Comments on S Specs.

[Tony]

A quick update; I needed some new tyres to go on my shiny new 6UL rims and according to the blokes at Gordon Leven's, the RE-11's are still some way off. My next choice was the new R-S3 Hankooks in 225/45 x 15, but they too don't appear to be available in Australia until later in the year. The list price I was quoted by the local Hankook dealer was $330 ea!

With the Aussie dollar so strong at present I ended up biting the bullet and getting a set of the R-S3's from the Tire Rack. I ordered them off Rudy (he's on the big forum quite a lot) on 24 January and they arrived in Bathurst on 2 February. That's 10 days door to door and it includes a weekend!

Cost wise they were US$107 per tyre, with US$89 per tyre freight. By the way, Tire Rack won't take credit card or PayPal payments from Australia, so I had to organise an international money transfer through my net bank facility. It cost me another A$22.00.

Total cost to me, including fitting and balancing, plus the bank fee was A$225.24 per tyre, on my car ready to go. Pretty good value really.

Following are some pics. I reckon they're a really good looking tyre (there's obviously a hot rodding influence in the design team somewhere!) and I'm hoping they perform as well as they look. I'm off the FoSC at Wakefield this weekend, so I'll post up a report next week.

Cheers...











PS: I now have a set of Federal RS-R's in 195/50 x15 for sale; probably about 35-40% left. PM me if you're interested (but I won't be back on air until Sunday evening).

[Tony]

Those familiar with Goulburn weather will not be surprised to hear that we essentially had all four seasons at the FoSC last weekend. Never-the-less this provided an ideal opportunity to try out my new Hankooks R-S3's.

Practice on Saturday morning was wet; wipers were on flat-out and there were streams of water across the track. I started out very tentatively, but the tyres inspired so much confidence I almost forgot it was a wet track! The tyres were bloody fantastic, no other way to describe them. No understeer and almost no oversteer, but then again they were almost brand new so they had plenty of tread.

I thought that the reason they felt so good may have been because I was going so slow, but out of 22 cars in our group I ended up with second best time for the session. I was beaten by a 911, with the remainder of the field stretched out for another 20 seconds behind me. For the record I started with 35psi cold due to the cold and wet conditions and finished with 36psi hot.

The next session was warm and dry, and the tyres felt OK but not great. They felt a bit greasy and skatey. Following the session I checked the pressures and realised that I hadn't lowered the pressures for the dry track. Damn...

The third session could be described as hot and dry, and with cold pressures set at 32psi cold, I set forth. This was much better, but still not as good as I had hoped. I finished with 38-39psi hot. My best time was a 1:18.65 (which is a good time for me) with lots of traffic.

The first run on Sunday morning was cool and dry but heavily overcast, so I started out with 30psi cold. Wow, this is what I was hoping for! Fan-bloody-tastic!! I even cut a half a second off my previous PB with a 1:17.44*. Turn-in and grip levels were everything I was expecting; tight, very progressive and extremely quiet too.

During the session I did have a "moment" at turn 2 when a Cobra got out of shape in front of me and I hit the picks pretty hard at mid-corner. I too got all out of shape, but the tyres were so progressive I managed to catch the tail and recover without a drama. Knowing the limited extent of my ability, I'm 100% certain that it was the tyres that made the difference between hero and zero! Once again for the record, my hot pressures at the end of the session were 36psi which I reckon was just about perfect for the conditions.

Over the three days I completed a total of 84 laps of Wakefield, plus travelled another 400kms round trip to the track. The flame decoration embossed into the tread, as shown in the third photo above, was still clearly visible when I got home, so I'm thinking that I should get plenty of track time out of these tyres.

So in summary, I'm well pleased with these tyres based on their performance so far. I'll post up any developments if they start to misbehave in the future!

Cheers and kind regards...

* I have done a few other mods over the Christmas break, so I'm not sure exactly how much of this improvement is due to tyres alone.

[Tony]

Another quick update following my runs at Mount Panorama over the Easter Weekend.

Confirming that for my car a hot pressure of 36-37 psi seems to be the sweet spot; cold starting pressure around 30 to 34 psi, but will depend on ambient air and track temps.

