Anyone have these on their F-Type? No need for all season tires in the desert sw.

​​​​​​I am looking at 305/30 r20 on the tail and stock on the nose.

 

My 2016 Ftype R is down in Florida right now (and I am not) so I only recall that the stock rear was 295 and 20".. I put 305 Michelin tires on and they fit good.. look good.. drives great.
Left fronts the same size.. (rear wheel drive car)
Lawrence

 

I put Michelin PSS on my wife's V6 and they stick better and are more comfortable. But they are softer than the stock P Zeros and flex more on turn in, making the steering feel less crisp to me. I think they are the perfert GT tires for the V6.

One thing I hate about Michelin performance tires is that they aren't black. Drives me crazy, but most people don't care or even prefer gray. On second thought, maybe gray on black wheels would set off the rims?

For my V8 I want a good street racing tire that both handles and grips, especially off the line. The P Zeros handle well but they don't have any straight line bite. Nittos have a great reputation, but I've never owned a set.

 

Have a set of these at the house right now - but they are a summer tire and it's way too cold up here to be putting them on just yet. Sadly, won't be able to drive on them until the spring probably.

 

I had Nitto 555 on my Vette yrs ago. Loved them. Great price, great performance.

 

I've read that the only way the Hellcat guys can get good traction is with the Nittos...but they don't last long on the street.

 

I took the plunge, plus upped the rears to 305.

First impressions:

​​​​​​I wanted to love these tires, but NT555 G2s are no match for my F-Types 540 whp. Wheel spin is so excessive I'm unable to launch anywhere near full power.

I'm hoping todays 45-55F temperatures and a lack off break-in time is the culprit, but if something doesn't tighten up soon, I might exchange for Mich Super Sports.

Cornering impressions are a lack of rear end grip making the car to quick oversteer. It's progessive enough to catch but as a result I can't corner as hard as the PZeros.

Road noise is a bit more noticeable but not bad on smooth roads. On rougher highway surfaces the road noise finds some weird reasonances. The sound is hard to describe, but to me it sounds like the worbley whistle they use to make a spaceship sound on TV.
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So far the straight-line slippery but corner connected P-Zeros win on all counts. Maybe when March brings 80-90F temps?

 

Good info! thanks!!

 

 

Update:

In the warmer weather (62F) and after a 100 miles, the Nittos are getting both better and worse.

Better, in that grip and directional stability has improved substantially, to the point of being only slightly less locked-in compared to the OEM P-Zeros. 0-60 times are still going to suffer since they slip through all of first gear with traction control half-off. Also on the good size, losing grip is very predictable, controllable, and fun. Accellerating out of a corner slides the rear end out so smoothly, you start to get used to angles that are way too extreme for public roads. I have to admit, I kinda like that this tire has so much crazy in her.

Cornering limits are still not as good as OEM, but again departure is completely controlled for a nice progressive lateral slide.

Overall, the Nittos are a little less sticky than the P-Zeros at similar outside air temps, but more controllable when the contact patch is broken. If a Tokyo drift car was what I was looking for, this would be it.

On the bad side, ride quality has deteriorated some, in reverse to the improving grip. There is already a very slight shimmy through the steering wheel at medium speeds. The vibration on rough pavement is worse than the P-Zeros, and the road noise is a bit too loud unless the roads are smooth. Our roads are third world, so this trait is annoying because I can't decide if its the tires' fault or the city's fault given relentless potholes, gulleys, and sprawling road disintegration.

Final thoughts: grip is still no better than the Pirellis I was trying to step up from, maybe a little less, and the ride is definitely a notch worse. In very hot summer temps, they'd probably stick pretty good, but there is a lot of comprimise required with these tires. Thanks to Discount Tire's satisfaction gauranty I have an appointment to put Mich PS4s on early next week with a full credit from the Nittos. PSSs were about 15% less with great reviews, but as Unhingd points out, thats close enough for a slightly better tire and PSS 305s were not in the DT computer anymore, only 295s.

