Summer tyres for 205 GTI
Discussion
Hopefully this is the right place to post this question. Apologies if not.
I’ve struggled through the winter on terrible, terrible Pirelli P6000s, and want to get a decent tyre for the summer. I was planning on doing a couple of trackdays this year (not as many as last year!) and at least one trip the ‘ring.
My 205 is used for a 300 mile a week commute on A and B roads, fun driving at the weekend, and the occasional long journey up to the family in Scotland. I do have use of a Corsa though, so if the weather is bad I generally take that. Even the 165 width tyres on that seem to grip better than the P6000s on the GTI in the wet.
For summer and track use I’ve always been a fan of Yokohama A539s, but it appears you can’t get them any more. Is there is a direct replacement? Size is 195/50/R15.
I was looking at Toyo R888s, as I think I could live with the lack of grip in the wet. Anything has to be better than these P6000s. I’m just concerned about wear rates, given the annual mileage of the car is around 12-15000. The A539s used to last about 8-10k miles depending on track use.
I need to replace all four corners, so looking at around £320 for R888s. Is there anything similar that would wear better? I don’t think I can stretch to Yoko AO48s (best price I’ve found is £140 a corner in my area).
Would the R888s give a good enough increase in performance to warrant the wet weather performance trade-off, or should I save £50-60 and just get the Goodyears that everyone seems to rave about?
I’ve struggled through the winter on terrible, terrible Pirelli P6000s, and want to get a decent tyre for the summer. I was planning on doing a couple of trackdays this year (not as many as last year!) and at least one trip the ‘ring.
My 205 is used for a 300 mile a week commute on A and B roads, fun driving at the weekend, and the occasional long journey up to the family in Scotland. I do have use of a Corsa though, so if the weather is bad I generally take that. Even the 165 width tyres on that seem to grip better than the P6000s on the GTI in the wet.
For summer and track use I’ve always been a fan of Yokohama A539s, but it appears you can’t get them any more. Is there is a direct replacement? Size is 195/50/R15.
I was looking at Toyo R888s, as I think I could live with the lack of grip in the wet. Anything has to be better than these P6000s. I’m just concerned about wear rates, given the annual mileage of the car is around 12-15000. The A539s used to last about 8-10k miles depending on track use.
I need to replace all four corners, so looking at around £320 for R888s. Is there anything similar that would wear better? I don’t think I can stretch to Yoko AO48s (best price I’ve found is £140 a corner in my area).
Would the R888s give a good enough increase in performance to warrant the wet weather performance trade-off, or should I save £50-60 and just get the Goodyears that everyone seems to rave about?
Really, anything recent is better than the P6000. I had them on a Corsa, truely awful tyres.
I replaced them with Bridgestone Potenza RE720, which were excellent, nice hard sidewalls too which would suit your 205 well. They lasted longer than the Pirellis, had infinately more grip, and nice controllable break-away unlike the P6k which suddenly gave up grip and never regained it.
Falken 452 also gets good reviews just about everywhere. I'm also a big fan of the Vredestein Sportrac/Ultrac - both are good wearing tyres with decent grip.
I replaced them with Bridgestone Potenza RE720, which were excellent, nice hard sidewalls too which would suit your 205 well. They lasted longer than the Pirellis, had infinately more grip, and nice controllable break-away unlike the P6k which suddenly gave up grip and never regained it.
Falken 452 also gets good reviews just about everywhere. I'm also a big fan of the Vredestein Sportrac/Ultrac - both are good wearing tyres with decent grip.
I use R888's on my 205 GTI6 track car and once warm they are incredible. I'm not sure you'd get them up to a half decent operating temperature on the road, so I run a spare set of wheels for track days and keep Yoko A539's for the road. I would go with either Toyo T1R or Goodyear Eagle F1 - both about £40 a corner in 195/50/15.
It's not worth getting cheap tyres on a 205, they respond well to good rubber.
It's not worth getting cheap tyres on a 205, they respond well to good rubber.
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