# Goodyear RS-A's...



## coldintake (Oct 18, 2002)

I have these on my stock 330 wheels, but I'm going to change them soon. In the meantime, does anybody else think that these tires are horrible and have a VERY soft sidewall? I find myself running a higher pressure(38/41) so I can compensate for the sidewall. Do you guys that run these tires do the same and sacrifice a little ride-quality, or do you just go with the bad handling tires?


----------



## ·clyde· (Dec 26, 2001)

Did someone say soft sidewall WRT GY Eagle RS-A tires?










This is on my 2002 325 xiT and the fronts were set to 48 or 49psi cold that day.

I'm going to run them through the winter and then put on new wheels with Falken Azeni Sports. Next fall, I will probably have Sumitomo HTR+ mounted on the stock wheels for winter, although I have heard, recently, that those sidewalls are soft too...I doubt they are as soft as the RS-As though.


----------



## nate (Dec 24, 2001)

[email protected] said:


> *Did someone say soft sidewall WRT GY Eagle RS-A tires?
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I have a pic of my S-03s flexing like that :dunno:


----------



## ·clyde· (Dec 26, 2001)

nate328Ci said:


> *I have a pic of my S-03s flexing like that :dunno: *


OK, to the right edge of the wheel is the tire sidewall which is dark. It gets lighter, which is the part of the tire that is coming in contact with the ground. To the right of where it goes dark to light, do you see the thin darker band? That's where the sidewalls meet the tread. Is that the kind of rollover that your S-03s displayed? :dunno:


----------



## nate (Dec 24, 2001)

[email protected] said:


> *OK, to the right edge of the wheel is the tire sidewall which is dark. It gets lighter, which is the part of the tire that is coming in contact with the ground. To the right of where it goes dark to light, do you see the thin darker band? That's where the sidewalls meet the tread. Is that the kind of rollover that your S-03s displayed? :dunno: *


I wore the shoulders on both front and REAR on my S-03s at the track last month.

Here is a pic from a long time ago. You can see some sidewall flex.


----------



## Raffi (May 18, 2002)

The sidewall flex on Clyde's car looks much worse than on Nate's, IMHO.


----------



## Nick325xiT 5spd (Dec 24, 2001)

Close up of Clyde's tire towards, but not efter the end of the season.


----------



## nate (Dec 24, 2001)

Nick325xiT 5spd said:


> *
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Christ, use the rear wheels a bit to bring that car around the turns. Killing the front tires.

Need to align for more front negative camber...


----------



## JT - '02 330i (Dec 29, 2001)

Here is me with a set of 225's on my 330. The tires are the Falknen Azenis Sports at 38 psi. I've been very happy with them for street and track, though they do tend to get a little noisy after five thousand miles. I managed to put 10K miles and 20 autox events on them. Time for a new set.


----------



## ·clyde· (Dec 26, 2001)

nate328Ci said:


> *Christ, use the rear wheels a bit to bring that car around the turns. Killing the front tires.
> 
> Need to align for more front negative camber... *


Ever autox an xiT?  It's partly the tire, it's partly the car, it's mostly the driver. The day that pic was taken, I was kinda forgettign to slow down before turning...and it showed...my times were awful (I only beat Nick by 2/10). At the event the next day, slowed down way early and did pretty well. No plowing and not nearly as much rollover (not onto the letters anyway)


----------



## ·clyde· (Dec 26, 2001)

JT - '02 330i said:


> *Here is me with a set of 225's on my 330. The tires are the Falknen Azenis Sports at 38 psi. I've been very happy with them for street and track, though they do tend to get a little noisy after five thousand miles. I managed to put 10K miles and 20 autox events on them. Time for a new set.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Sounds great to me!


----------



## Nick325xiT 5spd (Dec 24, 2001)

[email protected] said:


> *(I only beat Nick by 2/10). *


  :banghead:  :banghead:  :banghead:


----------



## nate (Dec 24, 2001)

[email protected] said:


> *Ever autox an xiT?  It's partly the tire, it's partly the car, it's mostly the driver. The day that pic was taken, I was kinda forgettign to slow down before turning...and it showed...my times were awful (I only beat Nick by 2/10). At the event the next day, slowed down way early and did pretty well. No plowing and not nearly as much rollover (not onto the letters anyway) *


Learn to use the hand brake 

Try left-foot braking?


