If they come out in a 15, sure. But I doubt it. Same with PS4S.

They make a 205/50/15 already. They will go on my 15x8's nicely.

Got 2 sets coming, going to run a couple 8 hour enduros in a vvt swapped NA with MCS and aero at the end of April. Curious to see how they compare to the AD08r we were running before which wore like iron.

Oh. I didn't know that. Interesting.

225s?

Yep!

There is also a 205/45-16 in the Conti EC Sport...same basic OD as the 205/50-15 but for 16" wheel folks. Both are good options for early Miatas.

And is the track wear rate of those Super200 tires worse than the RC-1?

Because they are much softer and have tread sipes, which generate heat reduce void/tread ratio. Super200's are race tires with race compounds. That is hyperbole.

Have you been under a rock? Not like you to be so behind the curve Jason.

Ah thanks yes, I'm behind on this Super200 phenomenon.
I think I'll spring for the R-C1's.

Ordered a set of 225 RS-4s, should be here tomorrow and I'll autocross on them Saturday.

We got ours mounted up on some fresh Beryllium 10" 6ULs today!

Attachment 181669

Much excite.

MmmmMMmmmmm. I do need another set of wheels. Currently have two sets of 9s, one with rs3s, other with r7s, I could ditch the rs3s on use that set to scrub stickers... I could run this setup for the "street" :D

Hankook RS-4 : First impressions
 

Disclaimer: Not a controlled A/B test.

Evaluating the 225/45/15 Rival-S 1.5 on 15x9 6UL and 245/45/15 Hakook RS-4 on 15x10 6UL yesterday
Roadster Cup TT at Streets of Willow
Car is Snoopy. 2003 Club Sport, 800/500 Xida, 54103 front, SPM adjustable 14m rear, Urethane bushings.
OS Giken 4.875 with SPM tune, 5 spd, blueprinted NB2 engine on pump gas. Not tuned yet but we estimated 130whp

Sonny and I pretty much matched each others times. His set earlier in the day with no wind and slightly cooler temps on 225 Rival-S 1.5. Mine a tick faster in warmer, windier conditions on the 245 RS4's.
Track temps were about 70° in the morning rising to about 95° in the afternoon. The RS-4 definitely preferred the track about 15-20° hotter than the Rival-S. We would opine that the RS-4 continues the Hankook 200tw tradition of being good in the heat. Most of our fast laps on the RS-4 in a session came at the end, after 5-8 hard laps. The Rival-S seemed to be best on 2nd or 3rd lap. Keep in mind that's with these track temps.

Sonny and I both agreed the 245 RS4 had a a skosh more lateral grip than the 225 Rival-S 1.5. While the Rival-S steering precision was improved, it was still fastest with a bit more slip angle than the RS-4. We did about 3x as many laps on the RS-4 as the Rival-S but the Rival-S showed more wear.
Snoopy doesn't quite have enough power to take full advantage of the prodigous grip of the 245 RS4 on this tight road course. Haven't looked at the data from the skidpad portion of the track but I'm guessing we were 1.5g sustained on the RS-4's. Nuts!
We rolled the fenders last thing before aligning it Friday and didn't quite tuck everything back enough. We caught the front bumper/fender seam on the shoulders and did some tire carving. Minor, fixable. Liners are out.
The Rival-S were, as Tomy Reynolds observed, not too picky on pressure but we did, as always, try to run them as low as possible. The RS-4 was also tolerant of a wide range of pressures.
What stood out to me was the RS-4 exceptional responsiveness, precision and linearity at the limit. 200tw's are getting more and more like race slicks in that regard. To be truthful, none of us felt like we got everything the RS-4's offered in terms of lateral grip.
It was hard to adjust to a "street" tire than welcomed 1.6g corner entries with a manual steering rack on a few of the gently banked turns.



https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...17e786e5de.jpg

:x::skid:

Whew......Good cause I just ordered the RS4 last night

You say the rs4 is responsive eh? So, if it has a stiffer sidewall theoretically it should work better on a 9 than the other 245 offerings? Is it stiff enough to be faster on a 9 than a 225? Time will tell I guess.

