oneheadlite
Well-known member
- Aug 20, 2015
- 1,795
- 100
General has some pretty good offerings.
My recently departed avant I ran the Altimax Arctics after having been in plenty of customer cars to confirm they were a good winter option. First set on that car were Nordmans (member of the Hakapelita family), but knowing my ownership time in that car was waning... I went cheap. Overall the Altimax Arctics were solid performers and I'd recommend them to folks.
I put a set of General all seasons on my wife's A4 when we went to sell it (I think RT43's or 45's?). Came round (sadly, as a tire installer I can tell you that's not a given. Pirelli, Bridgestone, I'm looking at you...), rode smooth. Looked like a solid tread design if you were gonna suffer through the whole year on them (Read: They have actual siping to provide actual winter traction).
The G-Max RS looks like an interesting summer only option. Seems like the tread design should move some water, which is always a focus for me when I'm picking summer skins. My pilot supersports never got a hint of hydroplaning even when they were nearly worn out.
The Conti DW (non-DWS) is a really good wet weather performer. My friend had an early get set on his E36 M3 and praised their wet performance. Later, when I was at PRI (A convention like SEMA, but for aftermarket performance parts), my boss and I were chatting with the Hoosier guy and he mentioned that they used the Conti DW as their benchmark tire when they were making their Hoosier Wets. High praise! Fast forward, I think Conti bought Hoosier (or, less likely, vise versa?) and they went in together to make a high performance tire that some of our endurance guys use for WRL and Chumpcar racing. I believe that's the Extreme Contact Force.
The DWS Conti's I'm just not a fan of. (Klasse, hopefully we can still be friends!) Haven't been blown away with them on customer cars. They came on my current daily and... they're fine enough to not change out. I'll burn'm off and switch to something else.
I went Vredestein (Hypertrak) on the avant and was surprised how much fun the tires turned out to be for all seasons. They made comical all-season noises on cloverleafs, but I'll be danged if they weren't tenacious with grip levels.
On the brake front, when I mentioned true multipiece rotors, something like this was what I was thinking: 403 Forbidden (EDIT: Ah shoot. OK, go to ECS Tuning's site, enter ES#4658197 in the search bar)
Full truth, you'd probably really only need the fronts rotor wise. Def do matching pads front and rear!
If you like supporting small businesses, check out FrozenRotors.com - Give them a call and ask for Mark Link. He's a friend of mine (Tell him John from Orr told you to call), and a wealth of brake knowledge. He'd be great to talk to about picking pads for what you want to do.
I can also check in with my friend to see what he's running on his enthusiastically-street-driven/Auto-X M3; his pads have been a good balance of heat-tolerant-but-don't-sound-like-a-stopping-train-constantly.
My recently departed avant I ran the Altimax Arctics after having been in plenty of customer cars to confirm they were a good winter option. First set on that car were Nordmans (member of the Hakapelita family), but knowing my ownership time in that car was waning... I went cheap. Overall the Altimax Arctics were solid performers and I'd recommend them to folks.
I put a set of General all seasons on my wife's A4 when we went to sell it (I think RT43's or 45's?). Came round (sadly, as a tire installer I can tell you that's not a given. Pirelli, Bridgestone, I'm looking at you...), rode smooth. Looked like a solid tread design if you were gonna suffer through the whole year on them (Read: They have actual siping to provide actual winter traction).
The G-Max RS looks like an interesting summer only option. Seems like the tread design should move some water, which is always a focus for me when I'm picking summer skins. My pilot supersports never got a hint of hydroplaning even when they were nearly worn out.
The Conti DW (non-DWS) is a really good wet weather performer. My friend had an early get set on his E36 M3 and praised their wet performance. Later, when I was at PRI (A convention like SEMA, but for aftermarket performance parts), my boss and I were chatting with the Hoosier guy and he mentioned that they used the Conti DW as their benchmark tire when they were making their Hoosier Wets. High praise! Fast forward, I think Conti bought Hoosier (or, less likely, vise versa?) and they went in together to make a high performance tire that some of our endurance guys use for WRL and Chumpcar racing. I believe that's the Extreme Contact Force.
The DWS Conti's I'm just not a fan of. (Klasse, hopefully we can still be friends!) Haven't been blown away with them on customer cars. They came on my current daily and... they're fine enough to not change out. I'll burn'm off and switch to something else.
I went Vredestein (Hypertrak) on the avant and was surprised how much fun the tires turned out to be for all seasons. They made comical all-season noises on cloverleafs, but I'll be danged if they weren't tenacious with grip levels.
On the brake front, when I mentioned true multipiece rotors, something like this was what I was thinking: 403 Forbidden (EDIT: Ah shoot. OK, go to ECS Tuning's site, enter ES#4658197 in the search bar)
Full truth, you'd probably really only need the fronts rotor wise. Def do matching pads front and rear!
If you like supporting small businesses, check out FrozenRotors.com - Give them a call and ask for Mark Link. He's a friend of mine (Tell him John from Orr told you to call), and a wealth of brake knowledge. He'd be great to talk to about picking pads for what you want to do.
I can also check in with my friend to see what he's running on his enthusiastically-street-driven/Auto-X M3; his pads have been a good balance of heat-tolerant-but-don't-sound-like-a-stopping-train-constantly.
