Roadster 3.0 Tires

zgames said:

Ugh, I've been holding off on tires since this whole 3.0 thing started before the end of last year, and now I have bald tires and either must get new ones or let the car sit in the garage.

Btw, what kind of mileage are you guys getting on your tires? I've driven maybe 10k miles and I really didn't expect them to wear this fast. I could swear I already replaced them once before...

Click to expand...

Changed my rear tires at 8500 miles. Also surprised. They could have gone a little more but it was in for annual service. Have the sport tires question whether it was those or my driving

Any information on the 3.0 upgrade as far as the specific replacement tires?
I am in the same situation as zgames on bald right rear tire, both rear tires needing replacement along with front tires.
This will be my third set of rear tires including the original set, Roadster now has just over 20K miles total.
I have paid $750. per set through Tesla twice, but will have Discount Tires replace them this time around.
Planning on replacing the rear tires with the Yokohama ADVAN Neova AD08, 225/45 R17 91W SL BSW at $225. EA., which should give a quieter ride and with the same tire ratings otherwise.
Front tires will be Yokohama ADVAN Neova Ado7 LTS,175/55 R16 80W SL BSW , $239 EA. same as the originals.
Anyone have any suggestions before I make the purchase?
Thanks,
Dean412

No info yet from Tesla on the new tires for the Roadster. A lot of us really want to know.
There is an existing Sticky thread about Roadster tires with tons of information, I suggest you post there so that this thread about the 3.0 upgrade does not get off topic...

Roadster 3.0

And now I'm worried that because the 1.5 cars Do not have "tire learning" capability that the new Roadster tire Tesla will eventually announce will only work with the 2.0/2.5 cars.

ecarfan said:

And now I'm worried that because the 1.5 cars Do not have "tire learning" capability that the new Roadster tire Tesla will eventually announce will only work with the 2.0/2.5 cars.

Click to expand...

Ouch.

zgames said:

Btw, what kind of mileage are you guys getting on your tires? I've driven maybe 10k miles and I really didn't expect them to wear this fast. I could swear I already replaced them once before...

Click to expand...

I got 12,500 miles with the original AD07 rears, replaced those, got 22,000 miles out of the AD08 replacements, and on my 3rd set of Yoko rears, this time the AD08R's and currently have 50,000 on the clock. So with the math I have 15,500 on the AD08R's that are on there now and they still have plenty of meat. The AD07 fronts were replaced at around 30k. My style of driving is that I don't launch hard at first off of lights / stops, but rather get the Roadster rolling some and then launch. I'm very aggressive with braking, regen, and turns/handling. I also have my front and rear negative camber set more aggressively than the factory specs. I do believe Tesla or whoever did the alignment of the Roadsters at Menlo Park dialed them in wrong. I've seen many Roadsters dialed way over the negative camber than the factory spec. Even mine, hence why I believe I got only 12,500 out of the original AD07s. I don't have my original sheet from my first alignment, but the inside edges were worn more than my 2nd set of AD08s and the drivers vs. passenger side wear was off too. Never hit any nasty pot-holes either to throw it off like that.

As for the 3.0 tires, that's a good point about the sizing and tire-learning and anything can happen as we can see which may disappointing to some. I'm only interested in the wheel-bearing upgrade and will be installing those myself. At least they can't screw that up in terms of not being backwards compatible with the 1.5's. I just hope they're German quality bearings (which I have always found to be the best in terms of durability and precision) and not some crappy Japanese ones. If we're running what's on the Lotus Elise, then I believe we currently have Timken which I believe is made in Spain. And I trust their quality as well, but prefer German.

slcasner said:

Ouch.

Click to expand...

But even if the 1.5's don't "learn" about tires, I would expect that a more-or-less simple firmware upgrade could be done to manually select what tires are installed.

zgames said:

Besides the battery, the other major feature of the 3.0 upgrade is the tires.

Click to expand...

Selecting other tires is not a "major feature". It's a 5 minute job to look on the market what is available, and choose the ones with the lowest resistance. And because of the 400 mile "promise", they won't look at the quality of driving at all. "Roadster 3.0 tires" are a joke.

REAR: I have put 19000km on the Original AD07 rears, and 26800km on the AD08R's. My Pirelli winters already covered 22000km and will be replaced in about 4000km.
FRONT: The AD07 fronts (175s) have 45800km and still a lot thread left, but I will replace them as they are 4y old now. The Pirelli winters (195s) covered 22000km and still look almost new.

zgames said:

Besides the battery, the other major feature of the 3.0 upgrade is the tires. We've had 100 pages of battery talk...a few posts about tires isn't going to hijack the thread. I'm interested in knowing more about the features and timing of the tire upgrade as part of this 3.0 version. Very strange they didn't announce the full 3.0 "package".

