[Shotimes] New tires - review included

[Steve Tatro]

Since I saved sooo much money on my a/c repair by doing it myself, I decided
it was time to get some new shoes for the SHO.  Actually I had ordered them
a month ago, but what the heck.  I finally got them put on Saturday morning.
225/55/16 ContiExtreme directionals.  $82 from TireRack, but I got them
installed for a grand total of $390 from a local shop (who I think gets
tires even cheaper from TireRack).  These are installed on the 16"x6.5" Gen3
SHO wheel, BTW.

It was raining Saturday, so I got to test them in wet conditions.  They
performed very well, although I'm sure a bit of that perceived performance
is simply because I have NEW tires, versus the old worn-down dry-rotted
tires I discarded.

I was able to do some cornering this morning in dry conditions, and they're
night-and-day different than the old tires, even when brand new.  For
reference, I previously had Sumitomo Srixon4 in 215/60/16 (H-rated).  Not a
bad tire for the money, lasted me a relatively long time, stayed nice and
round, did fine in the little bit of rain and snow we get around here.

Anyway, I'm glad to have new rubber.  My old ones were, as I mentioned,
dry-rotting and had worn down to the wear indicator bars.  They were no
longer a pleasure to drive on in the rain, needless to say!

Oh, and I found out that tires come stamped with sort of a "born on date".
You can tell if your tires have been sitting in a warehouse for years (if an
older model) by looking at the sticker on said tires.  For example, mine
were manufactured the 37th week of 2003, so they're pretty fresh.  No
dry-rot for me ;^)

Now if I just knew how to take care of them!

Steve Tatro
Red/Black '93 with 171k miles (and new shoes)
Cincinnati, Ohio