[chiketkd]

I just picked up a set of 4 lightly used RE070's this past weekend and will mount them on my WRX TR later today. I had a chance to compare them with the 225/45/17 Kumho Ecsta 712's on my car and was amazed...

The tread width of the Kuhmo's measured ~8.25" (actual 8.2" per TireRack) while the RE070's (that are labelled to be in the same size) were ~8.75" (actual 8.7" per TireRack) across! What's even more amazing is that when I looked at the tread width of the OE Lancer Evo 235/45/17 Advan A046, it is listed as being 8.6" (per TireRack).

I'm quite amazed by this and look forward to getting these tires on my WRX as they're one of the only (if not the only) street tire to be design specifically for the Impreza platform.

[sebtarta]

Dont rave to much on them, as they are pretty good on the dry but be careful when on wet and specially heavy rain.
I guess i should not say anything about them in the snow.....

[chiketkd]

LOL! I still have my skinny set of stock 215/45/17 RE-92's in my garage for the winter. They're not the best snow tire, but VA has been getting such little snow in the last 5+ years that they'll more than suffice.

I can't wait to do my first autoX on the RE070's in 2 weeks in Danville, VA!

[wdb]

RE-92's, gaaaahhhhhh! I had those on my '00 Legacy, and they were absolutely awful after about 5K miles.

225mm = 8.858 inches. This tender little truth exposes one of the ways in which some tire companies manage to keep their prices so low, namely by selling what are essentially undersized tires. Bridgestone is one of a few whose tire sizes closely reflect reality.

[chiketkd]

Originally Posted by wdb

RE-92's, gaaaahhhhhh! I had those on my '00 Legacy, and they were absolutely awful after about 5K miles.

225mm = 8.858 inches. This tender little truth exposes one of the ways in which some tire companies manage to keep their prices so low, namely by selling what are essentially undersized tires. Bridgestone is one of a few whose tire sizes closely reflect reality.

Yeah, re-92's really aren't the greatest, but I'll only have them on my car for 3-4 months out of the year. I probably only have 3-4K miles on the set in my garage.

That's a very interesting tid bit of info right there...

[ValvetrainEngineer]

I'd like to know how you measured tire width with that kind of accuracy. Given the tire curvature and all I have to measure with is a tape measure...I couldn't do better than +/- 0.25"...

[chiketkd]

Originally Posted by ValvetrainEngineer

I'd like to know how you measured tire width with that kind of accuracy. Given the tire curvature and all I have to measure with is a tape measure...I couldn't do better than +/- 0.25"...

The tires I measured all had 90%+ tread life remaining with even wear across the width of the tread. The Kumho's were actually easier to measure as the edge of the tread was a very defined line. I used a taught cable to measure off the 'perceived' tread width, and then measured the cable with my vernier caliper. I repeated this three times on each brand of tire (the RE070's were definitely trickier as the edge of the tread is much harder to determine - my first measurement came in at a hair under 9" until I got a better determination of where the tread ended on both edges).

I did a bunch of advanced Math & Chemistry in high school and college, but graduated as a Philosophy major. I guess I'm still a science geek at heart.

[wdb]

Originally Posted by ValvetrainEngineer

I'd like to know how you measured tire width with that kind of accuracy. Given the tire curvature and all I have to measure with is a tape measure...I couldn't do better than +/- 0.25"...

If you are asking where I got that figure, it was from mathematically converting mm to inches. I didn't physically measure anything. And I rounded it from 8.8582410".

[sciolist]

Originally Posted by ValvetrainEngineer

I'd like to know how you measured tire width with that kind of accuracy. Given the tire curvature and all I have to measure with is a tape measure...I couldn't do better than +/- 0.25"...

Jeebus, you're an engineer?

Put the tire face-down on a flat surface. Lay a level accross the top. Measure from the face of the level contacting the tire to the resting surface. If the tire's bead stands proud of the shoulder, you can easily subtract out for that.

[ValvetrainEngineer]

haha...the real trick I was getting at was measuring 8"+ with a tape measure and reporting out to hundredths of an inch. But large vernier calipers would take care of that. The other issue that hasn't been mentioned is inflation pressure. Frankly the best technique is measurements of contact patch width measured with the tire on the car...