MOTOR Tyre Test 2015

Conventional wisdom has it that the original equipment tyre fitted off the showroom floor is the ideal choice for your car.

In a perfect world that may be the case, as a carmaker’s engineers generally tend to optimise a car’s handling, braking and electronic systems intervention to the OE tyre.

But it’s no perfect world. Particularly when chasing maximum handling and braking performance. And, further to that, combined dry and wet performance.

Fuel consumption, ride comfort, low noise, cost, supply logistics – there are myriad considerations outside of extracting maximum tyre performance that carmakers have when selecting OE rubber. Even with some big-dollar performance cars it can be a lottery as to what brand and model of tyre is fitted, due to the economics of car making.

So MOTOR’s Tyre Test is back. The purpose? To funnel the finest and freshest rubber through a single hi-po vehicle to decide what’s the best all-round, all-weather tyre out there for your pride and joy. By measures of speed, time and distance, we’re out to crown a performance-tyre king.

And as performance equates to maximising grip, handling and stopping, by the very nature of our testing regime we’ll also discover the safest performance tyre of this year’s eight-strong field.

This year Bridgestone, Continental, Dunlop, Falken, Goodyear, Michelin, Toyo and Winrun stepped up to our annual ‘Tyre Olympics’, each nominating their best-performing tyre model within conditions of the Tyre Test rules.

The rules are, in a nutshell, pretty simple. The eligible candidate must be a certified road tyre and be available as standard or optional fitment to a series production car. Pretty straightforward then, thus removing the murky grey line separating a proper road tyre from grooved/lightly treated dedicated off-street rubber.

That’s precisely why our testing is split between dry and wet disciplines. By its very nature, mixed running works unfavourably against sticky track tyres that require dry heat with which to excel and favours rubber capable of dealing with all real-world on-road conditions.

New to our Tyre Test is the Mercedes-Benz A45 AMG, a list-topper of ideal Tyre Test go-to vehicles for two reasons. Firstly, it’s the hottest modest-sized device out there, so it’s a perfect fit for the disciplines at hand. And, secondly, it runs 19-inch rims fitted with 235mm-wide 35-aspect ratio rubber that, today, seems to be something of a sweet spot for high-performance road rubber.

As ever, the AMG also provides a crucial control tyre to which all competition rubber can be scaled against, which is tested at the outset and retested twice through proceedings; primarily as a yardstick to adjust final calculations if conditions change throughout the testing process.

The rest of the Tyre Test cast and crew will be familiar to regular, erm, viewers: Warren Luff as stunt test dummy, our trusted mates at JAX Tyres supplying the tyre-swapping muscle and Eagle SMF the hardware, our trusty Driftbox timing equipment as judge and jury, and Sydney Motorsport Park and Sydney Dragway as the exotic test locales.

Let’s cut to the chase then, shall we?

THE CONTENDERS

MICHELIN PILOT SPORT CUP 2

ORIGIN: FRANCE
TREADWEAR: 180
PRICE: $480

WINRUN R330

ORIGIN: CHINA
TREADWEAR: 420
PRICE: $145

GOODYEAR Eagle F1 asymmetric 2

ORIGIN: GERMANY
TREADWEAR: 300
PRICE: $540

DUNLOPDIREZZA DZ102

ORIGIN: THAILAND
TREADWEAR: 460
PRICE: $460

TOYO PROXES T1 SPORT

ORIGIN: JAPAN
TREADWEAR: 240
PRICE: $350

FALKEN AZENIS FK453

ORIGIN: JAPAN
TREADWEAR: 300
PRICE: $279

CONTINENTAL CONTISPORTCONTACT 5P

ORIGIN: CZECH REPUBLIC
TREADWEAR: 240
PRICE: $360

BRIDGESTONE POTENZA RE050A

ORIGIN: JAPAN
TREADWEAR: 140
PRICE: $440