I certainly wouldn't say the RE-71 has been consistent. Grip was crazy the first couple events, but had tread squirm. After several events, the tire is much more predictable in my opinion. I have probably 100 AutoX runs and 4000 street miles on these tires and I think I may run one more event and call them done. They have about 2/32 left at this point. Someone did recommend the RS-4 because they remained consistent over the life of the tire. Not sure what I want to do, because I got two years out of these tires and that isn't too bad for a race tire... I think I will do another set of RE-71 and wait until the next "it" tire comes out.

 

Looks like only the Proxes RR comes in 17" 255. Have you used both? How would you compare BFG R1 (which is supposed to be the faster tire in general) in 245 width to the Proxes RR in 255?

 

in my experience, the RS4 isn't a very good autox tire cause they need some heat in them to get grip. on track its not an issue cause you just do a warmup lap and you're good. but autox you need grip right away... when I autox'd on them it was understeer city, till the end of the day and I was able to do about 6 run with less than 3 min break between, they were finally starting to find grip by run 4-5-6 and really only reflected in time by run 5-6. if you're doing autox competitively, its only your first 3 runs that count... if you're just doing it for fun, its still not a good autox tire cause cold tire understeer is frustrating...

have you thought about getting the RE71R's shaved so you don't get tread squirm when they're new and sticky?

 

I ran a set of R1 until they heat cycled out. Got 5 events out of them with driving back and forth. They slow down pretty substantially when heat cycled, but when new were easily another 1.5sec or so faster than RE71R.

I haven't run the Proxy RR yet but i know a lot of people that adore them because they don't slow down appreciably from sticker to cord.

 

My understanding is that with full slicks guys will use tire warmers between sessions to keep the tire temperature up and avoid heat cycling. (Basically making the whole day a single heat cycle rather than one for each session.) Full on electric tire warmers seems like a lot of hassle, but I wonder if you could get the same thing with a set of tire blankets. ISTM there's enough heat coming off the brakes to keep the tires pretty hot if you trap it in. Of course, the downside would be that your brakes have less of an opportunity to cool down! Currently I run electric fans pointing at my front brakes between sessions so they're nice and fresh, since RE-71Rs wear out long before heat cycling becomes an issue.

Another related question: does anyone know how much margin for error there is between cording and catastrophic failure in these kinds of tires? I've yet to run one right down to the cords, but I do get a bit nervous running a tire that's near end of life, since a blowout would obviously be... bad. Is it possible to go from no cords showing to a blowout in a single 20-minute session? Or are you going to be ok as long as you check after each one? Obviously you can just replace them sooner to be safe, but given the cost it's nice to squeeze out as much life as possible!

 

^Interested in this as well. I would guess a 20 minute session would be pushing it, but I would think as long as you check them and no cords showing and any tread left, you would be fine. I think I would still rather swap them at 1-2 32nds just to be safe. You would think they would have a little rubber past the tread, so the tire would be totally bald before cording. Harder to tell running a lot of camber though. I don't think I would get more than 1 or 2 more autocrosses out of the ones I have and I don't like to fiddle mid season. I want to get used to what I have and drive around the short falls(didn't work out great last year, so I did make changes but...). If you smash your car into the wall or break a wheel, maybe you aren't saving any money. lol.

 

I drove on these RS3s until they became extremely twitchy in the rain. They were fine in the dry.

 

There is a good bit of rubber past the tread. You can start to see the color of the rubber change as it gets near the cords...that is when it is time to switch!