Still trying to decide on tires for my 996 tt. The car has only 6,000 miles and has the original Pirelli P Zeros. The rear tires are a little noisy and have some hairline cracks close to the rims. The front tires look fine. Would I be safe just replacing the rear tires with new P Zeros or should I replace all 4 given the age of the tires? If I replace all 4 , what do you recommend? I know the Michelins are rated high, but I read an tire comparison article in Car & Driver that rated the Hankook tires very well (2nd place). Just trying to get some input guys. Thanks

 

if you drive primarliy on the street, and observe the "basic speed law" at all times, i would imagine you'd like the hankook ventus v12's just fine. especially at $800 a set. less even than two rear ps2's. if you drive in more spirited conditions, you may find that you'd gotten what you'd paid for, in terms of cheaper vs less so. that was my experience. hankooks are not the tire for me, or my car, or my current driving style and condition(s). IF that changed significantly i *might* forget everything i've learned about tires on my 996 turbo, and go with less expensive replacement tires eg hankooks. i must offer the caveat: my negative view of hankook tires is limited to my one set of v12's and i threw them out. conversely, i have heard great things about the h'kook rs2/3 series tires, so perhaps they are great all around. i can't get them in gt2 sizes or i'd know by now.

the oem pireli's are pretty "tough" as are michelin ps''2 so in terms of "age"? i felt ok driving my "old" oem tires until they needed replacing. if i were you, knowing what i know,.. i would replace them with ps2's or p zero's or yoko advans ad08's. others will mention sumi's and toyos also.. but i've never tried em.

so.. to answer your original question? i would rather have two old(er) p zeros against two new rears.. than a new set of hankook tires all around.

 

I would replace all four, those tires have done more sitting than moving.

You can't go wrong with Michelins.

 

Agree swapping all 4. I had a mixed set and the abs/traction control was all over me. Agree with others here and would be helpful to understand what type if driving you want to do in the future. Given the 6k mike in a 13 year old car sounds like it hasn't had much if anything in the past. Hopefully you want to change that going forward.

I'm on V12s for street and they are a fine value. Used them at the track for rain days and they didn't do so hot.

 

you've said in two sentences, what i've been trying to say ( ad nauseum ) for years but i'm really here just practicing my barely passable typing skills

 

You WILL notice a difference between Hankooks and something like Michelin PS2s. The difference isn't huge, but it's noticeable...and if you track your car, don't even bother with the Hankooks. Also, the comment above about tracking them in the rain is probably accurate, but just road driving them in the rain? They handled like a champ...no complaints at all up to (and above) highway speeds.

If you do go with the Hankooks, all of the posts about the first 500 miles or so of scrubbing are true as well...I thought I'd made a huge mistake when I first got them, but they do need to be broken in.

Also, I agree about swapping all 4...but I've taken this stance with all of my cars. I think mixing different tread levels and tread patterns is a weird and dangerous idea, but that's just me.

 

I've got the Yokohama ADVAN AD08's and they do great. They are a pretty good value also. I don't think they will last much past 15,000 miles though.

 

If you can get 15,000 miles out of those Yoks, your a better man than most.

 

certainly a gentler man lol

 

Yeah, 12 year old tires probably need to be replaced. I debated this for quite some time when I first got my car and had to replace the tires. Quite a bit of money can be saved by going to Hankook, Kuhmo, etc. In the end, I decided to go with MPS2s and more recently MPSS tires. My rationale was that this was a performance car and I wasn't going to save a few bucks on a key component of that performance. I figured that if I drove the car hard and did some track events (which turned out to be true), I'd want the best performance out of the tires that I could get. On the other hand, if I drove the car easy most of the time, then the more expensive tires would likely last long enough for me to justify the higher cost.

In the end, it's the cost-benefit trade that only you can make for yourself. Like most things in life, you're paying 100% more to get that last 10% of performance and only you can judge if it's worth it....

 

Wait a minute..a 2001 with only 6000 miles on it? Did you buy it that way? Or did you forget you owned it?

 

Thanks for all the input guys. Do you think the Michelin ps2s are worth twice as much as the Hankooks?

 

only the last half lol

 

Not if you drive at 5/10ths; Yes if you drive at 9/10ths

 

Thanks for the input guys!