205 Handling? Whats good???

[matt205]

Hey GTI124, you might already know that the MXV3A are not longer being made and are replaced by the Primacy according to Bob Jane, i can get the Preceda in my size but is it worth the extra $25 a tyre, the guy at Bob Janes does'nt think so.

He probably just can't supply them or has extra stock of the premacy's. Years ago when I was a young fella I got some bad advice from a Bob Jane guy, recommended I fit 205's to my twin cam corolla (175's as standard from memory) at the time, it handled like a bag of sh!t, I suspect he had a set their and saw me a as a way to offload them, obvioulsy this is just my experience but ever since I've been wary of the big tyre store chains. I should have taken the car back and insisted on them changing them, but being young and naive I did want to admit I made a bad decision....

I've always had good performance from Pirelli's, I'm running P7000's at the moment and previously ran P700-Z's. I've also been driving on some Continentals lately in other cars and these are very impressive. For anyone in Sydney I can recommend a good "independant" tyre dealer, I've been dealing with him for more than 12 years and he knows his stuff including motorsport tyres. PM me if you want contact details.

I've heard alot of people over the years say that you need to run Michellins on Pug's cause "thats what they're designed around", I think this is a little naive. I found that with a better performance tyre, like the Pirelli's, the handling stays the same just the grip level increases. I ran Yokohama A008R's while I was doing some club racing a while ago and again the handling characteristics where the same the level of grip was just much, much higher, they only lasted 10k's though! I notice now that Pirelli's are standard on most performance Pugs, I know the 307 XSI comes with P-Zero Rosso's, a very high performance tyre indeed!

The S3 orginally had 185/55, and when I got the car it had 195/55, is there a difference in ride if you go to 50 series tyres!

195/55 is definetly the wrong size for the 205, running this size will adversly affect handling and also acceleration. 195/50/15 is the best size for a good ride/handling balance. The ride will be slightly firmer but pay off is better turn-in, feedback and grip.

 

[pugsy]

Thnaks Matt, I had a chat to the guy at Bob Janes the guy I had spoken to before wasn't there and this guy was really helpful, I'm going to stick with 195/55 as I think the car is fine with this profile, I should get the tyres on by Thursday and see how i go, I am going to Precedas as I have been offered a good deal on them, I stick with Michelins because in the past when i have changed brands they have not lasted and have been generally crap.

 

[PeterT]

I'm going to stick with 195/55 as I think the car is fine with this profile,

I'd be looking at tyre web site to check on the rolling radius. 195/55x15 are std. fitment to Mi16's.

 

[matt205]

195/55's were standard on the Mi-16 and S16, possibly GTi-6 as well. I think you are doing your Pug and yourself a disservice by running oversized rubber, if anything you'b be better going back to a 185/55.

185/55/15 rolling diameter = 585mm
195/55/15 rolling diameter = 596mm
195/50/15 rolling diameter = 576mm
205/50/15 rolling diameter = 586mm

Rolling diameter has quite a profound effect on acceleration...

Don't be scared to shop around and look at other brands, I agree there is some crap out there but don't be brainwashed by the French car, French tyre philosophy that many people spout...

 

[matt205]

Forgot to metion too, I saw nearly 50k's out of a set of Pirelli P700-Z's once, these were classed as an "ultra-high performance" tyre at the time, not exactly gentle driving either.

 

[nJm]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume you're talking GTi's

I've been getting plenty of lifts around in a lovely series 1.5 205 GL 1.1L 5 door. Beautifully soft ride, more bodyroll than my 505 GR, plenty of understeer or lift off on a damp road and heaps and heaps of oversteer. Lovely little cars, um, yeah maybe.

Mind you this one is fully sick with its 145/80R13 Pirelli rubber, rubbery, vague manual steering and dead gearbox :roflmao:

 

[pugsy]

Oh crap! I have already ordered 2 michelin precedas in 195/55, they should be here today they had to be specically ordered. I rang the bloke at Bob Jane and he said there is little between the two sizes about 2-3% and it would not make much of a difference. He also said the load rating between the tyres may be different and may make the 50 series illegal, but with so little difference i doubt it. I went to www.205gti.com and checked out the tyre comparision calculator and there is about a 3.2% difference between the two so pretty close.
I have so far got over 43,000 k's out of the last michelins and i am not sure how many k's the previous owner did, because the tyres had to specially ordered I don't think I can change over. Thanks for the advice and I will keep it in mind for next time.

 

[Luca]

You can have the best tires in the world on the pug but so long as you've got the existing mcpherson set up u're going no where.

I'd say in order of priority get the thing lowered on nice springs (Eibach) to bring the centre of gravity down and get the body roll to a minimum, then put some nice 15's with wider rubber than the standard 185 and lastly worry about the "getting the power to the ground" and put a LSD.

 

[S Chung]

Luca,

where did you get your car lowered, by how much and what did it cost?
I already have a set of koni adjustables but want to drop the car about 30mm
Cheers

 

[matt205]

You can have the best tires in the world on the pug but so long as you've got the existing mcpherson set up u're going no where.

I think your under-estimating the value of good rubber here. Given the choice between Koni's or Bilsteins lowered springs, lowered torions bars or a good set of rubber, I'd choose the rubber everytime.

I remember a guy with a Pulsar Q a few years ago who spent big on lowering, rock hard springs and shocks and then skimped on tyres. He was 2 seconds a lap slower at Oran Park south than when the car was stock. The 205 has excellent "mechanical" grip due to it's outstanding chassis the wrong setup can cause a big step backwards. Tyres are simple and relatively cheap way of improving the cars handling dramatically.

I'll put my stock suspended 205 with Dunlop D01's against any modded 205 on average rubber any day.