Gents,

I believe my four-year-old R-S4s are shot, although there is considerable tread left. I'm considering buying an inexpensive durometer gauge as I have four sets of mounted tires of various ages and manufacturers. I'm interested if the durometer readings would give me any insight. For example, I have three Conti ECS that were made in the 24th week of 2019 that I beat the crap out of a few weeks ago and are chunked, and another from the 2nd week of '22 that I beat that crap out of but looks fine. I have a new set of the ECS 02 on order to compare durometer readings.

I do not have a number for the R-S4 when new. I searched for longer than I should have--I'll never get that time back. Can someone help me out here?

From the Hankook website (I thought it was interesting). No durometer info...

 

Gents,

I purchased an inexpensive digital durometer and took some measurements. I don't have any data from when the tires were new, but the data I got seems interesting.

I took a bunch of measurements from different places on tires to come up with an average. I have five different tires based on model and manufacture date. Here's what I came up with:

Conti ECS manufacture date 2419. Durometer ~74
Conti ECS 0222. 67
Hankook R-S4 0420. 72
Nankang AR-1 0121. 65
Nankang AR-1 3621. 63

The older Contis are beat to ****, and chunked in a few places. I had to replace one a while back due to uneven wear, hence the two build dates. I'm replacing all four, and am interested in what a new ECS durometer might be. The R-S4s have lots of tread left.

Just thought I'd share something more lighthearted...

 

That sounds about right, older conti is about as good as a RS4.

not sure durometer tests are the right way to judge a tire though.

keep in mind you will NEVER wear the tread of an RS4, it’ll just become a hockey puck. If they’re a year or two old, you’ll get some decent grip after 10-20 minutes on track, but they’ll never be impressive, just last forever.

I know I put some 2020 RS4s on my car back in 2021, and they were absolute garbage by summer 2023, I can’t imagine how bad 2019 units are. Maybe just keep those for rollers.