I've got a pair of Dunlop Star Specs that I bought and installed back in Mar '10. They were good and sticky back then. They still have plenty of tread left, but I'm wondering if they've lost their grip for autocross use. They saw about 8 events in '10, 8 events in '11, and 2 events in '12 (). This past year they just didn't seem to grip nearly as well. The tread definitely feels harder than they did brand new. I've probably put maybe 7K miles on them total since I bought them. So someone who knows tires school me here, are these tires done for autocross? I'm looking to get back to Autocrossing more often next year and wonder if I need a tire investment.

 

Won't be as good, but you can still run them to wear them out, or use them as street tires ( DD) to get your money out of them. Fresh tires are always better.

A track day would also be fine for them, typically you get a lot more heat on the track.

 

I loved the star specs. I went through 3 different sets on my previous car. I usually got about 12 auto-x events with 2-3 track days in intermediate group. The grip drops of dramatically once you approach wear bars. Hard to runs these down to cords if you are after grip.

 

I had Star Specs, and they were good for 1.5 years worth of events, and 8,000 street miles before they got hard, and grip fell off (even before hitting the wear bars).

I would look to replace the Star Specs, as fresh tires are definitely stickier than almost 3 year old, worn tires. You can buy the current Star Specs on closeout from Tire Rack, or wait for the new Star Spec ZII to become available this spring

 

Guys, Thanks for the inputs. I'll just put these on a non autocross car and get some new tires.