s2000Junky

You answered why. One shoe doesn't fit all, especially when it comes to an s2k chassis. Its suspension and chassis are not built around comfort, but its a hard nosed light,shorter wheel base car that requires the firmest constructed tires on the market to yield proper intended performance. If you use the car as a cruiser, are an old man with a bent back then maybe compromises are willing to be made, but then I ask why own an s2000 and not a Miata, Boxter or Z3/4, any of which will accommodate a softer tire like the pss or most any other soft single ply sidewall tire without upsetting its feel.

ZDan

I had them on my FD. They were OK at first, but lost all grip over time. Seriously awful after ~18 months, NO grip on the street. I would get understeer turning in semi-aggressively at what would normally be 7/10ths. It was ridiculous how much lateral grip and drive grip the car would lose under benign conditions. I was astounded at how bad they became.

They were fine, then they were TERRIBLE. For daily driving. Dangerous even.

Anyway, at *best* they are obsolete. But for whatever reason some worship these tires. I thought they were OK, until they sucked worse than any modern tire I've ever experienced...

Iradier310

It probably is overkill or they will just be too loud. I recently got RS3’s on my car and I love the grip but they make a lot of noise on the freeway. You can drown it out with music but when you want to have a conversation in the car you kind of have to raise your voice. It can be annoying sometimes.

DavidNJ

For the street: PSS by a wide margin.

For autocross, we don't know how the 2-year-old RE71r compares to new tires from Dunlop, Hankook, and BFG.

-Tim-

There's only "2" things I hate about the Michelins- The fact that they don't come in 255/40, and that their 245/40's end up having a stretched-look when mounted on an AP2 rear wheel. It makes the rear wheels look smaller than the fronts, which looks bad in my opinion. It's not so much the stretch-look, but the fact that it doesn't match the fronts.

Thanks everyone for all the input. Since I can't get the Michelin PSS's, I'll probably go with what seems to be the next best thing- The Bridgestone Potenza S-04 Pole Positions.

I'm sure I'd have a lot more fun with the RE71R's, so in a few months, I'll probably get myself a set of used AP1V1 or AP2V2 wheels and throw some RE71R's on them.

ZDan

Are you really considering buying 2 sets of Summer tires? Why not just get Dunlop ZII StarSpec, or Hankook RS3 or RS4? S-04 is no better suited for colder weather than the Extreme tires if that's your reasoning.
EP tires are not "overkill" for stock suspension, but rather complement it IMO.

DanZilla

-Tim-

Its not that I think the S-04's will be better in the cold, I just think they'll be better all-around for what I will be using the car for the majority of the time- some spirited driving on some back-roads, or having fun on some twisty mountain roads on the way to a winery.......with my wife. What that means is - the only thing louder than the sound of driving on sticky tires, will be the sound of her voice complaining about it (I listened to some youtube videos of the RE71R...that velcro-like sound is pretty loud).

As I mentioned in my initial post- I probably won't make it to any track events any time soon (a 6yr old daughter and an old house restoration keeps me busy right now). However- there is an auto-x event held every Sunday morning about 10mins away from me. On the rare occasion I actually have a Sunday morning free to myself, it would be nice to put on a different set of wheels with some tires I can drive on and use full advantage of.

Who knows- maybe I'll get lucky and find a used set of wheels WITH some nice sticky tires for sale!

Jah2000

I have them... and, they're not that easy to break loose ...actually, quite hard to do that on the streets with these tires and I drive pretty hard/fast in the twisties on occasion. Pretty grippy for UHP tires.

Jah2000

RE760 (10 years old and discontinued) = RE001 outside of the US

Firehawk Indy 500 = RE003 outside of the US

Firehawk Indy 500 is the new (10year or 2generation) successor of the RE760.