JUST CURIOUS . . . why do many owners replace the OEMs (RE050s), once they wear ou,t with another tire, whether it's Bridgestones or another brand???

Is it that the newer tires are better (better in grip, road feel or whatever) ? Or they just want to try something new?

I love the way the OEMs feel and wouldn't want to lose anything in transitioning to another tire.

I would appreciate your thoughts !

 

It's mostly price. RE050 are a few hundred dollars more than a set of max performance tires. That's a lot to some owners. The OEM sizes of the RE050 and S-02 were made specifically for the S2000, so the sales volume is low which means the cost to keep them available is higher than more mainstream tires.

After that it's performance. The RE050 is a high performance street tire but a lot of people opt for max performance tires that are intended for autocross. And a lot of people feel like they need to upsize to wider tires, or run a square setup. Most people don't understand how sensitive the S2000 is to tire stagger, sidewall stiffness, and diameter. Fat tires and soft sidewalls make the S feel sloppy, larger diameter tires bog down our low torque engines.

I've had more than a dozen different tires on my S cars and the RE050 is still one of the best feeling tires for the car. Super crisp steering response, very predictable at the limit of handling, fairly safe in the rain, good tire life, and the correct stagger for the stock suspension. They don't have as much grip as my RE11, but they feel great.

And a lot of people compare their old worn out RE050 to whatever fresh tires they replaced them with, which isn't a fair comparison. A fresh set of RE050 is a great street tire for relatively stock S2000's. But they're expensive.

 

Tire technology has come a long way since 1999 when the first S2000s and tires were designed, The RE050 may have been a super tire 16 years ago but it's a mediocre high performance tire now. Even the loved RE-11A has been superseded by the RE-7`R.

-- Chuck

 

Thanks s2ka for the insight . . . "I've had more than a dozen different tires on my S cars and the RE050 is still one of the best feeling tires for the car. Super crisp steering response, very predictable at the limit of handling, fairly safe in the rain, good tire life, and the correct stagger for the stock suspension".

I truly love the "feel" that the RE050s provide and I would hate to lose that after 10 yrs of ownership between an '05 and my current '08.

You know how it goes, you read posts on other tires, Yokos, Michelin, etc and how great they are and you feel like you should get those.

I'm thinking that if Bridgestone continues to make the tire after 10 yrs then it must still be able to compete with other manufacturers!

Thanks again !

 

The RE50 handles good/is precise because its stiff sidewall construction. The rubber compounds for grip have improved a lot over the years, but that has little to do with the construction/feel of the tire. So with that, id say as long as you stick to the first base of action with running a dual ply sidewall constructed tire, you will be ok. There are many single ply sidewall constructed max summer tires which will handle like shit in comparison to the RE50, but be more compliant for everyday use and have similar grip levels. The S2k does not handle well with these kinds of tires. All Extreme summer tires are dual ply sidewalls and will therefore generally set a baseline for appropriate handling you cant really go wrong with. The know stiffest/more precise offering in this category tire has typically been the Starspec/Z1/Z2. The softest handler being the RS3. Everyone else has been in the middle somewhere. The RE50 would be more towards the Starspec/z1/Z2 in feel, but with more grip. If you lie the idea of moving up in grip levels for shits and giggles, I would not hesitate to try out the new Bridgstone RE71. Every test indication is showing that it offers about the best all out grip and handling character for a extreme performance tire right now.

 

After much thought I replaced mine with RE71Rs. They may be overkill for my daily driver but I love them.

 

RE-050s are an old tire compound. They're also super expensive for what they are. I find that OEM replacement tires are super expensive for some odd reason.

For equal or lesser money, you can have much better tires. The list is quite long for possible replacements that will exceed the performance of the RE-050 while being cheaper. Everything on the list below grips better than the RE-050. As far as feel/responsiveness, both the RE-11a and ZII have felt better or equal as far as I'm concerned. The RS-3s grip awesome, but feel sloppy/numb (soft side walls). The other tires I have not tried yet - but laptimes indicate superior performance to the RE-050 (I cannot speak to response/feel though).

-RE-71R
-Pilot Super Sport
-RS-3
-AD-08R
-RE-11 or RE-11a if you can still find them
-Dunlop ZII if you can find it
-Rival S

 

Thanks s2000junky and Bullwings for your insight ! Very helpful.

 

 

I'm going the same route.

I'm happy they make a 215-40-18 tire. The RE71R is the only one on TIre Rack offering this size in the extreme tires. I Could always use the extra clearance.


Gonna see how a 215-40-18/ 255-35-18 handles.