All things considered, the NT555s were not bad tires for the price, just not up to a dyno'd 600 bhp a luxury GT street brawler. I'd imagine they would be a great match for muscle cars up to 400-500 bhp or so, especially for cars that depart unpredictably.

 

 

Yep.
Jimbo is the only commentator I know of who has ever said that the P-Zero is better than the Michelin PSS or PS4S in any way, most say (me included) that the P-Zero is utter crap. Maybe the latest P-Zero is a vast improvement on earlier versions?

 

Where did you read that?

 

In about four hundred posts on this forum and in almost every tyre test involving the P-Zero and the MPSS and/or the MPS4S.

 

Lets try it this way, quote where I said the P-Zero is superior to the MPSS.

 

Sorry Jimbo, it seems you are correct and I jumped to an incorrect conclusion.
Nowhere did you say that the P-Zeros are better than the MPSS or MPS4S, instead you opined that the P-Zeros were better than the Nitto 555s in some ways, and I somehow read this as "P-Zero better than Michelin".

 

Np, I'll post an update when I get MP4Ss on the car soon. The Nittos are getting better with wear and warmer days.

 

Final update:

Thanks to Discount Tire's 30 day guaranty (no affiliation), off came the Nittos and on went the Mich 4Ss. Some will consider it blasphemous, but I went with 305s on the rear and dropped to 245s on the front for three reasons:

1. My fronts had a few mms of tire wall poke, looks perfect now
2. The fronts have no traction issue as the rears break away first
3. I'm trend-setting for the McLaren 720s which copied my raked set-up, except they cheaped-out on 19" front wheels.

To make it easy, here are my subjective ratings on the areas I happen to care about, in no order. All three options were brand new minus a few hundred miles break-in. Max warm OAT was 70F, the Nittos may have performed better in hot weather.

P-Zero OEM
Ride: 8
Hwy noise: 7
Turn-in/lack of sidewall roll: 10
Cornering grip: 8
Launch grip (RWD): 6
Gear 1 thru 4 wheel spin (8-speed): 5
Lost contact patch predictability: 5
Wet traction: 7
Cold traction (<50F): 7
​​​​​​Warm traction (>50F): 8
Looks (side/rear) : 8/8
Price: 6
​Value: 8

Nitto NT555 G2
Ride: 5
Hwy noise: 5
Turn-in/lack of sidewall roll: 5
Cornering grip: 7
Launch grip (RWD): 5 (warm)
Gear 1 thru 4 wheel spin (8-speed): 5
Lost contact patch predictability: 10
Wet traction: 8
Cold traction (<50F): 3
​​​​​​Warm traction (>50F): 7
Looks (side/rear) : 6/11
Price: 9
Value: 6

Michelin Pilot 4S
Ride: 8
Hwy noise: 8
Turn-in/lack of sidewall roll: 10
Cornering grip: 10
Launch grip (RWD): 7
Gear 1 thru 4 wheel spin (8-speed): 8
Lost contact patch predictability: 7
Wet traction: 9
Cold traction (<50F): 8
​​​​​​Warm traction (>50F): 10
Looks (side/rear) : 7/4 (gray, generic tread)
Price: 4
Value: 9

 

I would imagine a stagger like that would give you bad understeer. That was a problem for me when I first put on 255/305. Bumping the fronts to 265 solved the problem.

 

The OEM P-Zeros 255/295 were balanced but RWD throttle easily kicked out the rear end, fast. I don't consider that wrong.

The Nittos actually severly oversteered with the stepped-down fronts, the fat rears slipped out without throttle. I think that was partly front sidewall roll before rear. They were so predictable, I started to like it, but without off-the-line capability I couldn't live with them.

I seem to have good balance so far with the 4Ss 245/305 setup, but I don't track the car. As long as they are constructed well, thinner tires have more normal-force at the same weight than wider tires.