kcoTiger

Mine's 1/4" below stock ride height in those pictures. When I run it in events, I drop it another inch to help with downforce. You also have to consider hard turns which press the front end down further on one side, creating the tightest fit the tires will have to survive. Turning the wheels out on those 888's, you could see how close they came to the front fender in race trim. Your ride height right now is roughly where mine was from the dealership, perhaps 1/4" lower but certainly no more than that. If the front wheels have enough offset, you can easily run a 275 width without interference on your car.

m05fastbackGT

I understand where your coming from regarding having enough offset..
My only concern is the larger the offset, also pulls the wheel further into the wheel well closer to both the struts and sway bar links..

So my question is this.. Will my 20x9.5 Steeda wheels with 45mm offset clear both the struts and sway bar links with 275-35-20" tires ?

kcoTiger

I can't answer that definitively, because both suspensions I've worked with are different than what you've got on yours. If you're really not sure, I'd get in touch with Steeda and let them know what you have installed. They should be able to answer that better than I could without seeing it physically. One of the benefits of the KW setup I use, aside from ride/rebound/damper adjustment, is the much greater space between the hub/rotor and the suspension components themselves. The bilsteins eat a good bit more space than what I have now.

m05fastbackGT

Trust me, I did over 2 weeks of research both on here and on S197 forums long before making my final decision.. And I most definitely let Steeda know what my concerns were in addition to going over with them the suspension mods I've already done such as the Eibach pro springs, Koni sport yellow adj struts/shocks and GT500 strut mounts.. After they assured me that I wouldn't run across any clearance issues, I then proceeded with placing the order..

However I still wanted to get some unbiased feedback/opinions just for my own piece of mind anyhow

kcoTiger

I don't blame you, chunking that kind of money at something you're not 100% sure is going to fit the way it needs to isn't exactly fun. Not all 275-width tires have the same profile when they're on a wheel, some are more square at the shoulder and some are more rounded, etc. If Steeda told you they'd fit after the feedback you'd given them about the suspension, I wouldn't worry about it. You should be good with what you're going with.

m05fastbackGT

You sure got that right, especially when it concerns chunking over 2k..
As you most definitely want to make certain the parts purchased are going to fit properly and despite the fact that Steeda has been in the performance industry for nearly 30 years, it's still reassuring to get feedback from fellow Mustang owners who can provide an unbiased opinion based upon their own experiences and knowledge.. It's just like you said, not all tires have the same profile despite having similar sizes in common, just as wheels are not all the same, as they each have different offsets/backspacing even though they may share the same dimensional width..

I was also considering BFG g-force sport comp 2's, Nitto invo's and Sumitomo HTR Z III's, but in the end I went with Steeda's recommendation and selected the Nitto NT555 G2's as my tire choice..

At any rate, your once again right, as I shouldn't have anything to worry about when it comes to purchasing parts from Steeda, as they've been engineering and designing quality Mustang parts at or above OEM standards for nearly 30 years.. Therefore I really don't believe they would just sell a product to one of their customers, if they were fully aware of the fact that the product would neither function nor fit properly in the first place lol.

dmichaels

I made it on my computer here, so a bit more feedback

I decided to run the G2's again at Limerock today as the weather forecast was questionable. Turned out I got 3 dry sessions before the rain moved in, so I got about an hour of seat time and ~75 more track miles on the tires today.

Wear: Minimal wear after putting on about 125 total track miles at Limerock. This particular track is brutal on the drivers front tire, and I rotated the wheels after about 50 miles to keep wear even. That said, the tires held up very well with minimal wear, as I'd expect with a 320 treadwear tire. There is a very small amount of chunking on the left front tire, nowhere else though. I pushed them about as hard as I could today

Subjective review: Once I dialed in pressures (my best results came with the hot tire pressure at around 38), the floaty-ness that I noted yesterday was quite a bit better, and the tires really did not grease up at all, despite me driving the car hard. With the square setup, the car was quite neutral on these and I could induce great rotation with lift throttle, as you will be able to hear in the video below, especially through Big Bend (turn 1) and the left hander into the right hander (turns 2 and 3). When the rear stepped out, it was very controlled and the tires give just enough audio feedback to warn as the limit was reached. The sidewall is definitely more flexible/soft than the R888's or BFG R1's, but that's very much expected. The tires worked really well at the track today though! And on the ride home, they are very comfy riding along all surfaces. Lastly, the skies opened up on my drive home, so I finally got some drive time in very wet conditions. Only brought it up to about 75 mph, but zero indications of hydroplaning, and the grip accelerating was perfectly reasonable. I tossed on my R888's right afterwards to support tomorrow's track day and took them to get take out - difference is very noticable. The R888's break away MUCH sooner. I don't have any lap data in the wet, as I'm a track brat and pretty much only go out when it's dry now

The data: So lap times and data are the most telling! I got Limerock times down to 1.04.7 today, which is exactly 0.11 seconds slower than the Sumitomo HTR ZIII's when I ran them. Worth noting, they were 275 rear and 255 front compared with the 265 square setup I have now. Minor difference, but worth noting. I will say though, they HOWLED and got greasy. The Nitto's take the track heat better so far. I prefer them thus far. As far as braking performance, they were able to pull about 0.9 lineal g's from the quick data review I saw. The highest cornering forces I saw were about 1.2 g's in the uphill compression zone, and about 1.1 in the "normal" corners. This is on par with the Sumi's and the OEM Pirelli's. For reference, I pull 1.4 in the uphill on R888's and 1.2 in "normal" corners. Doesn't sound like much, but it's good for about 2.5 seconds faster lap times at Limerock. But those are dedicated track tires!

Anyways, here is some video footage from today on the Nitto's


And for reference, here are some laps on the Sumi's.

Lastly, here is a lap on BFG R1's

kcoTiger

Thanks for the info, and especially the videos. Yeah, those 888's are loads of fun in the rain. That's what solid tread block will do, regardless of the grooves in the tire. I swear those tread grooves were designed by the chief engineer's 3rd grade child because they're worthless in the wet stuff.

5.M0NSTER

Hey Derek, great write up and I think just about what is to be expected. They were on Par with the Sumi's which are in the max performance summer, while the Nitto is in Ultra High Performance summer category. So kudos to Nitto for almost matching a tire in the next level up.

I know you're very well aware, but for the rest of us here there is a huge gap between the max perf summer and track tires. The R1s and R888 are in the race track and autocross only tire categoty. That's 3 layers above where the Sumi's and Nitto's reside.

The order is Ultra High Performance summer --> Max Perf summer --> extreme performace summer --> streetable track and competition --> race track and autox only.

SGwick

where do NT05s classify?

5.M0NSTER

NT05s? I'm not familiar with those.

NT05 is max performance summer while NT05R is drag competition tire. And NT01s are race and autox only

EDIT. NT05's as in plural, not NT05S. Sorry, I'm slow!

SGwick

lol, no worries :-) thx

dmichaels

Yup, I was not surprised with the results at all. It was good to get track time on them - I put on about 125 track miles over 2 days. I probably will not put these tires on the track again, since I have better tires suited for that duty, but I'm glad I was able to get data to support the testing! Street duty for them going forward, and on that front I am very very happy... they are quiet, sticky enough to go WOT, and make for a very comfortable ride on my stock wheels!! Definitely a better overall ride than the OEM Pirelli's so far!