Tire selection for H/C upgrade.
 

Had my first close call a few days ago. Early morning on my way to work. Not even trying to push it and 3rd got out from under me and i couldn’t recover. After two full spins I ended up on the side of the road. Scared the shit out of me. Cost is no concern. Just want the best rear tire possible for traction.

6 Speed
3.42 gears
1 7/8 inch headers
AFR 220cc heads Miller to 59cc P/P by Tony Mamo
comp cam
johnson lifters
Roller rockers

Currently running 295/35/18 Potenza’s

Glad you didn't kill anybody. Best traction depends on a lot of things. What are you going to use the tires for drag strip, road racing, daily driver, weather conditions (hot, cold. wet), road conditions (smooth highway or bumpy back roads)? No one tire will be best for all conditions and none will improve your driving skills.

Daily driving. Smooth highway. Only time I open it up is on smooth highway. Do unprovoked insults always come with asking for advice?

If you are looking for a well rounded street/track tire, I’d recommend Toyo r888r. You won’t get nearly as much tread life out of them as you will a harder compound tire, maybe 10k miles, but they’re known to hook up great with higher HP/TQ setups. They’re essentially a road racing tire. Next step back from then would be the Michelin PSS.

Good luck with your decision. I’m glad your road ballet didn’t turn into anything more severe.

Hard to find a 295 35 18 for sure, unless you want a drag radial. I found a Continental extreme contact sport and have about 200 miles on them. So far so good, and they are great on traction and road noise isn't terrible either.

Good luck! Hard decision for sure.

Oh yeah, didn’t take note you were looking for stock sizes. You might want to consider stepping up to 275/305. You’ll have a ton more choices that way

I think the ultimate street strip tire (something that you have almost zero trade off besides tread life) is the Nitto NT05R

This tire hooks better than any conventional street tire and by a large margin. Look a Michelin or any other what you may want to call a sticky street tire simply has slightly more traction than general rubber and its still designed with some sort of decent service life still in the picture. That is one of the trade offs with more dedicated or purpose built rubber that your trying to put down some real power with and in the case of the NT05R is probably the only trade off as the car still feels solid and handles reasonably well also (a slightly earlier steering wheel input needed if really pushing the limits with quick left and right transitions). The NT01 btw (also Nitto) is a great handling tire and also sticks pretty well in a straight line but the NT05R is more straight line oriented with a modest sacrifice to razor sharp turning ability the NT01 offers which was designed as more of a road race tire from its inception.

Coupled with "normal" sticky NT05's on the front you have both a good looking package that matches front and rear and excellent traction.....really good in the warmer temps. No tire works great in the cold so always be careful when road temps are under 45 degree.

And....wait for it.....LOL.....they are actually very quiet as well....surprisingly so in fact having swapped out some Michelin PSS on my CTSV and upgrading to the Nittos.....traction improvement was night and day better and less road noise.

Hope this helps....

-Tony

I find this amusing.. I have an HCI C5Z as well with RE760 Potenzas on the back and have never spun the car out under loss of traction. My car works just fine from a 40 hit in 2nd or a lower hit in 1st.

I would bet that you probably have the pressure pretty high around low 30s and the road may have been a little cold as well as the tires.

I run my potenzas around 24 psi all the time.

But since you are afraid of them... The continental extreme contact is a perfect tire that won't get away from you that will have a nice life span for your intended driving. Had them on my buddys cam, nitrous c5z as well as my other friends cam ZR1 which also had no issues.