IIRC

245 x10 > 245x9 > 225x9

But really - No one knows, yet

OK I'll ask again :)
Is there enough info now to estimate track life vs. the RC-1?

Already shared what they found

Did they mention the rc-1?

Not really. You'll need to wait for a competent ChumpCar, WRL, or Lucky Dog team to run them through a 6-8hr enduro stint to have enough data to take an educated guess at that. Given their speed, it would be ill-advised to assume they will last as long as an RC-1, though.

Given Emilio's anecdotal datapoint (225 Rival S 1.5 ~= 245 RS-4) at that particular track (SoW, low speed track, less aero penalty for 245s) and those conditions (245 RS4s matching 225 RivalS1.5 pace in windier conditions), here's what I would guess the raw-grip hierarchy is (braking/lateral/accel grip, no aero consideration). This assumes the Rival 1.5 is a hair faster than the 1.0. Also assume that all 205s are on 8s, 225s on 9s, 245s on 10s.

Slowest
225 Rival S 1.0
205 RE71R
225 Rival S 1.5
245 RS-4
245 Rival S 1.5
Fastest

The caveat to that is that because we are looking at three different tire sizes, the order of this list will be highly dependent on how much power your car makes and how fast the track is. For instance, low power cars (1.6s) may favor the 205 RE71R on mid and high-speed tracks, and mid-power cars (built N/A or low-boost turbo) on a high-speed track may favor the 225 Rival S over the 245 RS-4. Windy conditions might flip this around as well.

Since Hankook is doing an RS-4 in 225/45, given the (assumed) wear rate of that tire and the aero penalty of the 10s, that would be the tire I would pick for a stock body VVT-swapped NA knowing what I know right now.

I did some autocross this weekend with a sticker set of Hankook RS-4s, 225 on 15x9s, no A/B testing just notes on my direct experience with the tire. Weather conditions were Sunny with 80-85F* ambient and track temps were ~95F*.

Car Details:
Gen 2 Xidas - 800/500, Racing Beat Front 54104 Bar , disconnected rear sway , urethane bushings
6 Speed, 4.10 Diff with the car making ~240WHP on E85 on a junkyard BP5a using a C30-74 Rotrex

Super deep tread as discussed, the tires look a bit strange from the side profile and at a glance they look taller than a normal 45 sidewall. Knowing how deep the tread was I was expecting a fair bit of tread squirm but I did not notice much if any. The tire shop also noted the sidewalls were pretty darn stiff for a street tire.
https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/589/32...cf98a278_z.jpg

The first two heat cycles (two sets of 10 autocross runs that were continuous) were a bit funky. In the morning I tried higher tire pressures (30-33psi hot) but I found the car did not want to take a set and there was an abrupt transition during mid corner of grip to no grip. I also noticed a fair bit of skipping and hopping over the very rough sections of the lot (some areas are borderline rallycross). During the afternoon the afternoon runs I ran much lower pressures (~27-28psi hot) and this eliminated the skipping over bumps. Mid-corner grip was also improved and the car was much more settled during the higher speed sections (~80mph).

Overall steering feel of these tires is very good, lots of feedback and very precise with no numbness. Both acceleration grip and braking grip were impressive, it is still hard to believe this is considered a "street" tire. Looking forward to running these at big track and doing more testing at autocross. There are likely more gains to be had on the clock with further set up changes for these tires. I think there was an easy second left on the table for this course we ran, just need more time to figure out what the tire wants and likes. Overall this feels like a SOLID improvement over the Hankook RS-3 V2.

https://c1.staticflickr.com/3/2931/3...19088f08_b.jpg

One of the timed runs from the day, this lap was ~1.75 seconds off Brian in our ND on Hoosier A7s.

80 second lap times??? That course is not only HUGE but looks really FAST too! Nothing like our virginia second gear burners..

Yes, only a few people hit sub 80, most of the student times were 80-90 seconds. I was well into 4th gear 3 times during the lap...I think this stretches the definition of autocross a bit. I cannot stress how lucky we are to have this space for autocross, it will be a very very sad day when it goes away.

Sweet lot there. Lots of sea-of-cones areas though. 0_0 In for more info on RS4.

