Thought it could be fun to start a thread sort of like the "What did you do to your MINI today" thread, but for when you buy new tires.

You know you need new tires when:
1) You look at your tires thinking "I can get another track day out of these..." and you have to admit to yourself no, you can't.
2) You start understeering like Sebastian Vettel at Monza (2018, lap 1, turn 4)
3) You look at your tires and you hear that line from Game of Thrones, "Winter is coming...."

Here's what a set of Michelin Pilot Super Sports looks like after 31,000 miles and 5 track days:



The picture makes it look better than it actually was, less than 1mm left. Used up the 30K mile treadwear rating and then some. I waited for the $70 off on Michelins to come around at Costco, then ordered while they had the 1 cent installation special Got the new set of Michelin PS4s installed this morning, so far very happy. Funny how the installers always take my car for the "test drive" when I get new tires, but never my wife's car.

Let's hear your completions for "You know you need new tires when..." and see what you replaced!

 

Sunday morning at a motel in Kamiah ID doing my pre-flight walk around discovered that for some unknown reason the off side front tire had none of those alternating light and dark stripes. It was completely bald. There is a tire shop right across the street...not open on Sunday. We now know more about Kamiah than we intended but drove away late the next morning not worrying about tire failure somewhere in the Montana wilderness.

 

I would not have waited so long to replace your worn tires as shown in your picture. They were long past replacement if used during any wet conditions or on the track.

Every time you go on the track and with every check of air pressure you should examine tires for even wear for any problems. Tires may not wear evenly on all four corners so it's common to have maybe two of the four not so bad and one or two that are worn down enough to replace. You need all four tires to be able to handle bad weather or whatever you throw at them.

For Max Summer tires I would be lucky to get 12,000 to 15,000 street miles out of a set before replacement. Usually once you install and use the new tires you can really tell the difference and how badly the old tires were performing.

You did get pretty even wear (on the middle treads of the picture) but the shoulders don't show and I expect not all of the tires were so good especially the fronts. Front tires typically get a lot of use and wear shoulders easily especially with track use.

 

It was the last track day in mid-August that did these in, it really counts as two track days since I would do my session then hand the car over to my son for his session. I rotate the tires every 5K and check the wear regularly, all 4 were pretty even. I was for sure past due for tires, we haven't seen rain in the SF Bay area for about 6 months and I was definitely hearing "Winter is coming...." in my head while waiting for the new ones to arrive. No way I would have gotten away with it (or even tried) if I lived somewhere with regular rain.

 

4) You rear ended the car in front of you and your brakes are in fine shape. You do need some gripping action for the car to stop.

* no pics as I've never let my tires get to that condition. But I see them all the time when going through a parking lot.

 

5. When the cords are showing
6. If you are really poor, when the air is showing.

Seriously, there is nothing wrong with bald tires as long as there is no moisture in the picture. In San Diego people get away with that for years but get caught out mightily at times. Looking at the OP's tires, that looks close to what you would shave the tires to for competition use. I imagine the rubber has hardened up quite a bit though!

 

I mean I see what you're saying, but that isn't advice I'd give to anyone I live in a lowish area, and I can feel the effect of tread wear intensifying from month 6 on or so. Balled tires sound like a nightmare!

 

 

Yeah that was a pretty big fail. I bet he had a hard time explaining that to the team.

The idea for this thread was when you buy new tires, show us the old ones and tell us what made you finally decide that they were done. In my case, I really was starting to understeer like Vettel did... on my commute home, there's a place where I can safely push the limits of the tires without risking life or property, so I was well aware of the loss of grip.

 

When the other guy at the track is faster than you........better get new tires.