Tyres: Bridgestone S02 or S03?
Discussion
My S02's are approaching the end of their brief existance and I am a little worried about some of the comments regarding the S03 replacement. Since Griffs are slidey things anyway Tyres are rather important. Has anyone become converted to a religion other than Bridgestone? If so, why?
SO2s are still available so if you don't want to use SO3s stay with them.
As for other makes, I've tried many others including Yokohama AVS and nothing else gets close. As for S03 rumours, I've heard nothing but good but the guys that I have talked to are very careful to run them in and get a few heat/cool cycles in them to finish the curing and get rid of the slippery release agent. Failure to do this means you have a tyre with the grip of wet vinyl... If you don'tfollow this, then it is easy to jump to the wrong conclusions. This process should be followed with almost any tyre BTW.
The production car sprint community by and large all use Bridgestones and have done for several years. If there was an advantage to be had with a different make, trust me we would have swapped!
Steve
www.tvrbooks.co.uk
As for other makes, I've tried many others including Yokohama AVS and nothing else gets close. As for S03 rumours, I've heard nothing but good but the guys that I have talked to are very careful to run them in and get a few heat/cool cycles in them to finish the curing and get rid of the slippery release agent. Failure to do this means you have a tyre with the grip of wet vinyl... If you don'tfollow this, then it is easy to jump to the wrong conclusions. This process should be followed with almost any tyre BTW.
The production car sprint community by and large all use Bridgestones and have done for several years. If there was an advantage to be had with a different make, trust me we would have swapped!
Steve
www.tvrbooks.co.uk
Drive the car so that the tyres heat up and then let them cool down. Repeat half a dozen times and there you are. Does not require aggressive 200 m of black lines. Some spirited driving is really all that is needed. What typically happens is that people drive on the tyres but don't get them hot enough or if they do, don't let them cool down. The process needs to cycle and be repeated. If you don't do this and the first time they get hot, then there is a danger that they will overheat and suddenly all that nice rubber you paid for starts to come off the time and you get very heavy wear.
This process gets also gets rid of the release agent which can make the tyres very slippery although this will eventually go away after a few hundred miles anyway.
You should do the same thing with brake pads as well.
Regards
Steve
This process gets also gets rid of the release agent which can make the tyres very slippery although this will eventually go away after a few hundred miles anyway.
You should do the same thing with brake pads as well.
Regards
Steve
Think my SO2's were about 280 the pair fitted, 245s like yours. Judging by chatter elsewhere on here, you can do slightly better than that, but might have to be prepared to travel.
It was last winter when I got mine done, and I couldn't be arsed to travel anywhere far as my existing ones were down to the wear bars.
It was last winter when I got mine done, and I couldn't be arsed to travel anywhere far as my existing ones were down to the wear bars.
quote:
Some spirited driving is really all that is needed. What typically happens is that people drive on the tyres but don't get them hot enough or if they do, don't let them cool down.
So what are we saying 10-15 mins thrash followed by a cup of coffee followed by anothe rthrash etc.? I think I could set asside a morning to do that!
could this be the problem with my SO3's which feel like plastic ? I bought my SO 2's last october and drove normally, they were excellent tyres. If this is crucial to preparing tyres for road use why did my old tyres perform ok and these new SO 3's not, also should there not be some advice from the manufacturer regarding this
ps Bridgestone are sending an engineer out to inspect them on monday after I emailed them
Edited by apache on Friday 16th November 12:58
ps Bridgestone are sending an engineer out to inspect them on monday after I emailed them
Edited by apache on Friday 16th November 12:58
I can remember the same arguments when the S)2 came out compared to the S01...
As for a 10-15 minute thrash. I said get the tyres hot. A thrash (like on a track) could wreck them in 10-15 minutes. Use some common sense with this.
Steve
www.tvrbooks.co.uk
As for a 10-15 minute thrash. I said get the tyres hot. A thrash (like on a track) could wreck them in 10-15 minutes. Use some common sense with this.
