standard tires on 2.5

[SteveTheTech]

Over the last few years I have seen many tire related threads, but this one is more interesting than the usual, it is just such an odd size. All I see now is 18+".

I'm curious to see the alignment angles of the roadster. Does anyone have a scanned printout handy?

How are these tires wearing, inside, outside, featheredged?

The tires that are pictured have tread blocks that are far too solid for a daily driver in anything but ideal conditions.

http://www.tirerack.com/images/tires/michelin/mi_pilot_exalto_as_ci2_l.jpg

If I had to choose between the two I would prefer the wider aspect ratio and slightly smaller sidewall. The Michelin Exalto is a decent tire on passenger cars but how it would act on a Roadster remains to be seen.

Continental has several offerings in the larger size.

http://www.google.com/products?q=195/50/16&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&lnk=vbrsugg&brand=Continental


The Contis have the ablility to be cross rotated regularly, which in theory should prolong them. Also the ones in the photo above have blocks that look like they would tolerate the negative camber better than the factory tires.

 

[SByer]

What tires did you have?
How many miles did you get?
Did they handle and stop well?
Were they noisy?
Was there a catastrophic failure, ie blow out, etc...?
What did you get to replace them?
How much for new tires?

I had the performance tires for the first year on my '08. Now I've got the standard. The performance tires were indeed noisier, and didn't even make it to the end of the year before I started hearing/feeling the wear bars (which you notice a whole heck of a lot more in an EV!). Didn't have a problem in the rain with them, but I was aware to watch for that. I got maybe 3500 miles out of that set - the fronts had more life in them, but I didn't want to mix-and-match with the standard, and I'd already decided to switch.

With the standard tires I notice a bit better energy usage - but that could also be training from the nanny graph. I do notice the TC coming on a bit more - especially accelerating out of corners from a right turn at a light - but not enough to go back to the performance tires. I'm guesstimating I'll get about 10-12k out of the rear standards, which is about what I was getting out of the rears on the 911 (and before that the MR2). It's a condition of mid-engine/battery cars (is the Roaster technically mid-motor?).

As for stopping, I rarely use the friction brakes, so don't ever push the tires in that way (I like to say I'm an asymmetric hyper-miler). Someone who's had the car on a track with both sets of tires could answer that better than I.

The replacement tire cost seemed perfectly reasonable to me (about the same as for the 911).

 

[samcarney]

Let's make use of this Tire Thread: Everyone who has perfomed at least 1 tire change answer the following questions:
What tires did you have?
How many miles did you get?
Did they handle and stop well?
Were they noisy?
Was there a catastrophic failure, ie blow out, etc...?
What did you get to replace them?
How much for new tires?

Roadster 2.0 standard Yokahama's
Rears replaced at 8400 miles. Fronts still good at 11300
Tires handled excellent wet and dry
They got noisy as they began to wear out
No catastrophic failure
Replaced with same
Price for 2 rear tires $550 +$50 installation

 

[donauker]

Let's make use of this Tire Thread: Everyone who has perfomed at least 1 tire change answer the following questions:
What tires did you have?
How many miles did you get?
Did they handle and stop well?
Were they noisy?
Was there a catastrophic failure, ie blow out, etc...?
What did you get to replace them?
How much for new tires?

08 Roadster with 19,500 miles.
Just ordered my 4th set of standard rear tires. Original fronts still have plenty of life remaining.

Getting 6,500 miles per set of rears +/- a few hundred. First set had lots of test rides and 36 laps of auto cross plus drag strip time so I blamed it on that. Second set with no auto cross or drag strip and more normal driving proved to be no better.

Tires have amazing traction in both wet and dry conditions. (But are useless in snow)

Do not consider the tires noisy until the end of tread life, but they are very sticky and shower the bottom of the car with any loose road debris.

No failures.

Replaced with same.

$536 from Tire Rack

 

[csummers]

Barring other longer life tires, performance or otherwise, what other wheels would fit the Roadster that can take a longer life tire?

