You have a set of winter tires. Don't neuter your car in the other three seasons. Buy the MPSS tires and don't look back; they're the best mid-range summer tire out there.

 

You have a set of winter tires. Don't neuter your car in the other three seasons. Buy the MPSS tires and don't look back; they're the best summer tire out there.

Corrected. Best tire I have had on my 11 year old WRX.

 

"all-season performance".

Oxymoron.

It really depends on how important "spirited" driving is to you. If the only time you push the car's limit of traction is the occasional on-ramp, I wouldn't bother with the Michelin Super Sports. Get an all-season tire that lasts for more miles and probably gets better MPG. I have the Super Sports and I like them. But if I didn't get the opportunity for the occasional blast on the windy roads in my area, I wouldn't have chosen them. Though neither would I have chosen a WRX.

 

Corrected. Best tire I have had on my 11 year old WRX.

I don't believe you've had a tire in the next level...you had the Dunlop Z1 SS tires, which used to be my "mid-range" recommendation.

 

Z1 SS? Star Specs? Yes I have. What is the high range?

 

Thanks for the replies. I went with the MPSS. Getting them installed tomorrow. Just too many sources out there raving about this tire. I figure, what the heck, you only live once. If they only last 15-20k miles, I'll deal with it then.

 

I also have MPSS's on my car and I am very happy with them. Unless you are driving super aggressive or tracking the car they should last longer than 15-20K. I think they are rated around 30K miles. I find them to be heads and shoulders above the stock rubber.

Definitely make sure to get a good alignment.

 

You will be very happy with the MPSS. I will likely need to replace the set I have sometime this warm weather season.

Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 will be available in 18"+ sizes soon. If they offered 17" I'd consider those. They are optimized for dry conditions. The "old" MPSS excel in the wet when relatively new.

 

I'm just curious as to why more people don't run the nitto NT05 on our cars. It seems like on most other sporty cars, and especially high HP cars, they're the street tire of choice, but when it comes to "the Subaru world" much like everything else, the MPSS is the most hyped thing out there, just as there's something "hyped" in every other category. I know nothing gets hype because it's an awful product, but if someone just built their car via forum search, then everyone would have a Subaru with:

Accessport Stage 2, Q300, RPF1's, MPSS Tires, BC Racing coils, Whiteline Front/Rear Sways..... you get the picture.

 

Ive had Nitto mud tires before. They were horrible. Everyone raved about them but they were 100% sub par in every single aspect of the tire.

Since then I refuse to buy anything nitto they were that bad.

 

Well, I've had the super sports for about 8 days. Definitely a good tire, but as luck would have it I got an unrepairable flat. Of course, I got the last set in the area. The Guy at NTB said he only had the pilot sport a/s 3's. I didn't want to switch models, but I had no choice. I had him put the A/S 3 on. The guy swore up and down that it wouldn't harm the car. I was skeptical, since I had heard that Subarus don't do well different tires. Am I being overly concerned?

 

The radial difference between tread patterns can damage the diff and trans over time. That's with any car thougj

 

It messes with the awd system its hard on the diff's and can cause the traction lights to come on. Typically as long as the tire is the exact same diameter you should be alright but I would always recommend the same tire all the way around on anything full time awd.

 

As others have said, you don't really want to do this. I'm really surprised that a tire shop would have recommended it.

On a 2WD vehicle, you still want to have identical tires on the same axle. You will get slightly different traction from them under normal conditions but, more importantly, is the way they disperse water. One tread pattern will cope better in the rain than the other. If you have to brake hard in the rain, you'll be getting better traction from the all-season tire which could cause the car to rotate. Ok, so that's a pretty extreme case, but you get the idea.

Then there's the fact that this is AWD. If you have differential problems and you take the car to Subaru, they're gonna' deny all liability because you didn't follow their strict guidelines for tires. A tire shop is not expected to know Subaru's tire recommendations, but they definitely should know not to advise different tires on the same axle.

 

I don't know that it would harm your car, but like this guy^^^ said, I really don't know why a tire shop would recommend it, just as a liability on their part, because though you may ride that way for 50,000 miles and have no issues, you COULD, and that's usually more risk than they're willing to take.

 

I would return that tire and never take a recommendation from this tire shop again.

Install winter tires, measure thread depth on remaining tires and contact a other tire shop or tire rack to get a PROPER replacement. The thread depth will tell a GOOD tire shop if they need to shave the tire and by how much. If it's too worn simply replace all 4.

 

As others have said, you need a full matching set. Get a new Pilot Super Sport tire immediately.

FWIW, the Pilot Sport A/S3 is an excellent tire as well, although nowhere near as good as the Super Sport. I have the A/S3s on my Outback, and I've never broken traction in any conditions, and I've tossed the Outback pretty hard into some mountain roads. Wet weather traction on the A/S3 is exceptional, but it is classified as a "high performance all-season", and not a true summer tire.

 

MPSS are a great street tire. A bit greasy on the track from what I've heard.

FYR, as a fellow Spartan I fully endorse your avatar!

 

FYR, as a fellow Spartan I fully endorse your avatar!

Go Green!

 

Which is the best tyre for summer? - performance tyre test | Evo

 

The latest from a leading consumer publication:

 

There are a lot of tires missing from this. Is it old?

 

Thank you all, for your replies. Just ordered a single MPSS from tirerack.com as a replacement.

 

Go blue.

That is all.

 

I love my Super Sports so far 27k on them loving them. I need to measure to see how much tread I have left but easily half the only "problem" is I need to use a little more tire dressing to fill in all the grooves to get them look good.

 

Thanks for the chart, Sassquatch. Were there no overall "Excellent" rated summer tires there?

Surprised too to see the Bridgestone RE-11 and S04 rated as low as they are there.

 

Just an FYI, tirerack has those Conti DW tires on sale. They're about $145 for 18". They also weigh less per tire than all the others by at least 2lbs. It's something to consider. I just know because I was researching the 18" sizes for summer.

 

I bought a set of super sports from the tire place i went to based on the fact that the person selling them had a wrx parked out front and said he loved them. Had them for 4 months and tread wear is good and have had no probably as far as grip goes.
This is also based on my "spirited" drives to work, which frankly, is more of a frantic haul-a$$ session, 6 days a week.