Now that I've bought my winter tires. I am starting to read up on summers- as I do want to finally replace my crappy Eagle RSAs in the spring.

Having some issue with the terminology..

Sometimes I read where firmer/harder
= better control/stability/traction/grip

Sometimes I reader where softer
= stickier = better control/stability/traction/grip

Kinnda confusiing!

What I am looking for is a set of tires that gives me 'stability"....the crappy Eagle RSA give me a very bouncy ride (up/down and side to side). On my earlier Acura TL, it was great - could have been a better suspension mind you, and/or the tires (they were BF Goodrich Touring T/A), but I felt in control - hardly even felt the speed bumps.

I am not an agressive driver, but obviously want to be able to take a corner in a G35..and want to get rid of that bouncy/nauseating ride the Eagle RSAs are giving me. I put on less about 12,000 km a year, which means about 8000 a year on summer tires, so tread wear should not be a major concern. Not even concerned about road noise - thats what music is for! Needs to be good on wet roads as well of course.

Any suggested good-place-to-start links re tire reviews? ..such as this:
http://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/...mparison_tests

 

Usually summer tires are made up of a softer rubber compound (stickier) whereas winter tires have a harder rubber. You can look into some Falken fk452's. They are pretty cheap for a set and have good wet/dry traction. Some say they get noisy but noise isn't a concern for you so it shouldn't be a problem.

 

That looks like a pretty good roundup. Pick your sweet-spot between dry/wet grip, comfort and noise. IMO tires are a very personal choice and nobody can tell you what to run. If it were me, I'd probably go with the BS RE760s.

 

I have a little over 19K miles on a set of BridgeStone RE760 and have been happy with the performance and wear of these tires so far. IMO these tires are a good value for the money. You can read more here. As SwivelHips said, Tires are a personal choice; ask ten people you'll probably get ten answers. Good luck with your decision.

 

The real difference is what the compound does at various temperatures. Summer tires tend to get hard at a higher temperature than winter tires.

So one really needs to look at the average low temperatures for winter time and then pick the tire based on that and conditions. Many all seasons will be good temperature wise down to about 0 degrees F. So they may be the best choice if the weather is cold but dry above this temperature or wet and above freezing. The winter tire tread pattern then comes into play based on conditions such as snow and the compound comes into play if the temp drops below the all season threshold.

 

For the winter season, at the low temperatures, and threshold ice/snow conditions and worse, I have winter tires, so I am good to go, with winter tire compound that will stay soft/sticky.

For all other seasons, I guess I can choose between summer, all season , and the other specialty tires (eg high performance).

 

One factor that I would like to see more defined is what use to be a major selling point - breakaway.

I use to run Continentals a long time ago and one of its selling points was that you did not all of a sudden experience lost traction. Many tires were much more sticky but would pretty much make you feel like you were on ice when they no longer were glued to the pavement. The Continentals would gradually reach their limits in regard to traction and were great for scrubbing off speed in the corners. They also wore very well. Not sure at all how they are today but to me this would still be a major selling factor.

I am very happy with my Toyos on my other car and probably will have to look long and hard at them for the 'G' when it comes time. I'll be looking most likely at Blizzacks (sp) for a winter set.

 

I think it's opposite: winter tires are soft and they don't harden that much. Summer tires are hard and once freezing temp approch they become like a stone.