The longest session we had was 7 laps, with no sign of the tyres fading whatsoever. In fact, they seemed to get better the longer we went; but that could also be due to my rising confidence levels!

I can't compare their performance to that of a full R-spec, but for an S-spec I couldn't be happier.

I could have used more power though, my poor little MX5 really struggled with my 110kg of ballast when heading up Mountain Straight and through the Cutting! Not surprisingly it went much better down the hill, I was only a couple of hundred revs off the red line in top. I still had to back off before going through the kink into the Chase; I don't have the testicular fortitude to do it flat!

[NMX516]

Interesting comments on the Hankook's Tony. Thanks for the write up

[Lokiel]

Thanks for the RS-3 write-up Tony.

I originally wanted 225/45/15 Hankook RS-3s when I upgraded to 15x8 6ULs since they're quite popular in the US and get snapped up quickly as they're perceived to be the best bang-for-buck 225/45/15 tyre (in the dry). Unfortunately for me, Hankook only produce these tyres in batches and tirerack had no idea when they'd be available so I settled for Toyo R1Rs which were about US$20 per tyre more expensive. About a week after I ordered mine, tirerack had RS-3s in stock

Just like Tony, I couldn't use MC or PayPal and had to fork over the international money transfer fee, but it was still about A$350 cheaper overall purchasing from O/S; Beaurepairs, who fitted and balanced the tyres, just shook their heads and agreed that there's no way they can compete for non-standard tyres.

As for the Toyo R1Rs, they're an awesome tyre, even in the wet. I'm just worried about longevity - but given that mine's a weekend car, they'll probably serve me well.

[deviant]

My car runs 16 inch rims so I am a little bit limited on what I can get for it. It seems I either have to compromise on width or profile. I found that Toyo R1R's come in a 205 / 45 which is about ideal so I recently went for a set of those.

I have not really pushed them on the road and I have not used them in the wet so I can't comment on them there.

I have used them a couple of times on track and found them okay so far. My times at Barbagallo came down 3 seconds (compared to the horrible RE001's I used to use) within a couple of sessions. They are grippy from the start and come on quickly but after half a dozen laps they did feel to be getting slimy however they had only done a few hundred KM so were essentially brand new so the tread blocks would be moving around a lot, I really think these tyres would benefit from being shaved and from what I have read the guys using these only as a track tyre do get them shaved. Supposedly they are at their best when their is less than half the tread left and they can be run down to almost being slick.

I think if you can live with being beat by guys running semi-slicks all the time an S-Spec is a great thing to use. Much more grip than a road tyre and 'happy' to be hot but geometry set up and tyre pressures are not critical for getting life and the most grip from them. They do not really need to be heat cycled and a lock up is not going to destroy the tyre in one hit. They should also last a good number of events.

[Guran]

My current set of Adrenalins copped a pummelling at Phillip Island, so I'll need to replace at least a couple of them to pass rego next month. With that in mind, I asked Mike Hicks for a ruling on eligibility of Dunlop Direzza Sport Z1 Star Specs in the NSW club trackday standard classes. He has ruled that Star Specs are not permitted because 1) they're promoted as being for motorsport use, and 2) they can only be purchased in Australia from motorsport tyre specialists. In other words, they are considered to be a performance enhancing modification that is not within the "spirit" of a factory-fitted tyre. Anyone in a standard NA or NB who is running Star Specs will go into Class 4 "Standard Road Registered NA and NB but running on R Spec Tyres".

Personally, I'm cool with this ruling and relieved to have some clarity. It means I can keep on using RE001 Adrenalins and put the money I save towards R-specs for the State Supersprints.

Victorians who're thinking of competing in standard classes for the next Interstate Challenge at Wakefield Park later this year might want to keep this in mind.

UPDATE!

Mike Hicks has now decided to allow people to use Dunlop Direzza Z1 Star Specs in the Standard and Clubman classes at NSW club trackdays. Provided that the tyre has a UTQG tread wear rating of at least 140, it will be regarded as a road tyre and be acceptable to use in Class 1 to Class 4. Excellent news!

I understand Mike's intention is to bring the NSW classes more in line with the Victorian rules. NSW/VIC Interstate Challenges of the future should be a more even contest as a result.