 

[tomsax]

Tires: Stock base tires on an 08 Roadster.
Miles: 11,937. They were still above the wear bars, but I wanted new tires before driving to Portland for drag racing.
Did they handle and stop well: By my amateur standards, yes. A pro driver who drove it at Pacific Grand Prix gave high praise to the car.
Were they noisy: road noise on the freeway is the worst thing about the car.
Was there a catastrophic failure: No, probably could have lasted another 1,000 miles.
What did you get to replace them: Same.
How much for new tires: Not sure, I did the 12k service at the same time. The total was ~1,300, which is consistent with 600 for service plus 600 for tires, but I don't have the invoice handy.

I've heard that the traction control is tuned to the standard tires. Tesla had to update the firmware and add a tire setting when they started selling winter tires. If you go with something other than the stock tires, especially different sizes, beware of possible traction control problems, like TC turning regen off when slowing.

 

[Jaff]

Thanks for all of your responses guys, some great case study info here for we noobs!:smile:

 

[Tdave]

Also, as a reminder - go easy on brand new tires. They tend to have less traction at first until the molding compound wears off.

I want to reiterate this. I spun out and got in an accident with only 10 miles on a new set of rear tires because of this. It was this reason plus the fact that the TC needs up to 50 miles to recalibrate with a new set of tires.

 

[mpt]

What tires did you have? Standard
How many miles did you get? Front less than 50% worn at 11K, Rears done after about 6K
Did they handle and stop well? yes
Were they noisy? Yes
Was there a catastrophic failure, ie blow out, etc...? No
What did you get to replace them? 225/45ZR -17 Sumitomo HTR Z II
How much for new tires? $76 each

Now, I think that they might not be as good as the originals; perhaps if I did a double blind test I might be able to spot the difference but probably because they're quieter. I reasoned that at 6K per set, I wasn't feeling good about spreading all of that money around the roads of New Jersey. 4K miles in though (*) and they still only look 50% worn so for me they seem a better solution.

No issues with regen or TC.

* I didn't say I actually changed them when they'd worn out though; at that rate of wear, if you don't check every day they can slip by!

 

[tomsax]

I want to reiterate this. I spun out and got in an accident with only 10 miles on a new set of rear tires because of this. It was this reason plus the fact that the TC needs up to 50 miles to recalibrate with a new set of tires.

Does this mean that Tesla has upgraded the firmware to be more tolerant of different tires?

 

[Doug_G]

Does this mean that Tesla has upgraded the firmware to be more tolerant of different tires?

They added a "New Tires" menu option in Version 4.1.33. When you activate it, it temporarily disables TC and Regen. Then you're supposed to coast in a straight line at 20-60 mph for 10 seconds, from which information it figures out the new tires. Then it will turn TC and Regen back on, and away you go. The instructions say it's for "Installing Snow Tires", but I'm sure it would work for other brands of tires too.

 

[SteveTheTech]

I want to reiterate this. I spun out and got in an accident with only 10 miles on a new set of rear tires because of this. It was this reason plus the fact that the TC needs up to 50 miles to recalibrate with a new set of tires.

I do not know if what you experienced was anything other than a fluke. New tires have lower static friction meaning they will spin easier and the wet traction is not as great as it will be once the finished is worn off. That usually takes about 5 or 10 miles. You should always be extra careful when the road surface is anything less than ideal. But new tires are typically the best you will ever be.

Traction control does not really relearn new tires per say. What it does do is look at the real time wheel speed signal inputs and applies ABS or divert torque (depending on what type of car) away from the wheel with the faster wheel speed.

 

[SteveTheTech]

They added a "New Tires" menu option in Version 4.1.33. When you activate it, it temporarily disables TC and Regen. Then you're supposed to coast in a straight line at 20-60 mph for 10 seconds, from which information it figures out the new tires. Then it will turn TC and Regen back on, and away you go. The instructions say it's for "Installing Snow Tires", but I'm sure it would work for other brands of tires too.