----------



## ·clyde· (Dec 26, 2001)

nate328Ci said:


> *Learn to use the hand brake
> 
> Try left-foot braking? *


Seriously, it pivots well enough (especially under trail braking) when I remember to slow down enough beforehand. Left foot braking is on the agenda for this year as I think that it may help improve my smoothness in throttle-brake-throttle transitions....kind of afraid that the computer systems will go bonky, though :eeps:


----------



## Raffi (May 18, 2002)

Nick325xiT 5spd said:


> *
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Holy cow! :yikes: That's some serious beating on the tires! :lmao: :lmao: :lmao: Have you tried pumping up the pressure to see if it would reduce the sidewall roll? :dunno:


----------



## Nick325xiT 5spd (Dec 24, 2001)

He was running in the low forties at that point, as I recall...

Eventually, bumping it up near to 50 helped reduce that a bit.


----------



## ·clyde· (Dec 26, 2001)

Nick325xiT 5spd said:


> *He was running in the low forties at that point, as I recall...
> 
> Eventually, bumping it up near to 50 helped reduce that a bit. *


No...That pic was after I was already up near 50 cold.


----------



## JT - '02 330i (Dec 29, 2001)

I started out with RS-A's as well, and the tires are really damn crappy. My tires looked VERY similar to that pic. (The tire shop guys had some intersting looks when I asked for a set of Azenis and they took off these BEAT RS-A's.)

The graph below is my performance in the San Francisco region, typically 200+ entrants per event. The percentages are the percent of entrants that I beat based upon the PAX score event 7 was when I switched to the Azenis from the RS-A's, event 8 was when I added some UUC sways. Before event 11, I re-did the alignment by having the tech punch out the allignment pin on the upper strut hat, and loosening the hat bolts, and we re-adjusted for max negative camber. (Ended up with -.5 L and -.8R on the front. Will need to lower it to get more negative, as I'm not going the camber plates route.)

After the tires, the car felt better, but it wasn't til two events later that they were scrubbed off enough to really stick, by that time I had added the sways. I'm really damn happy with it now.

Finished the winter season with a Novice first place trophy. (We autocross year round here.)


----------



## JonW (Jan 6, 2002)

coldintake said:


> *I have these on my stock 330 wheels, but I'm going to change them soon. In the meantime, does anybody else think that these tires are horrible and have a VERY soft sidewall? I find myself running a higher pressure(38/41) so I can compensate for the sidewall. Do you guys that run these tires do the same and sacrifice a little ride-quality, or do you just go with the bad handling tires? *


Yup, they're really soft and all. I think I had them up at 45 psi for an autocross. And the sidewall flexed about as much as at 38 psi. Didn't seem to help. After doing a driving school with the RSA's, I think I'm going to switch over to SO3's on a set of BBS RK's in the warmer weather. But there is one good thing about the RSA's: they're quite good in snow. So I will have the SO3's for summer and track driving, and the RSA's for winter. Then when the RSA's are worn out, I'll probably go with dedicated snow tires on those wheels. For performance driving, the RSA's suck. For snow, they're very good.


----------



## ·clyde· (Dec 26, 2001)

JT - '02 330i said:


> *
> 
> 
> 
> ...


JT,

Did you do much/any autocrossing prior to what's represented on the graph (even in another car)? It's tough to place too much emphasis on a few mechanical tweaks when you're still rapidly climbing the learning curve. Your plot doesn't look all that dissimilar to what I imagine mine would look like for my first 12-14 events with no equipment changes. If I get some time, I'll pot out my results.


----------



## coldintake (Oct 18, 2002)

*Re: Re: Goodyear RS-A's...*



JonW said:


> *Yup, they're really soft and all. I think I had them up at 45 psi for an autocross. And the sidewall flexed about as much as at 38 psi. Didn't seem to help. After doing a driving school with the RSA's, I think I'm going to switch over to SO3's on a set of BBS RK's in the warmer weather. But there is one good thing about the RSA's: they're quite good in snow. So I will have the SO3's for summer and track driving, and the RSA's for winter. Then when the RSA's are worn out, I'll probably go with dedicated snow tires on those wheels. For performance driving, the RSA's suck. For snow, they're very good. *


Since my rear tires are more worn than my front, If I do decide to go into the snow, should I swap them? Or should I just leave the front tires with more thread, in the front?

Btw, thanks for the great replies, I wasn't expecting soo many


----------

