Well...

I was wondering if I will still get good handling if I get two different company's tires on te same car. Say I put Nittos on the back and Bridgestone on the front. Is this possible? Does the ride get messed up? This is so I can put stickier tires on the rear wheels and save money.

 

I did. goodyear eagle F1 on back and toyo proxies on front.

I was told that was ok so long as the tread pattern was similair, like i couldnt put the stock tread on back and toyo on front as they are very different. but if you look at the 2 tires I mentioned they are very very similair.

anyway, thats what I was told... I did it because I needed tires and the goodyear was the only tire within like the country in 275/40/18

 

How would it be if I put stock on the front but put Nitto 555 295/45/18 on the rear? This would help get more power to the wheels and they wouldn't spin as much coming out of a stop.

 

I Don't see a reason why you shouldn't. What it will do is each side will have different handling characteristics.

I am just thinking about my RC cars. YOu adjust the handling characteristics with the tires and suspension. The tires are the main adjustments and then the suspension takes up the rest for fine tuning.

 

they would be a different pattern which I was advised not to do. but i dont know why.

 

I forgot about something when I said 295/45/18.... Te stock rims are only 8" wide. I don't know if these will fit.

What is the largest width tire you can put on 18x8" wheels?
Thanks.

 

If you check the tirerack website you can see the specs on each of the tires. The specs will tell you the range of wheel widths that the tire can be mounted to. The largest "recommended" tire for the 8" wide rim was a 245, but I think a 255 would fit pretty easily and a 265 would probably be at the edge. I've heard of S2000 people running 245's on their stock 7" wide rims which would be about the same as running a 265 on an 8" rim.

I've been running Yokohama AVS ES100's on my front wheels (245/40-18) and their tread pattern is very different than the stock tread pattern. I haven't had any problems. The car does look a bit silly though, so maybe that's why they recommended similar tread design.

I have an issue of Grassroots Motorsports Mag where they tested the unidirectional tires in both the "right" and "wrong" direction, and they basically found that the tires performed very similarly in both wet and dry. The special tread is mainly for hydroplaning resisitance, which they didn't get to test for unfortunately. The reason I bring this up is because if they found very little performance difference in running a tire backwards, then I can't see how there'd be a problem with running different tires correctly (other than the goofy looks).

You should be fine, IMO and in my experience.


-D'oh!

 

There is no reason why you cant run two different tires front and rear. You can actually pass inspection with 2 different tires on the two rear wheels, just not the front, they have to match.

In a drifting scenerio...

I would run whatever i could find on my rx7 in the back, and falkens up front all the time. The rears would range from falkens, to yokos, to bridgestones, to goodyear, even hankooks and stuff. However im trying to run only yokos on my Z this time around.

 

295s will not fit on 8" tires. 295s are the proper size for a 10.5" tire. even at 265 your likely to get very unwanted handling characteristics. if you have an 8" rim I would suggest nothing larger than 255.

 

I have a question...

I see a lot of people only upgrade the front two tires. Is this better than upgrading only the rear tires or not? I don't know much about this so I need some help. Thanks.

I went to Nitto's website and they said the largest that would fit on stock 8" rims is a 255. So I am thinking about going with 255/45/18. Any suggestions are welcome.

 

I beleive they are doing fronts only to help with understeer.

kinda like putting crappy back tires on to get them to slip first.

your not really solving the problem at hand(suspension tuning and weight distrobution) but your just handicapping parts of the car till they have the proper traction characteristics.

 

I'm also in this predicament. Basically, the package deal I had bought was for toyo tires with rims. It turns out that toyo tires are in back order, esp. the 275 sizes for the rear (they have the front 245 sizes). I was asked if I would just take nitto tires instead for the package. After reading this board, It gave me an idea of mixing tires. I was thinking of having toyo proxes tires for the front rims and nitto for the back rims. Would that be ok to do?

 

should be fine.

 

ok...I understand that changing only the two front tires helps with understeer. What does changing the two rear tires do?

 

Also, there are many other tires that are good. What other tires are good but also cheap (Nitto, Yoko, Falken, Toyo, ect.). I found the 255/45/18 by Nitto for only $180 each. What is the best all around tire that is good in summer (good wet and dry handling, decent wear, and a good price.

 

It's not just changing the tires, but changing the size. I put on the wider front tires to help balance the car a bit. Wider rear tires should help acceleration since they would reduce wheelspin. I have now ordered new rear tires (since my originals are worn) and they are Hankook Ventu K104 in the original size. No idea if they are any good, but they're cheap, and since I'm going through tires quite quickly (replacing more than once a year) I have decided that for me, cheap is the way to go.

I'll be spending my money on race wheels and tires for the ultimate performance on the track. On the street, my girlfriend usually limits my cornering rather than my tires, so I don't need the ultimate tires then.

-D'oh!

 

I heard the Toyo TS-1 is a really good and sticky tire. Only problem is that they only last 3000-4000 miles and they are very expensive (Over $200).

That is why I like the Nittos. My friend has it on his souped up 1995 325is and it is awesome. I got to drive it and I really like the tires. I am just going to add a set of 255 in the rear to help with wheel spin. I am currently using all Bridgestone S-03 Pole Position all around and they are good. Only problem is that they lasted me less than a year and a half since I like to do burnouts and make the wheels spin. I decided to go with cheaper tires and the Nittos are under $180. This way I can afford them.