Hearing more good things about this tire. Looks like it will be in the ballpark of the Super 200's, but maybe more trackable. Review/comparo coming online in the next couple of days from someone who knows how to do such things...

Anyone have any input as to how quickly the RS-4 wear compared to the previous RS-3? Are they as soft as the RE71R, or as durable as their ancestral RS3?
I know that only time will tell, but if anyone has any indication....

Tire Test! Toyo R888R, and Hankook RS4 vs BFGoodrich Rival-S 1.5 ? tracktuned :giggle:

This more controlled test matches our brief eval last weekend. The RS4 appears to be a genuine Super200 that takes a bit longer to heat up and might, might, wear better than the Rival-S 1.5.

What was interesting in that test was their comments about the RS4 having less precise steering than the Rival-S. 1.5. We found the RS4 to be ultra sharp but I think that can be attributed to our sample being a 245/40 on 15x10 vs what appears to be 205/50 on 15x7.5. Our sample better supported by its wheel.

Just the fact that they heat up slower than the rival is a pretty good indicator of better wear. I'm actually astonished to see them so close to the rivals times and still be more heat tolerant.

Those look like 225/45 on a 7.5" so for people going with a 245 on a 9", the Rival might be the sharper tire

This is correct. David's test vehicle was an STS car, limited to 7.5" width.

I'm just hopeful that the 245 Rival-S 1.5 on a 9" wide wheel will be faster than a 225 (at least for autocross applications).

Nice to see that the RS-4 seems hold it's own against the current 200TW champions, though. Competition from other tire manufacturers is a good thing, IMO.

Got them on the exocet, big improvement over the 225 RS3's on 8 inch wheels.
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...6f161c9870.jpg
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...14b5ba6cf3.png
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...e93a5c615a.jpg

I need those wheels, whoever made them.

Not so cheap chinesium wheels

http://www.ebay.com/itm/152452005763

Did some haphazard testing on an E Street prepped '01 MR2-S with fresh RS4 vs some RE71r with about 80ish autocross runs on them.

Things of note:
RE71 was 195/50/15 on 6" & 205/50/15 on 6.5"
RS4 was 195/50 & 225/45 on the same width wheels. 195/50 Hankook has about the same tread width as the 205/50 RE71. 225/45 was not as pinched as you'd think.

We did two days of testing at Crow's Landing in Patterson, CA. Both days were pretty similar in weather, about 70ish ambient and cloudy skies with some breaks. Two different drivers, one day of TNT and one day of competition runs. Day 1, my co-driver used both sets at the TNT. I drove each of them independently of him in a traditional 3 run format & on a different course. No recorded times for his TNT runs, only thoughts on each.

We both felt that overall, the RS4 sidewalls are squishy making the car hard to place, it also did not point well and did not take a set quickly. I noted that they did not take abrupt longitudinal loads as well, ABS would kick in much sooner than the RE if I piled on the brakes. If we were not limited on factory wheel widths, I think an 8" for the 195/50 and a 9" for the 225/45 would better support the tire and give a bit sharper feedback.

The RE71R was it's same old self, however I did note that when the tire was cold the car was far more prone to oversteer and much harder to control vs the RS4.

My day 1 runs in order:
RE71R: 27.9, 27.5, 27.1
RS4: 27.8, 27.7, 27.6

I didn't feel like much was left on the table by 3rd runs on such a small course. I felt that the RE had the most potential for speed once warm. I was really pushing the RS4 as hard as I could but extracting the most out of them was difficult.

Day 2 was more interesting. The RS4 was better with lateral loads, likely because of the two heat cycles in them. The course was fairly slalom and transition heavy so the increased lateral grip from either the tire itself, or available tread width, stood out to me. The RS4 also handled multiple inputs a bit better than the RE71R.

Day 2 competition, morning RE71, afternoon RS4:
RE71R
Ryan: 50.4, 50.2, 49.8, 49.6
Tony: 49.7, 48.9, 49.1, 49.0

RS4
Ryan: 51.3, 50.5, 50.6, 50.2
Tony: 48.7, 48.8, 48.7, 48.6

So, the RS4 actually were the better tire of the day (for me). I'm trying not to read too much into that for a few reasons, but I think the potential is there. The biggest take away from this is that my co-driver could not drive these things to save his life. He was complaining about them left and right. So, these might just not work for some people.

