New Michelin Pilot Sports!! - The Unofficial BMW M5 Messageboard (m5board.com)

Rezf · 11th November 2001, 07:58

Michelin has recently unvailed its new Pilot Sport tires which has "AS" (All-Season) designation. For all of us who do not live in a warm climate all year round, this is SUPER!! As Michelin describes the new tire : "Not only will you feel superb grip on dry pavement, but also on wet and frozen roads" This is not an additional tire added to the line-up. It will REPLACE the existing Pilot Sports which are in the market at the present. I think this will be great, especially since as a Michelin driver, I often note the mediocre handling in rain/wet roads.
RezF

PS BTW it has a beautiful and aggressive tread design!

tfung · 11th November 2001, 08:11

hey Rezf,
where did you read about this? any pictures you could share?
Thanks!
Terence

BostonRocket · 11th November 2001, 08:14

Rezf,

Long time no hear buddy. We should meet up for lunch one of these days. Hey where did you see this info on the new Michelins.. I am about 3k more miles from losing all of my tread, and if this is thecase that it is All season, i am buying them!

Please respond soon!

'Rocket

tfung · 11th November 2001, 08:27

just did a search on yahoo and tirerack and found the tires... they're YR rated, and not the ZR rated like the regular pilot sports.. plus the press release didn't say anything about replacing the regular pilot sports... so I think they're going to be two seperate lines....

Rezf · 11th November 2001, 18:40

Hey Terence,
Are you sure it was y-rated? I swear I read it said z-rated. I got the info at the Auto Show, and one of mu buddies said he heard about it in Bimmer.org web site. Anyhow, even y-rated would be suffiecient for our driving, I would think? Y-rated means speeds up to 149mph? or do I have it wrong

RezF

PS Rocket. There is ANOTHER silver M5 '01 in Boston, who parks in the garage at my workplace. Also, I think GreekM5 who lists his location as NJ and Boston will soon be getting his Silver beast. That makes the total count of silvers at NINE that I know of. We should start our own club: The Silver Bullets. What can I say, they all have excellent tastes! The only way I know its you in the streets now is that bad *** rumble coming from your rear

jlvink · 11th November 2001, 19:01

At the Sears Point ALMS race this summer we had a presentation from the Michelin brand marketing manager on the new Pilot Sport AS tires. The tires utilize three different rubber compounds across the tread pattern. It is a new technology (some other tire companies have it as well) that allows them to inject different rubber compounds into a single tire. They illustrated this by passing around AS tire cross sections that had three different colors added to the rubber compounds. The outer treads (both inboard and outboard tread) have the same dry traction compound as the original Pilot Sports, the intermediate tread zone has a compound 1/2 way between the dry and wet compound, and the middle tread zone is the wet compound.

The Michelin folks said that the AS compound would sacrifice some dry gripping traction for better wet/snow performance. The dry traction compound on the outer tire edges minimizes the compromize for dry handling grip since this portion of the tread see's the most action under extreme cornering. The middle portion of the tread where the wet tire compound is placed see's the most action in typical wet/snow applications, thus improving wet handling.

They said that they were going to manufacture both the original and AS compounds for the Pilot Sports.

GreekM5 · 12th November 2001, 04:57

RezF,

Yup... one more week and then my titanium beauty comes in! I'm from NJ but go to Babson College. I love Boston! I've only seen one other titanium m5 in my 2 years there so far. But I have to agree with you, I do have good taste (for color combo).

Us "silver bullets" should meet up some time.

BostonRocket · 12th November 2001, 05:48

Rezf:

Make that TEN silver M5s.. There si a korean kid the I have seen at Auto DesignHaus. He has Bruyere wood on it.. And he also has an AC Schnitzer 3-piece wing on it.. uh huh, interesting..

So wanna meet up for Lunch sometime?

'Rocket

Rezf · 12th November 2001, 06:44

Another_Lap:
I thought the designation 275/35 ZR 18 signifies a Z-rated tire. I'm not sure I understand where the Y-rating comes in? So are our Pilot Sports z-rated or y-rated?

Rocket,

TEN you say, eh? WOW I bet there are alot of states that don't total ten M5s and we got 10 silver ones in this tiny city. Lunch sounds good, it has to be on the weekend

Greek,
We'll have to meet up when you get your car!

RezF

BostonRocket · 12th November 2001, 07:24

Reza,

Yeah let's do it jopefully the next weekend. Black M5 wants us to have a conference call. He wants us to hear what a diablo at 365 KM/H sounds like.. geez...

'Rocket

Bart Carter · 12th November 2001, 07:26

Anytime you buy a tire with enhanced wet performance it is at the expense of dry performance. I avoid them like the plague.

I always look for the maximum dry grip.

Of course I live in Las Vegas.