only. I dont drive the car daily, maybe a few thousand miles a year and I dont take it out in the rain but do get caught in the rain on occasion. I was looking at NT01 but the sizes are a little off for the rims I currently have.

Mrsideways

Look at the good year 3R for what your doing.

Hitman227

There are a lot of disadvantages for Hoosiers on the street (like mentioned, can run a search). Apparently it can be done, from what I understand more-so going back and forth to events, not DD. Heat into the tires on the street seems to be the biggest problem...

I hear the Toyo R888r are very capable on the street, though personally have no experience with them. Designed grip for AX, relatively one of the best traction you can get for street driving..

I'm curious how all the Max Performance Summer tires compare to the R888r, prolly less. Sounds like you want to go to a similar low TW / high traction street tire, not regular.

Olitho

I don't like the R888R. There are several other better performance street and track combination tires available.

Hitman227

Well I can't first hand discuss, though for the 90% street, might be the right ticket (as a AX tire, supposed to heat fast). If real serious about the RR 10%, then I do not know.

Sequentially I only hear good things about the NT01 for RR...haven't heard anything about them on the street, however..

EDIT
Woops I see OP usually on the R888 (or R888r ? I believe the R888r is the latest version, based on TireRack's limited sizes of the R888). Anyways prolly well aware of their performance all around

Olitho

I raced on R888s in World Challenge in 2011. I did not like them then. I tested R888Rs as part of a process to select the 2020 and 2021 season tires for Spec Corvette, along with Toyo RRs, Falken 615K+, Nankang NS-2R, and Yokohama something or another. I have also used Nitto NT01, BF Goodrich G-Force Rival S (amazing tire), and some others. The R888R is at the bottom of this stack for me. The Rival S is great, as is the NT01, but they have so little tread as to be treacherous in the rain. The Falken and Nankang's have reasonably deep tread as to be somewhat acceptable in the rain, but still pretty fast. If I was looking for a performance street tire I would choose one of those two. Both Falken (2018-2019) and Nankang (2020-2021) have been used with good outcomes in Spec Corvette racing as both the dry and rain tires.

Olitho

PS. Hoosier A7s are an amazing tire, wickedly fast, but a super poor choice on the street. They have thin carcasses as to be lightweight, are not designed to be flat resistant to street debris and will wear out before you know it. At $1,800 per set, you better have a thick wallet.

Hitman227

Olitho that is really interesting, thanks for sharing experience for these options.

I'd be curious to what makes the R888r worse than the ones you listed, but that's besides the point. I think the OP has a few good choices now, factors as well how poor the R7/A7 is for street.

Talking about RR driving, conversely for the street, I'd be interested to know how tire comes to temp - that is advantage of AX tires, by design. I.e., I'm not too sure how the NT01 would handle street driving for performance...as a RR tire, I would assume they take some time coming up to temperature, thus wouldn't be that grippy during various street conditions, but I digress.

_zebra

the 'rona & now a deployment kept me from getting to test my 615K+ on a track yet, but they've been great on the street so far. was originally trying to get the 140TW NT05s, but they kept sending sets that were 3-4yrs old, so i went with the Falkens & have been happy. if i didn't mostly street drive the car, i would've got NT01s based on recommendations from a couple road racing buddies & on commentary here.

turbrorx7

Why NS-2R over the AR-1?

ttx350z

I tried R888R for autox last year, they were horrible for me.

R888R’s were better than the Rival S cold, but the Rivals were faster for me when hot. They were decent cold but they never seemed to get any faster for me when tire temp was ambient to 140F. Maybe they needed to get even hotter then that to get more grip?

They got slower and slower every heat cycle. People I would consistently beat by seconds were now beating me and the gap would get larger the more events I did.

Swapped to the Yokohama A052’s before the R888R’s were dead because they were so bad. The A052’s are so much better in every category. Fast as hell cold, ton more lateral grip, longitudinal grip was just as good, awesome wet traction, soft and quiet ride on the street, similar wear rate with no grip level tapering off through each heat cycle, and a couple of pounds lighter per tire. There’s a reason why the A052’s are the dominant tire in SCCA.

Cons are they cost more than the R888R’s, wasnt worth the money saved to tumble down the timing sheet since I dont go to events to putt around.


ETA: Just saw this video on youtube with the R888R in it. The A052 wasnt in the video, but it’s well known to be quite a bit faster than the Supercar 3 thats in this video.

SmokeyJo6.0

Buy a set of BF Goodrich Rivals and run them with factory air. Rivals were designed around FR V8 cars.

ttx350z

Why?

Compared to A052’s, the Rivals are a worse street tire in every measurable category such as cold grip, hot grip, wet grip, braking, cost, etc. only thing the Rivals would have an edge on is probably heat resistance/longevity.

This carries over to competition driving as well.

SmokeyJo6.0

Because he said track. Not parking lot. Rivals and Hankook RS4s take the beat down of a track way better. I ran down my buddy in a 2019 C7 Zo6 at Oregon Raceway Park in a base C6 with rivals. You can't get RS4s for a corvette. Using a street tire on the track is way different than autocross. The speeds are higher, the heat is higher, the stress is higher.

ttx350z

You know time attack is ran on the track to right? Plenty of people using A052’s for that.

OP never mentioned any endurance events. If he’s considering A7’s, they wont last long on the track as well without overheating, but they will be the fastest. A052’s will be the most streetable but fastest option is he’s considering the A7’s.

SmokeyJo6.0

Time attack is less than 5 laps looking for hundreths of a second possibly using 2 sets of sticker tires in a day. This guy I'm assuming will be on track 20 minutes at a time and doesn't want his tires to fall off and eat themselves. The rivals and the RS4s don't eat themselves hot. If you can buy 2 or 3 sets of tires a year, sure pay for the extra cold grip, but nobody is having fun when their tires are slimy with 10 minutes left to drive.