Best Wheels/Tires for 2002 996

Tried a post on wheel forum, with no luck. Figured I'd try here. I am interested in tracking my 2002 C4. Was wondering if my current Pirelli Pzero's were ok for on and off track. I am not trailering the car, so I need something that fit's both purposes, although car is not a daily driver. Anything better. Also, if I did trailer what wheels sizes and offset?

The PZeros are even worse on track than they are on the street. I would not put them on my Porsche again. Michelin Pilot Sport PS2 are an excellent compromise tire if you only want one set of wheels for both and you do a lot of street driving. Michelin Pilot Sport Cups are excellent track tires, and will get you to the track and back with little problems. They will wear, though, when driven on the street and you definitely will want a second set of wheels and tires. Hope that helped.

I also have PZero and I wouldn't buy them again. Bill

If by "tracking" you mean DE's, then you can get some good info on the DE forum. I posted some info re: my new tires there (Yoko EVS100). They are a nice compromise tire, but I would categorize them as an excellent street / good track (my car is a daily driver). If you are looking for great street / great track, there are lots of votes for the Pilot Sports (PS2) on the board. If by "tracking" you mean more than just DE, and you are going to trailer your car, the PS-cups are very popular. And, even for DE's, there are lots of people that use the MPSC's. They're just to expensive and wear too fast for me... -td

One thing you should keep in mind is the weight of the tire - which can vary more than you might think. Also, the fact that the tire is obviously further away from the rotation center than the wheel, so the weight makes much more of an impact in terms of taking your torque away. For instance, I was looking at Tirerack.com and did a comparison of all their 295/30 18 tires. The PS2's only weighed like 26lbs I think. The Conti's weighed in at a whopping 36lbs!!!! Incredible 10 lb difference right there. Something to keep in mind, at least.

The P-Zero's will be an "ok" DE tire. I think Michelin Pilot Sports would be a better dual use tire or if you want a DE only tire try the Michelin Pilot Sport Cups. If you were going to go with dedicated track wheels and tires, I'd recommend GT3 size and offset (F 8.5 x 18 et 45, R 11.0 x 18 et 63). Good luck!!

how much do the michs weigh?

Here's the comparison page I was talking about for 295/30 18 tires on tirerack.com: Tire Comparison I would stay far, far away from the Continental ContiSportContact 2 because they are insanely heavy - 10lbs more than the PS2's. That's probably equivalent to 15lbs or more difference in wheel weight, since the weight is further out from the center.

I've been really happy with my brand new set of Bridgestone RE050A. I was bummed out that the S02 tires were being discontinued, but these new ones are really quite nice. I previously had P-Zeroes on the car and they were quite bad after the compound aged/hardened. Rain traction was awful.

Crap, I just checked the link I posted and it was only open to my registered account there. Anyway, if you are interested just go to Tirerack.com and search by tire size, and you can do a comparison on several different tires. It shows weight, diameter, section width, etc ratings, reviews, everything - very useful and I suggest looking thru it before you decide. It also shows stuff like user's ratings on given categories like: road noise, comfort, dry, wet, treadwear, etc.

Here is the Tire Rack comparison thta ElTorrente was talking about. I listed the RE050, Conti CS, PS2, and P-Zero. http://www.tirerack.com/tires/Compar...=0&sortValue=1

I have to replace one of my Pzeros now, looks like next set will be PS2. Since this will be my first DE event I figure the Pzeros will be adequate. Thanks for the info...

The Pzeros (or any other tire) will be adequate for your first DE.

great thread! I didn't realize tires could change that much. I have conti's on the solid spoke turbo twists. It seems like I could shave close to 20lbs per wheel if I went to michelin's and something like volk TE-37 from the tirerack. I wonder if you'd notice that during street driving.

You'll DEFINITELY notice 20lbs per corner even during street driving. It will "wake" the car up.

There's no more than a 3-4 pound variance for different performance tires in these sizes, and the PS2 and Conti SC2 happen to be more-or-less the same weights at each end. The 36lbs. listed by Tire Rack for the 295/30-18 is a typo - Conti's site shows 12.0kg = 26.4lb. Given that the 285/30-18 is listed as 26lb. at Tire Rack and 11.4kg=25.1lb by Continental, I think their information is reliable enough. The tire probably doesn't gain 1 lb. per mm of width.

I've found technical errors on Tire Rack in the past... with that much detailed information, it's worth double checking any vital figures that seem suspect.

I just started on this site and had some time today to cruise around. We have a couple track guys that work with us and we recomend the BBS RE. Its a great wheel and we match that up with the Michlin Sport Cups. If its your fist event, go out and play just to see what you like. I would recomend taking it to get the alignment set negatively before the track event so that you dont chew the side of the tire off and then have it re-aligned after the event.