Last year I was pretty happy to discover Dunlops renowned Z1 Star Spec was available in 185/60 14. Good fourteen inch tires are becoming a very rare thing. In fact… of the supposed “Maximum performance” street tires, only two are available in 14″ sizes. The other one is the Falken Azenis RT615K. I ordered new tires today. I thought about buying 15″ wheels to increase my options… but frankly I can’t afford to buy any more wheels. After my experience with the Dunlop’s I figure I owe Falken an opportunity to win me back.
I bought Azenis before… in like 2004?? And it was not a great experience. I didn’t feel like the tires were very drivable. Overall grip in the dry was almost comparable to race tires of the time (Toyo RA-1, Kumho V700, Advan A032R) but in the wet they were horrible. Beyond that, they gave very little feedback and indication of their limits to me at the wheel. I pulled them off the car and sold them before they were even half done.
Which is about what I did to the Star Specs last year… but for pretty much the opposite reasons. The Star Specs may have been the most easy to drive tire that I’ve ever used. In fact… in a whole year of driving, I NEVER spun the car once. I feel like I push pretty hard everywhere, the car certainly slid around, but it never caught me out… even in some pretty wet conditions where stiff, low void tires like these can be quite unpredictable.
However, I felt like they really didn’t offer the overall grip that they should have. Those who drove my car were amazed at how easy it was to control, but scoffed at it’s lack of cornering power. It was great for having fun, but pretty annoying to try and drive fast. Making matters worse, on hot days with a co-drive, the pyrometer indicated that the tires were getting way outside of their ideal operating temperature. That was even more frustrating as new knowledge of the course was often negated by deteriorating tire performance.
So I ordered the new Azenis.
There is nothing better than buying new tires. Buying other parts is exciting… but buying turbo’s and bushings etc is just an indication of work that needs to be done. Buying tires is a sign that driving is to be done. Sometimes I forget that that… is actually the primary objective.
Now, I don’t doubt that you overheat the Dunlops. But could it be because of a size that is entirely too narrow for you, as opposed to a characteristic of the tire itself?
yah it’s likely. Other cars of similar weight that competitively run Dunlops, typically wear 225’s. The Falkens are 10mm wider and taller which will help.
I may be more educated and a better driver than I used to be… but I’ve run on 185’s a lot in the past without noticing such a drastic fall off.
on another note: I DESPISE UPS. Paid $65 each for my tires… +$24.73 each UPS brokerage. I vow constantly to never use UPS… but somehow always do.
Yah… Falken’s are cheap.
Interesting. I’ve been running Falken RT615 and everyone’s been telling me to go to starspecs, so I was gonna go the opposite direction. I do tend to spin more running on the RT615 (hard to feel it’s limits) but when I do register a clean run it’s quite good. Though I’m running 215/45R17 on a Tiburon. I need some new rubber and now see they’ve added a K to the 615. What is so new about the 615K as opposed to before?
The consensus is that the Star Specs are better than RT-615’s… and the auto-x community has pretty much walked away from Falken since. I wonder if people will return now??? The 615K is supposed to be substantially better.
Falken made this… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrlfZp-hDCg
And their website has some details on it too… http://www.falkentire.com/Tires/Passenger-Car/Azenis-RT-615K-14