Opinions/answers..Tires

At ~8,000 miles the factory Conti's on my 2001 C4 were EXTREMELY noisy. I installed Bridgestone Potenza RE730's but now at ~14,000 miles it sounds as if my front wheel bearings are failing. Searching on the internet I find that this is a common problem with the RE730's and Bridgestone has even made a running design change, "gen-II", to the RE730 to try and combat the noise problem. Anyone with any experience on these and getting compensated by Bridgestone. Any adverse comments on my next try, Michelin PS2's..?? And by the way, the noise is my only complaint about the RE730's. About to make the return trip home to Seattle and believe it or not I would like to hear my wife talking on the way back.

You should be ruunning the Potenza RE750. NO problems with them. On a side note: Are you a newly wed? I am just wondering why you want to hear your wife talk.

I run PS2 on my M3 and 996. Best daily driver tire with extreme handling characteristics. I will probably never get a different street tire. They are more pricy but well worth it.

He must be newly wed, his wife is actually _in_ the car.

Married Feb. 22nd, 1963, retired, drive my wife to work every workday, drive her home at night, life is NICE!

Wow, 42 years of marriage, congrats! I'm jealous. I actually wish my wife could spend more time in the 911 with me but with young kids (11 mo & 4 years old), it's kinda hard. Cheers

My 996 is actually my wife's car, but I can't remember the last time she drove it.

Why does that remind me of the episode of the Simpsons where Homer bought Marge a bowling ball with "Homer" etched on it?

Toyo T1-S. Available at Les Schwab all around the Pacific Northwest. This is the second best rated Super High Performance Tire by Consumer Reports in November 2003 issue. I have 8000 miles on them on my 996 with plenty of tread life left. Quiet for a performance tire. I had 8000 miles on a set on my 993. I cannot find fault with them in any way in comparison talks with my active local PCA buddies. I run Michelins on my Duramax, Avalon, and prior Lexus's. But I'm sold on T1-S for my Porsche.

What size are you running?

I'd highly recommend going with the Pilot Sport Ribs, or the Bridgestone S02A', both of which are N rated for Porsche. The PS2's aren't, IIRC. I've had both of the above -- they are both amazing tires. I think the S02A's are a bit quieter.

I just put PS2's on my 03 C4S about 500 miles ago. Hard to make a fair comparison with the Pirelli Assyms, which had 12K on them...but these are about as good as it gets for me. The Michelins are superior to any tire that I have ever had. That said, I ran Toyo T-1s on my 993 and loved them. Without PSM, never broke traction...were especially good in rain. Only problem with the Toyos-the soft compound gave lousy wear-like under 10K.

I have run SO2A's on my 03 C4 for about 700 miles. Very quiet, extremely good handling, and they were readily available in correct 18" sizes. I tried to find the PS2's but after talking to Michelin I found that you can only buy them at the Porsche dealership in 285 30 18 size. The dealer wanted almost $400 per tire. SO2A's feel like they belong on the car. Good Luck!!

SO2As rock! They are rated N4 in 17" and N3 in 18" by Porsche. The higher N, the better. They come showroom stock on Turbo S's.

Sizes are: Front 225/40ZR18 and Rear 265/35ZR18 At 8000 miles they are not half gone yet. I have not tracked the car or autocross. I am near a rural area however and I get lots of opportunity to drive aggressively on rural roads.

I have the Michelin Pilot Sport N1s with the 285/30/18 on the rear. I replaced the rears about two weeks ago and it was a total pain. Ended up costing me about $400 per tire installed. I do really like the tires but will definitely consider something different just because of how difficult it was to purchase them this last time around. I am guessing that both the front and the rears will need replacing the next time around, so it would be easier to consider something different when replacing all four. I had about 14,000 on the rears when I replaced them, but they probably didn't have another 100 miles in them at that time. The new ones handle great. Kris

Not entirely surprised to hear about the difficulties in buying PS2s. I asked for a quote from my dealer and from my fav tire store in the area, Radial Tires. My dealer said he could not get the tires while Radial had them on my car the next day and in the 295 size, which I think my dealer said was unavailable. Incidentally, Radial's prices were like $15-20 or so bucks over the Rack's-hardly worth a drop shipment on my driveway and then solving the logistical issues.

I have the SO2A's and they are excellent. The tires are quite, but it really depends on road surface. I notice that they are much louder on cement roads. I seem to remember Seattle having a lot of cement roads. Mine are about half way done, as I have several track days and 5k miles on them, so this could also be the source of the noise. Also, I recently noticed these on Tirerack. Couldn't find anyone with any major experience, but they look sweet and appear to be "prosche approved", if that matters. http://www.yokohamatire.com/advan/ I have no affiliation with the company, but just think they look cool, and I currently don't need new tires.

Or 285/30/18.

I had nothing but trouble with Bridgestone (SO2's) on both my 1999 and 2001 996's. The rears "cupped" on two sets (on the 2001) and although I got a discount from B on the 2nd set....in the end I went through 4 sets of rears in less than 25K on the 01 (2 x SO2's and 2 x SO3's). No track time or AutoX either. Just mostly hwy driving actually. Will NEVER buy Bridgestone again and have heard great things about PS2's also. FWIW before I sold my 996 (and back to 993) I had Yokohama AVS Sport-S (N1) which were fantastic for sound (low noise) and performance. Most important though would be to stick with N1 factory rated tires as none of the troubled ones for me were.

I've heard the S02A's are significantly different than either the S02 or S03. I've had all 3 on various cars, and like the S02A's better than the S02s, which I found superior to the S03s. After running PS-Ribs on my car earlier, I'm a big fan of the S02A's.

Bridgestone sent me to Mastercare dealer here in Memphis and techician verified tire noise as the source immediately. After about an hour's discussion and multiple phone calls they agreed to a no charge upgrade to RE750's. So far I have opped to pay extra (substantial) for the RE050's but I'm wondering if the RE750 would suffice... Other than the noise the RE730's served me well. On the track at Daytona insofar as I could tell the PSM was never active. Does the new tread pattern on the RE750's really solve the noise problem?

I think a lot of the noise has to do with tire wear and alignment. A lot of folks hate the PZero Asimms, but they were quiet for me. Also, my Yoko ES100s after about 1/2 worn on our "family" car are silent. My RE750s are also quiet. If I start to get some feathering which I think is inherent due to running toe and therefore a trade-off for stability, I swap them right to left and run them backwards (in the summer) for a few months until they start to feather the other way. YMMV, but if I do this, tire noise does not increase with wear. I live in CA, so big rains are not a problem most of the year.