Click to expand...

Yes it is disappointing. However, I do not consider the new tire type to be "major" any more than the new wheel bearings and brake drag reduction modifications will be (two of five announced components of the complete "3.0" package).
Besides the battery, to me the most significant feature will likely be the yet to be revealed aerodynamic body modifications.

m0rph said:

Selecting other tires is not a "major feature". It's a 5 minute job to look on the market what is available, and choose the ones with the lowest resistance. And because of the 400 mile "promise", they won't look at the quality of driving at all. "Roadster 3.0 tires" are a joke.

Click to expand...

I am not going to pass judgment before seeing which tires Tesla has selected. Also, they need to be compatible with the 1.5 cars.
So can you share with us which tires currently on the market are suitable for all versions of the roadster and have significantly less rolling resistance?

ecarfan said:

Also, they need to be compatible with the 1.5 cars.

Click to expand...

One would think so, but...........................

Hey, I'm trying to maintain my optimism here...

Wiztec can you please share your alignment specs?

As for tires my initial Yokohama's lasted 4,500 miles as I guess I had too much fun. Then I tried Continental DWS and they lasted over 9000 miles and now I am trying Michelin Super Sport and have over 11,000 miles. Part is due to a more relaxed driving style.

wiztecy and I both drive Hwy 17 in the SF Bay Area regularly. He turned me on to a Lotus mechanic, who did my alignment work as well. Shims in the rear for more negative camber, and urethane bushing for less slop. I also added the "V2 steering arms" in the front, which enable getting more negative camber - I think wiztecy (re)moved a brake attachment plate to get his negative camber. The result with all this negative camber is that roads like Hwy 1 through Big Sur are super fun, but be warned that my specs are not suitable for cars mostly driven on freeways or on city streets - you'll wear the insides of your tires out prematurely. For me, I was wearing the outsides out way too early. That's an indication of having too much fun in the car, I guess.

As for tire wear, I've never gotten a lot of miles out of my tires. I probably accelerate too quickly too much, and use too much regen, not to mention the curvy roads I often drive. Anyway, here are my specs"

dhrivnak said:

Wiztec can you please share your alignment specs?

Click to expand...

8/14/15 Alignment specs.
Yes, as smorgasbord mentioned I pulled all my front shims out as well as the abs mounts which acts like a really large shim. When the Roadster was up on the rack we ended up pulling a shim from the left rear that added +0.02 and placed it up on the front right in order to bring it to -1.0, which I was aiming for. Currently the way I have my Roadster configured (shocks & adjustments, yoko tires, quick rack) these numbers work really really well. I also had the driver's seat ballast to my personal body weight with the trunk loaded with its normal stuff (aluminum tire jack, air pump, tire repair kit, etc) while setting numbers since that's how I normally drive the car.

wiztecy said:

I pulled all my front shims out as well as the abs mounts which acts like a really large shim.

Click to expand...

That obviously works. If you don't want to do that, you can get these replacement arms, which also help reduce bump steer.

smorgasbord said:

wiztecy and I both drive Hwy 17 in the SF Bay Area regularly. He turned me on to a Lotus mechanic, who did my alignment work as well. Shims in the rear for more negative camber, and urethane bushing for less slop. I also added the "V2 steering arms" in the front, which enable getting more negative camber - I think wiztecy (re)moved a brake attachment plate to get his negative camber. The result with all this negative camber is that roads like Hwy 1 through Big Sur are super fun, but be warned that my specs are not suitable for cars mostly driven on freeways or on city streets - you'll wear the insides of your tires out prematurely. For me, I was wearing the outsides out way too early. That's an indication of having too much fun in the car, I guess.

As for tire wear, I've never gotten a lot of miles out of my tires. I probably accelerate too quickly too much, and use too much regen, not to mention the curvy roads I often drive. Anyway, here are my specs"

Description	Left	Right
Front Camber	-0.9	-0.8
Front Toe	0.04	0.03
Front Caster	3.7	4.0
Rear Camber	-2.4	-2.2
Rear Toe	0.17	0.16

Click to expand...

Smorgasbord, What Urethane bushings did you go with? Did it add any additional noise or vibration to the car?

I added the RaceUprights for more negative camber and it dropped 9Lbs from the unsprung weight. (It requires modification of the brakes so not for the weary)

For efficiency reason i use Toyo nanoenergy 2, having the lowest rolling resistent of all tires i found. Efficiency class A.
Best mileage even after 100.000miles