Track tire recomendations

Do your tires wear out before they get old start cracking? No? Buy something really sticky for the street like Toyo 888s. Great track tires too. You'll get a couple of years out of them, maybe more.
Do you drive a lot in the rain? Okay, keep those Michelins or Bridgestones, Then buy some scratched-up wheels and put some slicks on them. Try Bob Chick. He sells scrubs that'll be good for a few track days.

 

I run Continental extreme dw's, very good handling tire in the dry and rated the best in the wet. I overheated my pads after 4 or 5 hard laps with them, so more aggressive tires would only serve to smoke the brakes sooner. I also have a set of hoosier r6 on challenge rims but they will have to wait until I get better brake pads at minimum.

I ran dunlop direzza z1* before the r6 and they were very sticky but also pretty harsh riding. I only autox'd with those, no track use. They were a little too harsh for street use, but a great 2nd set for bolting on and driving to and running an autox or track day. As I have a trailer, I went with the contis for street/wet due to their excellent wet rating and have the r6's if I feel the car is up to it. If I were only running one set of rims, I'd probably have gone for the new direzza z2's.

Don't spend money on slicks for your first time.

 

Then leave the street tires on the car. Novice drivers learn the handling qualities of the car faster and at a lower risk with street tires than with anything stickier. Sticky tires make it harder to feel the edge*, and when you do find it, you leave the road with significantly more energy--not good.


(*) that is the traction profile of the tire

 

Mitch brings up a very good point.

That said, I love the NT01s on my F355.


Street tires can wear quickly on the track.


Rob
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Maybe some of you guys that track your cars could let the rest of us know? How critical is tire pressure and what do you like to run front and rears. Not sure if it is that critical but when I raced motorcycles you could feel a difference very easily and if you wanted your tires to last longer and you were just out havin fun you could run a little more pressure and it made quite a difference to the amount of rubber scuffing off them.

 

Tire pressure is very critical and it depends on what type of tires you are running. If you are running street tires you want them to get up but not over 40 psi hot. On street tires for the 355 start with cold psi of 32 in the rear and 34 in the front. You read that correct less in the rear. Reason, there is a lot of heat generated at the rear of the 355 so it will rise in psi faster then the front and you want all 4 corners at close to the same psi. If you are running R compound tires like the NT01 or Toyo 888's then you want to start with lower cold psi like 30 in the rear and 32 in the front and aim for hot psi of around 37 or 38 all around.
Check your hot psi as soon as possible after you finish a track session. Most of us stop along the pit wall before re-entering the paddock and check there so that the tires don't have time to cool down. The most important thing is to be consistent and do it after each session until you get an idea of how your tires are performing. Once you get the same results then you can simply note that for the next event and only have to double check the psi once or twice during your track day.

 

i am curious as to whay size NT01's you used.

 

225/40/18 front and 275/35/18 rear on OEM F355 wheels. The 265/40/18 factory tire size is too narrow for a 10" wide wheel IMO. I find the handling at the limit to be quite neutral in medium to high speed turns with just the slightest hint of understeer at AutoX type hairpins, almost impossible to dial this out without ending up with a dangerous car at any other speed.

Rob

 

I get/got 10K total miles and 5 track weekends on Bridgestone S03s.

I setup the alignment with a probe tipped pyrometer to measure tread temperatures, and dialed in the suspension so that both ends would go "slick" within 100 miles of each other.

Oh and BTW, I get that 10K total miles and 5 track weekends while circulating within 2 seconds of the lap record for car weight, street tires and motor HP.

 

I just wanted an excuse to post a pic of the shredded tires on the rental car that was brought to the event. It was picked up with 25 miles on the odometer.

 

That is the size of tire I switched to back in 2004. I have been very happy with the balance of the car on track with those sizes so I am still using that spec today.

 

Stick to street tires for awhile until you really understand what the car is going to do at, and past the limit. Learning to drive the car fast on street tires then switching to a stickier compound down the road is far more rewarding and will make you a much better driver.

I run Toyo R888's on my 348 and absolutely love them but then again I drove an open wheel formula car on slicks for the last 4 years so I'm very familiar with the breakaway characteristics of a very aggressive tire and wouldn't have it any other way. I run 225/40s up front and 315/30s out back and the balance is far better than I was expecting, understeer is very very minimal and you can still get the car to rotate with all that rubber out back. Still get the classic lift off oversteer as we all expect, just have to drive around it.
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Don't mix tires, bad idea. Replace all four at the same time with the same brand and type of tire. Dry rotted tires are probably like bricks.

 

I had Michelin Pilot Super Sports put on back and waited to replace the old Pilot sports on the front. Big mistake... car was very hard to handle. I later found that the PSS were very old and cracking on the inside edge and the steel could be seen. The front wondered badly at speed. After the fronts were also changed to PSS, it made a world of difference. I agree with cuneo to have all 4 replaced at the same time.

 

One day when I was at the track a guy with a yellow F355 showed up with only 5000 miles on his car and the original tires! (The car was more than 10 years old at that point.)

ANyway, I passed him 3 times a session (25 minutes) and he spun the car multiple times.

Moral: Use new tires at the track.

 

You made a very good choice, you won't regret. Ah, I am talking about the tire choice by the way

 

+1 on the choosing Pilot Super Sports. Awesome tire. The Falkens and Hankook (High Perf road) tires do okay but squeal like a pig on turns. Video is of me in my Z4 with Hankooks prior to getting the F355.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC2kzeIynQ8[/ame]

 

Hi Rob'Z
Just tried to order the size tires you suggested for rear on a stock 98 F355GTS they would not order because the load capacity is rated at 95Y and they say the minimum is 97Y?
Have you ever had this issue?
Thanks
Larry

 

No Larry. I still have that same set of tires on my F355. They are not even half worn yet, maybe even 75% remaining.

Is the 97Y the rating on your current tire or what they have listed in their system?

 

Jeez, less than 100 lbs difference between 95 and 97. Wow, tell them to lighten up. Haha. Basically the entire weight of an F355 can be split evenly between the two 95y rear tires.

 

I've ran mpss on my car for the past few track days. They have held up very well, in fact still look almost new lol.
It really depends on how hard you are pushing it. If you are casually going around a track at like 80 percent of what's possible, your really not going to see much wear. If you are actually racing, or just really pushing it, your tire wear will go up exponentially.
I think i wore more off my tires on four 41sec autocross runs then I did on 3hrs at roebling road track.

All this to say, run good street tires

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