What tire?

I will be putting my Miata back on the road soon and am trying to find tires for it. I need a good three-season tire (I have Yokohama snows for it) that's decent in rain and strikes a good balance between long-wearing and good handling. I drive about 35000 miles a year...and I'd like to get at least a year out of a set of tires.

Wheels are 15" x 6.5" Konig alloys. I'm thinking either 195/55 or 205/50 would work. This car sees spirited street driving only at this point...if I start autocrossing (which I'd like to do) I'll probably buy a set of Star Specs just for that purpose.

I had Falken Ziex 912's on it before...I didn't love them, but didn't hate them either. I wasn't impressed with the wet weather grip. Before that I had Ziex 512's and was very unimpressed. Loud and worn out in a hurry, and didn't have spectacular grip.

I'd recommend wider wheels and smaller diameter tires, but otherwise you are heading in the right direction.

195/50R15 R1R, Star Spec, RE11 on 15x7.5s

Those all also come in 205/50R15s but the larger size has proven to be slower on Miatas on 7.5" wide rims, and your narrower rims will only make the difference worse. The 195/55R15s will probably ride nicer. Unfortunately, It looks like the $40 rebate ended on the closeout Star Specs. :(

Those will all wear out in his 1 year / 35K mile time frame, at least to the point where wet-weather performance would degrade dramatically.

I'd recommend the Yokohama S.Drive, Dunlop Direzza DZ101, or the BFG G-Force Sport Comp 2.

S.Drive in 205/50 was what I was headed towards...they seem well reviewed, fairly durable, and I could get a set of four in 205/50 for $400. I wanted to check with the brain trust first, because they the comparison tests I've found are a couple years old and I know three years is a long time in tire world. Also considered the DZ101, but don't know too much about them.

Wheels are what they are. I've got them, and I don't have the budget for new ones right now. If I didn't drive so much, Star Specs would be what I would go for...but they get expensive if I have to buy two sets a year.

The R1R is probably not going to last that long. I have to wonder if the S.drives would actually outlast the Star Specs though. It would probably depend on how aggressively you drive on course. I'd also avoid the DZ101s. It might make sense to get the less grippy tires in 205/50R15 too.

Firestone Wide Ovals available in that size. I like mine (different size, different car) although they're not the quietest thing out there. Probably not as grippy as the Spec Star.

Fuzion HRi perhaps? If you're getting a dedicated set of autox tires anyways, the HRi are decent enough for DD duty and I've gotten that many miles out of HRi's before (although over 2 years).

szeis4cookie wrote: Fuzion HRi perhaps? If you're getting a dedicated set of autox tires anyways, the HRi are decent enough for DD duty and I've gotten that many miles out of HRi's before (although over 2 years).

I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. I suffered through 3 years of HRi's on the Accent. loud, out of round, poor wet traction, terrible snow traction, horrific dry traction, no sidewall stability yet it still rode rougher than crap. How any tire could fail that hard in all categories is beyond me. they did wear like iron though. 50k miles and they still had 4-5/32's left.

What about the new Kumho Ecsta4x? Or my personal fave the Platinum LX. The latter has decent grip,. quiet, smooth and wear extremely well with great all weather traction.

When browsing Tire Rack for 205/50-15, choices are surprisingly slim. Given that you already have snow tires and plan to have a set of dedicated auto-x tires, I'd probably go with something reasonably cheap - one of the Kumho options at $78 ea or $63 ea.

Ian F wrote: When browsing Tire Rack for 205/50-15, choices are surprisingly slim.

That's because Tire Rack doesn't carry half of the good tires in that size. Discount Tire Direct FTW here:

http://www.discounttiredirect.com

Kumho Ecsta AST, Dunlop Direzza DZ101, Falken Ziex ZE-912, Nitto NT NeoGen VR, and Yokohama S.Drive all available, and for less than TR (when they have them) with shipping included.