Bridgestone Tyres On A S2 Elise

[Jamie Triner]

Hi there,

 

Im sure this has been asked before. 

 

I got a 111s s2 elise 2003. Rear tyres have gone and now needing some new ones. I have the standard bridgestone potenzas on the front. Would like to keep all the tyres the same. Ive read that i need to get the re040's with a certain code on them. 

 

My question is I've seen bridgestone potenzas like the s001 and the re050a. Could i put any other on, would it really make a massive difference? I don't really drive the car extremely hard, do have a lot of fun on the country roads but nothing too wild. 

 

Any help would be great!

 

Cheers

 

Jamie

[DeanB]

Jamie you can.  I run the standard Potenzas up front and have replaced the rears twice now in the last two years (I do a lot of miles).  Both times I got the RE040s, but without the Lotus code I believe.  The last set I bought from a company on the internet (French, I think) and they were £198 for the pair delivered.  They are excellent tyres and I do tend to drive quite hard at times - on track, natch  :-)

[Gary ZBJ]

Slight point, but how old are your fronts? Proper LTS spec tyres have not been made by Bridgestone for a long time. I am not saying you shouldn't stick to Bridgestone but the fronts might need replacing due to age, even if they have tread they might be past their best performance-wise

[TimSportsTourer]

Slight point, but how old are your fronts? Proper LTS spec tyres have not been made by Bridgestone for a long time. I am not saying you shouldn't stick to Bridgestone but the fronts might need replacing due to age, even if they have tread they might be past their best performance-wise

 

I agree with this. Tyres degrade due to age as well as wear. I had rear tyres on a FWD car that lasted for ever and ever. The tread was great, so I thought they were fine. They then delaminated. Big irregularities in the tread if you ran your hand over it (which I didn't, typically), fine cracking in the sidewalls, and growing road noise. I suspected hub bearings, all kinds of suspension badness, but it was the tyres all along. I realise I had been on a knife edge for some time. The difference with new tyres was astonishing. I wished I had replaced them a long time ago.

 

Some people say you should keep tyres no longer than 6 yr, and some say 10 yr is OK. However, having experienced it, I reckon that I'll never drive on a >10y/o tyre again.

 

Sorry – this is a bit of a thread hijack, and doesn't really answer your question, but I hope it's helpful nonetheless.

[daves2111s]

I had a similar issue on mine a few years ago.

The fronts outlasted two sets of rears so we're about 8 years old.

The fronts would lock up very easily under braking and felt quite intimerdating at times.

So swapped all round to AD07's and it was just so much better and now I feel I could use more brakes.

Probably down to the usually heavily servo assisted weak right foot though!

[Jamie Triner]

Thanks for the information guys, 

 

Going to have to pop down my local tyre place and spend some money! 

[Wildspark]

What's the recommended max age for the LTS Potenzas? I still have them all round. I did check the date codes last year, and I thought they were less than 5 years, which I thought was the max age..

Better check again!