Pressures:
Since the car is about 2100lbs, we run the RE's really low. We're at 23 front and 25 rear, and with that we are using all of the tire and not rolling over past the tread.
We used the same school of thought for the RS4, and that worked out fine for the front settling at 24psi. On the rear, we had to pump these up to about 32psi to get them to not roll over as much, this is purely due to the pinch, imo.

Wear:
The RS4 starts out at a really generous 9/32nds depth (vs RE at 8/32 and Rival 1.5S at 7/32). With about 20+ runs on the RS4, we are now at 8/32nds. Crow's Landing is notorious for high grip & high wear, so expect more life out of these on an asphalt lot.

Anyway, not a super controlled test but I think it paints a pretty good picture of what you might expect. We have a set of Rival 1.5S that we will be testing in 205/50 & 225/45 this weekend.

Thanks for your testing and review! This is actually really encouraging to see the RS4 so close and somewhat faster in the heat vs the RE71R.

Here's to hoping the Lemons/Chump testing comes back with good wear life for them too!

once again tested last weekend on a 40F degree autocross course in the rain. course was wet temp was cold.

Hankook RS4 245/45 on 10" ~ 52 seconds
Hoosier H20 225/45 on 9" ~50 seconds.
Bridgstone Re71R 205/50/15 on 7.5" about half the tread already worn off. ~47 seconds.

didn't try them but I believe the new Continentals sport contact DW or whatever they call it would have been the fastest of all they seem to dominate cold wet conditions. Toyo RA1/R888 are pretty good too.

Freekin night and day difference in trying to drive these tires in the wet. traction limit on the Hankook and Hoosires is like an On/off switch in the cold wet. Not sure how warm it needs to be for the H20's to actually work in the wet but here in the northwest wet weather is rarely warm and in those conditions there are numerous street tires that are significantly faster than H20's and the RS4's are even worse.

DOT date and condition of H2Os? They die very fast after the first heat cycle. Once they start cooking, they go from medium rare to well done pretty quickly. It's HARD to "wear out" and H2O before it "cycles" out, but they're insane when fresh-ish. I have lots of time on them in the low 40*s and wet in Ohio.

They were purchased direct from Hoosier on contingencies and just prior and used for 3 total runs at spring nationals in 2015. As in they are shit after you use them once and let them sit for a couple months I have found. Now that Continental owns Hoosier maybe they can spread some of the magic DW pixy dust into the compound and actually make them work better. I have used another set for track tires in the rain and they do seem to be better after you get some heat in them that you will never get on an autocross run in the wet.

Do you think you will be doing a side by side comparison with the RE71R and Rivals? Similar to when the RE71's first came out?

https://forum.chumpcar.com/index.php...comment-328844

"Lasted the full 24 and probably has another 8 hours in them which is fantastic; our drivers were pushing the car pretty hard. This was in a miata, didn't do any preparation to the tires, did a practice session for an hour just before race start. Noticed in practice that they felt a bit greasy but it went away. It wasn't really possible to overdrive the tire, after a bit of sliding they still didn't grease up like the 615 is known for. Sidewalls felt much softer than the 615, there was a bit more side to side mushyness in the car; we went from 205 on 7 inch rim to 225 on 7inch rim, I think some of the soft floaty feel might be from the rim and tire size combo. My biggest complaint relative to the 615k is the lack of feedback audibly on the RS4. It also seemed like it was a bit less forgiving/had a steeper limit drop off curve. Still very controllable. For reference, our best time was a low 2:17 at buttonwillow cw1 ( starmazda ) in a 1.6 miata . Unsure what spec cars do around that config on their stickier tires."

2:17 is not exactly slow given the car. PTE cars are in the 2:09 range on that config. At that pace, that life expectancy is pretty phenomenal.

My hope is to do a 245 shootout, when the Rival S finally gets out on that size. But it keeps getting delayed.

The problem with side-by-side to the RE71R is sizing...Stones are 205/50-15 where the RS4 is 195, 225 and 245. And BFG is 205, 225 and eventually 245.