Steve
www.tvrbooks.co.uk
quote:
If this is crucial to preparing tyres for road use why did my old tyres perform ok and these new SO 3's not, also should there not be some advice from the manufacturer regarding this
I have seen the warning to take things easy for a few hundred miles at many tyre places. It's just that everyone is used to Schuey strapping on a brand new set of tyres and setting a lap record.
Pete Humphries experienced this slippery when running in when he had new tyres on his V8S and went sprinting on them. I've experienced it too but we both find that heat cycling solves the problem and it is very common practice for the sprinting community to do this.
As for why not with S02s? If it is hot enough, just normal driving will get the tyres hot. Stopping for traffic will let them cool down. Some reasonable mileage like this and there you go. With the colder and slippery conditions today, this is unlikely to happen and so the heat cycling doesn't occur.
quote:
Thanks Steve (shpub) You sound like you know what you are on about so I am going to go with your advice. Cheers
The 520 gets through 20-24 tyres a season so I am constantly replacing them. Rears last around 800-1000 miles or a track day. Getting the tyres conditioned is essential to get the grip I need. One of the drawbacks of having 150 brake more than a chipped Griff 500 at 6000 rpm and capable of holding over 1 G sideways on bends...
Regards
Steve
I've just sent this email to Bridgestone because they appear not to believe the value of their customers, can anyone offer any more suggestions as to how I deal with this?
I have just had one of your engineers checking my new tyres on my TVR Griffith. He kept my wife hanging around for most of the afternoon and even took the car for a test drive against her wishes. The result was that he found flat spots which were caused by the tyres breaking away. I used to use SO 2's which were excellent, these SO 3's are lethal, I have lost traction under acceleration on a dry surface, on a roundabout and my wife has slid out of a junction into oncoming traffic. I am not happy, my wife is not happy, I expect a Company of Bridgestones size and reputation to honour the 30 day warranty that is on this tyre as stated on your website and refund the cost of purchase. If you want this to become a public and legal issue then I am quite prepared for that. Peter Wheeler, the chairman of TVR, has had them removed from all his cars so it must be obvious that there is a problem for this to happen. Please let me know of your intentions to resolve this matter
I have just had one of your engineers checking my new tyres on my TVR Griffith. He kept my wife hanging around for most of the afternoon and even took the car for a test drive against her wishes. The result was that he found flat spots which were caused by the tyres breaking away. I used to use SO 2's which were excellent, these SO 3's are lethal, I have lost traction under acceleration on a dry surface, on a roundabout and my wife has slid out of a junction into oncoming traffic. I am not happy, my wife is not happy, I expect a Company of Bridgestones size and reputation to honour the 30 day warranty that is on this tyre as stated on your website and refund the cost of purchase. If you want this to become a public and legal issue then I am quite prepared for that. Peter Wheeler, the chairman of TVR, has had them removed from all his cars so it must be obvious that there is a problem for this to happen. Please let me know of your intentions to resolve this matter
quote:
He kept my wife hanging around for most of the afternoon and even took the car for a test drive against her wishes. The result was that he found flat spots which were caused by the tyres breaking away. I used to use SO 2's which were excellent, these SO 3's are lethal, I have lost traction under acceleration on a dry surface, on a roundabout and my wife has slid out of a junction into oncoming traffic.
I'm stuck with S02PPs at the moment because of the sprint class regs but I'm interested to know whether there are really any problems with the S03s.
I've got mixed reactions from your post. I expect the flat spots were caused by your wife locking up when she overshot the junction? How was the mechanic supposed to tell whether the tyres were behaving 'normally' without driving the car? If you have changed from bald tyres to new ones you will get a dramatic change in feel, also the new ones will improve considerably after they have been fully cured. This time of year they will probably not cure just with normal driving. Have you done, or asked for, a back-to-back comparision of new S02 versus new S03?
You may well have a valid point, but from your post it isn't clear that you do.
Cheers,
Peter Humphries (and a green V8S)
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