I don't mind spending the bank on a set of Hankook R-S3's because, well, they're awesome. Problem is my commuting boring city highway driving distance is FAR greater than my spirited driving clover excitement. Face it, the RS3 tread wear is 140...

What would be the next best tire with a higher tread life in a 225/45-15 (or similar size) with similar value?

 

Very interested if someone has an answer, but from the research I've done in the past you'd pretty much have to go to different size

Also didn't know the rs3 was only 140. OUCH. And here I was pretty much set on them for my wheel setup. 140 treadwear on a street car is not happening

 

Buy 2 sets of wheels; and have S-drives or something on one set, and the 'kooks on the other.

225-45-15 is a funky size. Why not use a 205 for the DD tire?

 

This. If you want sticky tires, you pretty much *must* have them on a second set of wheels. If you DD them, they will (all of them) heat cycle out and lose their grip.

Or replace them frequently.

If you have the 16" NB wheels, the BF Goodrich Comp 2's are available in the weird 205/45R16. They are treadwear 340 or so but supposed to be very sticky and apparently will survive track days.

The 15" options are not as good, I believe they only have 195/50.

 

This. I had the same dilemma and ended up retiring my 6ULs for track/autox duty , mounting NT-01s on them and getting another set of wheels for daily driving.

If you care, I went with 15x8 TireRack C1 and 205/50/15 Star Specs. Very cheap, looks good, works great.

 

Buddy recommended the Z1 Star also, but they're not even close to wide enough. I hope to run a 9" wide wheel so obviously the options are going to be somewhat limited.

I don't/won't daily drive the Miata, it's only a nice weather / weekend playtoy as I've got 3 other cars to drive otherwise. Guess I'll order a set of RS3's and see how long they last..

On another note, I really like the cost of those TRM C1's...

 

I DD on my Star Specs. They hum like crazy at 40mph, but are crazy sticky.

 

On the 9's you are stuck with the RS3's as the highest treadwear as far as I know. Star specs are great tires and grip like crazy dry and have good wet weather traction too.

 

that sucks.
does anyone know what the QUIETEST tires are?

 

Bridgestone RE 11 is another choice

 

I run the BF Gforce Sports in this size, f'in spectacular tire with great life and rain traction, quiet, and handled the 235wftlbs with no spin in 2nd. So a great daily driver tire. I am considering something more aggressive now that my car will hopefully have more power and won't be driven in the rain, once it's done.

 

I've had zero problems with noise from mine.

 

I only put 3,000 miles on my RS3's when I had the turbo car but after 3K they still had the little flames that are molded into the tread at about 1/32" deep. I thought they wore very well when straight commuting.

 

It's nonesence. They are silent compared to NT-01.

 

I DD Star Specs too (205/50/15), no problems with noise. Drove halfway across the country on them and will be driving back in 3 weeks. They're at least as sticky as the 225/45 RS2s they replaced.

 

I originally had Toyo R1R 225/45/15's on my DD which have the same treadwear (140) as the RS3s and decided to save them for the track so purchased another set of 6ULs and Star Specs (205/50/15) for DD.

The Star Specs are definitely noisier but their handling in the wet is amazing. We did a club run to Mt. Glorious in Queensland on a very wet day and the roads looked very slippery but the Star Specs never lost grip once despite me trying to force the issue in some corners.

I wouldn't hesitate to recommend them as a DD tyre (though some may find them too noisy).

 

Not surprised. Summer tires don't wear out as quick as the fear-mongers try to say.

I expect 8,000miles and 20 autox events out of my 205 star specs. They'll probably be replaced due to heat cycling when they have about 3/32 on the inside edge. I DD with 2.2* of camber like a boss. Currently preparing to shoot for 2.7*+.

 

I pulled 8k out of the NT01's. That was 4k more then I expected.

 

Heat cycle RS3's daily driving them? Do they even ware when you daily drive them? Things are impossible to get up to temp driving hard unless its over 75* out. And from the hand pyrometer they're not even up to warm enough to get out on course temp after my 80mph hour drive to and from work. Maybe today, since it was like 85* out when I drove home, but I didn't check. Once you've driven on them truly up to temp (aka nearly too hot to touch) anything below that and they feel like rocks.

Star specs wont fit on that wheel, but dailying you'll heat cycle them out way before you kill them, should be good for 20k miles easy though. I haven't run the RS3's long enough to get an accurate life on them.

 

I cooked a set of Toyo T1R's in about 5500 miles on the Speed6 and they're rated at 280. That was a VERY exciting 5500 miles though! The difference between Mazda's factory garbage tires and T1R's made it more than worth cost of entry!

Personally have never owned either the RS3 or Star so I'll give the RS3 a shot and see what happens. It's only like $500 worth of tire, what's there to lose?