Hankook

Hankook Ventus RS2 Z212

[7/17/2008] Reviewed by: Dave

Applicable to: '90 - '97 1.8 liter

From the vendo: STREET CLASS MAX PERFORMANCE is the description of the tire. Hankook has created a tire to compete head-to-head with other popular street-class autocross tires. This is supposed to compete with the Falken Azenis.

I bought these with 15" Falken Hanabi wheels on my black NA Miata for track days. They came mounted and balanced from edgeracing.com. 205 50 R15 is the size I bought.

I really enjoy leaving these on for a few days after I put them on for my track days. I almost never have the 65mph shimmy with these wheels and tires. The overall weight is about exactly the same as my stock 14" wheels and tires. The traction for stopping and starting is quite different as it is very hard to get wheelspin compared to the smaller tires and the braking grip is quite strong and very hard to lock a wheel under braking. I do believe gas mileage suffers a bit with bigger tires as there is more rolling resistance. They are a bit stiffer ride than my 14" Bridgestone Traction T/As which makes sense as they are lower profile and are pretty quiet. As far as track performance I ran them in sopping wet weather and I think they did quite well. I was able to better a supercharged Miata with Kumho Ecstas but he probably just had too much power to get traction. On a hot track they seemed to do really well from beginning to the end of the run and performed predictably at and over the limit. They were a little greasy when hot and picked up a lot of rubber. Wear seems good. Only 2 track days and they seem to have lost very little tread. All that said, my lap times were not much better than with my 185/45/R14 Bridgestone all season tires. I look forward to finding the right tire pressures and lowering my lap times. I hope this helps anyone shopping for high performance tires.

Under 30 minutes to remove completely

Hankook Ventus R-S2 Z212

[6/30/2005] Reviewed by: Steve Humes - mr_toads_wild_ride@comcast.net

Applicable to: '90 - '97 1.6 liter 1.8 liter

High Performance tire

30 days

I bought these at America's Tire Memorial Day weekend. Since then I've put 3000 miles on them. 50% of my driving is on the freeway with the remainder mountain and back roads. These tires are very quite. They do not hunt around on freeway grooves. Turn in is quick (tires currently at 32 psi.) with no squeeling. Lots of grip on twisty roads even when pushed. Good grip in the rain. Will by again!!

Over 30 minutes to remove completely