Ruadhd2 Posted September 13, 2011 Share Posted September 13, 2011 Any other brand that folks can recommend for a 7 for daily use, mostly in dry weather and one or two track days a year other than Toyos? Mine are mounted on 15x7 Panasports. Want spirited drives. Don't need all season. Was going comparison shop Toyos with my local dealer against Tire Rack. Local dealer is Radial Tire, reknown guys in the racing business, but it is a two to four hour wait to get tires on your car. They are lined up there as early as 7AM every day. So, looking for a discount seller who can drop ship them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnCh Posted September 13, 2011 Share Posted September 13, 2011 I bought my Toyos from http://www.tiresdirect.net and was pleased with the service and price. I've also heard good things about http://treadzone.com/, but have no personal experience with them. -John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bsimon Posted September 13, 2011 Share Posted September 13, 2011 :iagree: http://www.tiresdirect.net Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boxologist Posted September 14, 2011 Share Posted September 14, 2011 kuhmo XS or Dunlop Direzza StarSpec are also good street tyres. I would really stick to the RA1, R888 or Advan AD048. The baby r comps really suit the lightweight se7ens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
escondidoron Posted September 14, 2011 Share Posted September 14, 2011 I just bought a set of RA-1s from Discount Tire. They don't stock them and had to order them. It took about a week to get them. The best part was that they price matched an internet quote for $125.27 each (205/60R13). http://tirecrawler.com/shop/detail_tire.php?product_id=8360&t=GS Here they are, installed, just after returning home from my first drive with them: http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6166/6142012193_a5d622f8ae_b.jpg and http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6153/6142568074_2b49277805_b.jpg The transformation from my old Yokohamas is excellent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimrankin Posted September 14, 2011 Share Posted September 14, 2011 I had the Dunlop Star Spec's on the 7 (205 X 16) and found them a bit too easy to get loose. Replaced them with Nitto NT 01's and love them. I tried to sell the Dunlops but no reasonable offer so put them on an old set of Inke superlight 16" rims for my MINI as it needed tires. They are GREAT on the MINI, can't beleive what a difference the car makes to the tire performance. Guess the Dunlops were just a smidge too hard for the weight of the 7 and perfect for the weight of the MINI. Think SOFT, like wear under 100, and it will probably work well on your 7, no matter what brand. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WestTexasS2K Posted September 14, 2011 Share Posted September 14, 2011 I'm liking my Nt01s as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ruadhd2 Posted September 15, 2011 Author Share Posted September 15, 2011 What is your experience with Toyo RA1's driving around town or countryside if they haven't heated up yet? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kitcat Posted September 15, 2011 Share Posted September 15, 2011 My experience is they are no grip-pier and probably not as grippy as high performance street tires. I just did back to back Toyo vs street tire test on my new Birkin and my butt-O-meter suggests the Toyos dont hold the road as well. I have a nice deserted roundabout (skid-pad?) where I see what the tires can do. My Toyos are "naturally shaved" and just have the 2 deeper tread rings left. On the track, once warm (1 lap is all it takes), the Toyos are terrific. Now that I have a set of full tread tires, I will run them on the street and save there Toyos for track use. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rnr Posted September 15, 2011 Share Posted September 15, 2011 My experience is they are no grip-pier and probably not as grippy as high performance street tires. I just did back to back Toyo vs street tire test on my new Birkin and my butt-O-meter suggests the Toyos dont hold the road as well. I am going to have to disagree with you on this one. While I havent done a back to back test on my Se7en, I have done it several times on my Elise and there is a dramatic difference in street driving. I once swapped from the RA1s to my AD07 street tires and took a U-turn at a light at my regular RA1 speed and ended up with huge understeer and tire squeal which luckily was not seen by a cop. Admittedly the Elise is a lot heavier than the Seven but at 2000 lbs its results are more applicable than most. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ruadhd2 Posted September 17, 2011 Author Share Posted September 17, 2011 Ok. Then. If I want a tire for occasional track use and mostly summer, non-wet driving, will I be safe , if reasonably careful, with the car on RA-1's if they don't get a chance to heat up around town? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kitcat Posted September 17, 2011 Share Posted September 17, 2011 Sure. I have 10K+ miles on mine and, other than some road rash on the body and a few extra small stones in the cockpit, they have been great. They do have decent grip cold, just much better thoroughly warmed. And they save you the need of having track rubber and street rubber. There is a school of thought that says race rubber can't be allowed to get too cold or they lose their effectiveness. But I have stored my car in an unheated garage for 4 winters and have not seen a fall-off in performance (minus 5-10 degrees F). In fact, a selling point of RA1's is they seem to get better with age, unlike full-tilt race rubber like Hoosiers, for instance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arya Ebrahimi Posted September 17, 2011 Share Posted September 17, 2011 Any other brand that folks can recommend for a 7 for daily use, mostly in dry weather and one or two track days a year other than Toyos? Mine are mounted on 15x7 Panasports. Want spirited drives. Don't need all season. Was going comparison shop Toyos with my local dealer against Tire Rack. Local dealer is Radial Tire, reknown guys in the racing business, but it is a two to four hour wait to get tires on your car. They are lined up there as early as 7AM every day. So, looking for a discount seller who can drop ship them. Good luck beating Radial's prices, especially on Toyo's. Also, if you mention that you're in a car club they usually knock another couple bucks off($10/tire last time I was in a month or so ago). The key to getting in and out quickly is to be first in line on a weekday, OR just drop your tires/wheels off and pick them up later. Sam and Paul are good people and I will recommend them to anyone and everyone in the greater DC area. You're lucky since they're in your neighborhood. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rnr Posted September 17, 2011 Share Posted September 17, 2011 Ok. Then. If I want a tire for occasional track use and mostly summer, non-wet driving, will I be safe , if reasonably careful, with the car on RA-1's if they don't get a chance to heat up around town? Absolutely. Cold RA1s (non freezing) are still better than any street tire out there. But I have stored my car in an unheated garage for 4 winters and have not seen a fall-off in performance (minus 5-10 degrees F). In fact, a selling point of RA1's is they seem to get better with age, unlike full-tilt race rubber like Hoosiers, for instance. +1 on the logevity of the RA1s. In the dry you can literally run them to the cord without a change in grip. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlumba81 Posted April 30, 2012 Share Posted April 30, 2012 FYI tirerack now carries toyo tires. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnK Posted April 30, 2012 Share Posted April 30, 2012 RA1s don't come in the sizes I'd like, but NT01s do. So the question is, are these two really equivalent, or are the Nitto's just thought to be the same compound. Discount Tire Direct handles Nittos and said specifically they don't handle Toyos 'cause Toyo owns Nitto and there are marketing issues. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WestTexasS2K Posted April 30, 2012 Share Posted April 30, 2012 I was told NT01s were the same compond as RA1s just different tread design. I really liked my NT01s. I was going to use RA1s but couldn't find them in the sizes I wanted. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
m wirth Posted May 1, 2012 Share Posted May 1, 2012 Just used my new NT01's last weekend at The Ridge motorsports park for the first time, granted I have only done 6 track days ever, but compared to the Faulkens they are amazing and give me much more confidence, the local Discount tire even matched all on line prices for tires and enkei's. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnK Posted May 1, 2012 Share Posted May 1, 2012 I was told NT01s were the same compond as RA1s just different tread design. I really liked my NT01s. I was going to use RA1s but couldn't find them in the sizes I wanted. And M Wirth. As I said, size availability is my attraction to NT01s and I should have added that Kitcat, speaking of his experience with RA1s, posted his own experience indicating that "death by cold temperature" didn't occur as predicted by the mfg's warning and that they improved with age, not showing the related "death by heat cycling". I remember someone saying that the NT01s are heavy, but heavier than the RA1s? Anyway, sounds like the NT01s are a pretty safe bet if you want to either swap out the Falkens on your Ultralite, or save some money, or even both! :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rnr Posted May 1, 2012 Share Posted May 1, 2012 I remember someone saying that the NT01s are heavy, but heavier than the RA1s? I dont know how much the RA1s weight but a set of 235R17 fronts and 275R17 rears for my ultralite weight a little over 100 lbs. Doesnt matter on most sedans but is a huge percentage of the weight of a Seven. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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