The 195/50 Hankook is the size of a 205 Stone/Rival. The numbers are just a formality.

Yeah Andy, don't ya know anything about deez tarz?

I have a set of the new Conti's sitting in my basement that I haven't got around to mounting yet. Hit me up if you're ever passing through Snohomish & want to see how they behave on the street. It will, of course, be raining.

Finally got these mounted this afternoon, no track data obviously but I do have a few observations from mounting them myself and the drive home.

These were difficult to mount compared to the Rivals, very stiff sidewall but it does seem like they are quite flexible where the sidewall meets the tread if that makes sense. We've seen already that these tires seem to reward a slightly stretched mounting on a 10" rim so that makes sense. They balanced well with less than 1oz. For 3 tires and one flyer at 3 oz. In hindsight I should have broke that one down and rotated it on the rim.

Street driving shows an audible tread whine, and a rough ride due to the stiff sidewalls..... No surprise here. What is odd is the off center steering feel is soft, with the stiff sidewall I would have expected the opposite. Tread squirm? Soft connection of the sidewall to the tread? Or simply the fact I mounted these on 9" wheels? Can't really comment on grip other than I can say braking is improved and they felt predictable in the turns. Steering feel was good once they took a set.

unmounted
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...447d1151ca.jpg

mounted
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...191e501fad.jpg

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...177fefe96a.jpg

These two ^^

I still don't understand why people insist on mounting anything wider than a 225 on a 9' rim...other than for appearance. Higher cost and no better performance (exception = Hoosier).

Longer wear? Do you get any more straight line grip?

I can think of about 900 reasons why I mounted these on 9" wheels. If I can get the same performance as the 225 rival and double the wear resistance this was a win win for me.

Comparing worn out rivals to new RS4 I can say that I can now hook up first gear at 10psi of boost where it was a smoke show before.

lol. We mounted 225s on 8s for years because that was the optimal combo at the time. Before that it was 205s on 7s. Nobody made comments like "I don't know why anyone puts anything wider than a 205 on an 8". Is it optimal today? No, but suggesting that it's useless is pretty stupid IMO.

And then there are those SM guys shoving a 205 Hoosier on a 15x7. Lol.

^Because class rules.

I said "I don't understand"

I did not say "useless".

The former at worst implies ignorance, not stupidity.

I am aware. But it's still funny.

Put your dictionary away. You implied that anyone putting a 245 on a 9 is just a poser and not doing it for performance reasons. It's not unreasonable to construe that as an insulting statement. No need to discuss the matter further.

The "performance" stipulation is conditional. The 1:1 rule for max performance for a radial always works. The variable is if "performance" does not involve steering response, linearity, wear or peak lateral grip but is focused on straight line acceleration grip (drag racing). As this forum is populated by more drivers that like to go around turns fast than drag racers, the miscommunication due to conflicting nomenclature persists.

Rule #1
If you want to make a given tire go around turns faster, mount it on a wheel at least as wide as the the tread.

If keeping the fenders unmodified is more important than getting the most lateral grip potential from your tire, then mounting it on a wheel narrower than the tread is also OK.

Broken down, I see it this way. And this applies to any width tire on any car..

Max lateral (turning) and longitudinal (braking/accelerating) grip for a given tire size with modified fenders: Mount tire on a wheel that is just wider than the tread, even if it means adding flares

Max longitudinal grip, giving up peak lateral performance for that tire while keeping stock fenders or, cheaping out by not buying new wheels: Mount the widest tire that fits your fenders even if it is on a wheel narrower than the tread

Max lateral and longitudinal grip while maintaining stock fenders: Mount the widest tire that fits while mounted on a wheel that is wider than the tread


What is important to note that mounting a 245/40/15 on a 15x9, 225/45 on a 15x8, or 205/50 on a 15x7 does not allow each tire to perform at its best, it will still sometimes provide greater lateral grip than the 225 on 15x9, 205 on 15x8, 195 on 15x7 but steer less precisely, be harder to drive at the limit and wear less evenly. So for the driver on a budget, mounting tires on wheels that are less that optimum width is a budget friendly half-way point. No need to hate on it but at the same time, those budget focused drivers need to realize its a budgetary decision, not a the optimum performance solution.