I have a 2006 C6 Coupe with 52K miles and aging run flat tires. Would appreciate suggestions for tire replacement - not run flats.

 

Continental is my "go to" tire.

 

Michelin Pilot Sport S4 is considered top of the hill but there are lots of less expensive options. Depends to a great deal how you use the car. Track days require totally different tires than driving in low temps. Go to Tirerack.com and you can see everything of quality that fits.

 

Michelin seems to be the GOAT for Corvettes.
Personally, I have always loved Continental for price and performance.

 

For tires there are two questions to answer first. One is run-flats and sounds like you have already answered that. Secondly, do you drive in the winter or would you be good with summer only tires?

If you search the threads, you will see lots of tire threads, most seem to come back to Continental or Michelin. I think if you want run-flats, Michelin is the most common choice. Otherwise, there are a lot of supporters of the Continental tires. As dr gallup said, depends how you want to use the car. If you are not looking to be "competitive" there are lots of good choices. I went with Goodyear Exhilarates, much nicer than the 10 year old run flats, quiet, nice ride and hook up much better than the old ones. They are not summer tires, as I drive in cold weather, I made that compromise.

 

Just spent 1500 for pilot sport s4....had s3 before. Looked for cheaper but just don't trust em for how I drive.

 

Here's what I did (research)and will be doing(buying). Step one) go to Tire Rack AFTER you decide how you will use the car. I do not have the skill to push a set of Strictly performance tiers to their limits, NOR will the car be used as such, It will be the Wife's main ride. She has even less. We will lean on it a bit, especially when we go down to "Potter County" Pa. on vacations. So if you go to "tire Rack" , use the site start the shopping by entering your car, then look at how they group tires in a specific categories, That will tell you what that group of tires they are testing are "supposed" to do. Then you can watch the videos of "professional drivers" perform the testing on a "closed course" Helps to make the correct decision for what you want them to do for you. My long time friend (65 = years now) is a retired County Mountie, used to even teach the EVOC courses, His son is a Lieutenant in the State Police. So both are capable of making a vehicle "Hustle" along. So I get some assistance to being safe and driving at "MY" level. What is actually on our Vette (08 base Rag, automatic) is Firestone Firehawks not even a speed rated tire (dealer stuck them on for the sale). I wanted an all around tire Speed rated that would be better than either of us are, and chose an all season as they always seam to have an advantage of being better in the rain. And if we get in to trouble, it will probably occur in the wet. They're rated for 50k miles ( not they will not get that, BUT they should get more than tires rated for 20,000) I am Going to but on the Connie DWS06 plus in the stock Vette sizes. In the group of tires they were tested with always seem to come up in the top three. Some of these Tire Rack tire tests are also on you tube. Fun to watch. If I remember I believe this tire fell into their Category of "Ultra High Performance All Season Tire" I think the advantage is that these testers have skill and test all tire in a specific group the same way at the same time in the same size used on the test vehicle. It appears as close as you could get to an unbiased test.

 

Before you go to none run flat tires, take a few hour drive, and not only look where you would have a place to pull over, but someone where that you could patch a tire, or change a tire on the vet as well. Hence there is a reason that the vet got run flats in the first place.

As for the new run flats, they are light years better than the old Goodyear run flats in regards to ride,and even performance.

As for about the best deal on tires, is the michelin tires, since they are tread life warrenty in regards to miles, and even running the super sports for 6 years/20K miles, you good for the set you first paid for to get you there. hence front tires last about 20k, the rears will last about 10K, but since the tires are tread life warrantied, you get a replacement set of rears for free, to cover you to the 20K/6 year life.

And the last one, tires rubber starts to go hard about year 6, the cords start to stretch to cause the tires to go out of round, they need to be replaced, and why the tire warrenty is only for 6 years.

 

I have had 2 set of tires on my c6 1. Goodyear F1 supercar RF (came on the car). Horrible tires. 2. I replaced the Goodyears with BFG G-force Comp 2 all season Non RF. Love these tires. I got great wear and performance out of them.

I have one more season and I will need to replace them. I am looking to go with the Continental Extreme Contact Non RF Or the Michelin Pilot Sport AS 4. I usually go with the Ultra High Performance all season tires since the summer tires do not advise driving in temps under 40 deg.

 

Thank you.

 

It's hard to go wrong if you with reputable name brand tires. Hankooks makes great ones, BFG, Continental, Goodyear has good tires now too amazingly, Firestone, Toyo, Nitto... It's harder to find a bad tire these days than good ones.

It's also going to depend how you drive the car. If you're just cruising with the occasional burst of speed, you don't need much. If you're tracking the car on weekends, you'll want a different tire.

 

the ones with the longest tread warranty. My yokohama are 50k

 

So if $ is no object, I would say go with the Michelin.....or Continental ! I went with the Hankook ventus v12 evo. Very sticky tires. I occasionally track mine and swear by their grippyness.

 

That might apply to truck tires but most Vette tires will age out before the owner puts 20k on them. Personally, I want the most dry and wet traction. That's how I roll. OP may be different.

 

It amazes me how people do not understand sports cars and how tires affect the car doing what it was designed for.
i agree, getting a 50k mile tire for a sports car is counter productive. Might as well Drife a Corolla at that point.

 

I have the Michelin Pilot non runflats on my Grand Sport.

 

As someone else said, don't be so quick to ditch the runflats. On the recommendation of the guy at Tire Rack I went with the Michelin runflats and couldn't be happier. If you have a lot of potholes and rough roads in your area I would avoid the Continentals... between my wife and I we had at least three sidewall failures. One of those left me changing a tire on the side of a busy interstate in cold, rainy weather but at least I had a spare.

 

True story:
The only time I have ever had a blowout was on run flats.

Just an interesting tidbit I wanted to add to the conversation.

 

I have Conti's, no complaints.

 

In the last six years, I’ve had two sets of Hankooks. Excellent tires for the money.