I still see some conflicts in the Victorian rules though. For example, Federal 595RS-R, Bridgestone RE-01R, Yokohama AD08, and Falken RT615 are all classed as "R specs" even though they have UTQG rating of 140 to 200. On the other hand, Toyo R1R (140), Kumho KU36 (180), Hankook R-S2 (220), and Dunlop DZ Z1 (220) are all classed as "road tyres". There's another tricky one for Rob to sort out.

[Hammer]

Does anyone know where you can get the Dunlop Direzza Z1 Star Specs in Sydney? Not everyone seem to stock them or even able to buy them.

Or is it still best to get them from the US?

[Guran]

Gary's Motorsport Tyres
Unit 3, 13 Penny Place
Arndell Park NSW 2148

Tel: (02) 9676 8655
Gary: 0418 968613
Peter: 0418 583997
Fax: (02) 9676 5300
Email: garydunlop@ozemail.com.au

http://www.garysmotorsporttyres.com.au

[Hammer]

Thanks Bryan.

Also found out why I was understeering badly on turn 4 and 5 on the last track day...my wheel alignment was way out (according to Stu). It must have been caused by one of my off-track excursion from the last track day.

[Charlie Brown]

I took an NC around Wakefield on Sunday fitted with AO8's.
It's the first time I have experienced oversteer in an almost stock NC on the track.
Once it let go there was no catching it. It was fun but I wouldn't want to experience this on the road where you can hit things.

Another tyre people should consider, if you have 17's, is the new Michelin Super Sport imported from the US. Cost is about the same as the PS3 bought here. Reports are that they are a superb tyre. I'll let you know in a few weeks.

[Tony]

Well... here we are at the end of another season of motorsport and co-incidentally the end of a full year running the Hankook R-S3's. So I figured I'd post up my thoughts, just for the hell of it.

If you recall, I drive my car approx. 450kms round trip to the track, hence my decision to go with S-spec rather than R-spec tyres. I have another car for EMR's and Sunday drives, so the MX-5 is essentially only used for motorsport activities. Last season the tyres travelled a total of 10,105kms and this includes competing in the following events:

6 x MX5 Club days at Wakefield Park (three events were double entered with my daughter)
4 x Supersprints at Eastern Creek
3 x Supersprints at Wakefield Park
1 x FoSC at Wakefield Park (9 x sessions in total over three days)
1 x Bathurst Motor Festival at Mount Panorama (6 x twenty minute sessions in total over three days)
1 x Supersprint at Winton, plus an additional practice/training day
1 x MX5 Club driver training day at Marulan (double entered with my daughter)
2 x Esses hillclimbs at Mount Panorama
2 x Conrod supersprints at Mount Panorama
1 x Mountain Straight hillclimb at Mount Panorama

(That's the equivalent of nearly 20 track days!).

Tread wear on motorsport tyres can be somewhat difficult to quantify as most of the wear tends to occur on the shoulders, however as an indication the tyres started new with 6mm tread depth in the main grooves around the center of the tread. Tread depth is now at 4.0mm on the right hand side and 3.5mm on the left hand side (due to the high number of events at Wakefield). There was no discernable difference in wear between front and rear tyres.

When hot, the tyres would grain up well on the outside shoulder and would also pick up a fair bit of rubber in the centre and on the inside shoulder. Temperatures (when I thought to measure them) were usually around the 60 degrees mark and there was always less than 5 degrees variation across the face of the tread (both front and rear); so the wheel alignment seemed to be doing its job.

The photos below illustrate how the tyres look now, after a full season of motorsport (I've also included a photo of a tyre when new by way of comparison). Some unkind people might say that I drive like a Granny, that's why the tyres have held up so well; and in some respects that may be true! To provide some context however, I got into the very low 1:15s at Wakefield on a number of occasions and I managed a 3:02 at Mount Panorama on my first foray. Not the quickest around, but having fun never-the-less.

My previous comments regarding the tyres performance remains unchanged; I'm very happy, particularly on a wet track. They've now also proven to wear well. For my intended use I couldn't be happier. I would recommend them without hesitation if you need to drive relatively long distances to the track and don't want to swap out/wear out/heat cycle out more expensive R-spec tyres.

I hope this review helps someone...