[urq] Tire selection

[packley]

Bill:

I have the older AVS on a BMW 2002 and the GForce 215x50x17 on the urq.
The Gforce is an excellent tire.  Read the writeups in TireRack, at:

 http://www.tirerack.com/tires/types/uhp.jsp

take these ratings with a grain of salt, as the only real way to compare
is to have one tester compare all tires, which I am not sure this rating
system does, so evaluation standards are not controlled.

Your tire selection will be limited as the performance tires may not
include
15" sizes.

but you will find the Gforce is one of the
superior performance tires available in 15", and I would assume among
the more expensive.  Avon has a tire reported at #1 which is a surprise.
Hankook, Kumho and Falken produce inexpensive tires that are competitive
to some extent, because of their attractive price points. Most owners
consider these a lower grade tire with compromises when compared to the
leading tires.

Final selection is subjective and depends on what you feel is the most
important feature.  Personally, I would not put an original size on your
car, as tire technology has improved drastically in 25 years, so try to
put the largest tire that will fit your rim and wheel arches.  I found
rolling arches to be tedious but with persistence and a good padded
large wooden dowel (<2") I was able to massage fender lips without any
trace of cracking or disfiguring.  Someone in the club must have the
Eastwood device which does this even more effectively, using the wheel
hub as the radius for force on the wheel arch.  

Phil

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Message: 2
Date: Wed, 27 Apr 2005 23:05:10 -0400
From: "W. Bremer" <wbremer at maine.rr.com>
Subject: [urq] Urq Tires
To: "Urquattro List" <urq at audifans.com>
Message-ID: <004e01c54b9f$20d461c0$cbd3cd45 at maine.rr.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="iso-8859-1"

I'm looking for new tires for my 82 urq with newly professionally
refinished 7" (in (Y7Y) Fuchs rims.  I'm sticking with the stock look
and spec tire which is 205/60-15 91V, although I'd also consider 90 V or
91H.  

Of the tires I found (at The Tire Rack, Discount Tires Direct and 1010
tires), it seems to come down to (alphabetically arranged):

BF Goodrich g-Force 91V 300-AA-A
Bridgestone Potenza G009 91H 460-A-A
Dunlop SP Sport 01 91V 280-A-A
Falken ZE-512 91H 420-A-A
Hankook Ventus HR ii H 408 91V 340-A-A
Kumho Ectsa ASX 91V 420-A-A
Toyo Proxes TPT 91V 400-A-A
Yokohoma AVS dBS2  90V 320-A-A

Any other recommendations?

Every once in a while I'll take the car to a driver's school where I'll
drive 7/10ths (no interest in breaking the car or bending metal).  I had
an earlier version of Toyo 91V tires on the car and was happy with them.
I use Falken ZE-512 on my '86 5000 CSTQ (same size) and been happy with
them for street use.

The car has H&Rs 3/4" lowering springs and Koni yellow strut inserts, so
it's very stiff at tire pressures over 29 psi.

I'd appreciate any comments on or off list.
thanks,
Bill (Bremer)