That's just odd, I have no idea what their logic is, but I would love to know.

 

[TEG]

...new tires are typically the best you will ever be...

Did you follow those links I posted before?:
Tire Tech Information - Breaking In Your Tires
Tires: break in period, mold release, color appearance
500 Miles of Breaking In Your Tires? [Archive] - NASIOC

 

[SteveTheTech]

I like you, you are really quick with the links and information.

Basically what they are getting at is heat the tires up.
This applies to brakes as well.
Heat in many aspects is a problem, in this regard it actually help break in the tires, and or brakes even ICEs need a certain amount of heat to work as efficiently as they can.

Back in the day I remember mounting snowtires on rwd police cars when I was working at my local Goodyear store. Those tires had immediate grip once the car was returned to the floor and driven out of the shop. Allot of the initial traction has allot to do with the purpose of the tire. Performance tires with wide tread blocks and end of the alphabet speed ratings tend to be constructed provide traction under the heaviest of loads.

Break in periods are not looked into enough by most users in real world situations. I'm gonna do a little digging into this. You guys over here are great though I like the fact that you back everything up.

 

[dsm363]

Is there a handout from Tesla that you can hand to the tire people when you get your tires changed that tells them exactly what to do? I remember reading in a previous thread that the Roadster has to be lifted in a certain way to not ruin the car.

 

[dwegmull]

Is there a handout from Tesla that you can hand to the tire people when you get your tires changed that tells them exactly what to do? I remember reading in a previous thread that the Roadster has to be lifted in a certain way to not ruin the car.

The roadster must be lifted one side at a time using well defined points. Not doing so will damage the chassis and or the body...
The jacking points are shown in the user manual. Page 9-12 in the UK version (for some reason I could not extract the zip file that contains the US user manual...). The following page shows how to raise the roadster using a two post lift. This requires using special adapters which, I guess, one can order from TM.

 

[Prime Mover]

Is there a handout from Tesla that you can hand to the tire people when you get your tires changed that tells them exactly what to do? I remember reading in a previous thread that the Roadster has to be lifted in a certain way to not ruin the car.

When the Tesla Toronto service rep (Dustin) did repairs to my headlamp assemblies, he had to remove each front tire to get to the headlamps. He had a small jack to raise the front of the car and then used a portable jack stand to support the Roadster while he did his work.

He gave me two interesting pieces of advice. The first was to wrap electrical tape around the locking nut remover so it wouldn't scrape the wheel hub while turning.

His other good recommendation was not to allow the tire people to use an impact wrench to take the tires on or off. Again, he was concerned about the impact gun slipping and hitting the hub (the nuts are recessed into the hub). I liked the extra care that he took but I don't know if my local tire garage would listen to me, especially if I wasn't present while they did the work.

Also, the Tesla tech had a proper torque wrench so that he could ensure the wheel nuts had all been correctly reinstalled. First Class / Great Job !!

 

[dsm363]

Thanks. I e-mailed Tesla about creating a one or two page detailed PDF online (with pictures) that you would simply print out when going to Firestone tires (or any tire store) to have your tires replaced. It would tell them how to lift the car, what to use....etc They're looking into it.

 

[dsm363]

It looks like the AD08 tires came out last year that serve as a replacement for the standard AD07s on the Roadster
http://www.yokohamatire.com/tires/advan_ad08.aspx

It appears that they don't come in all the sizes that the AD07s come in though (I could find matching rear tires but not front)

Too bad, it looks like they are an improvement over the older tires.

update:
Heard back from Yokohama tires:

Thank you for contacting our office.

You are correct the AD08 is manufactured in the rear tire size you listed. Unfortunately, it is not manufactured in size 175/55R16. However, the AD07 is.

Thank you for your interest in Yokohama Tire Corporation.