Azenis start to lose traction before hitting wear indicators?

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Mid_Life_Crisis

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2007 MS3
I think I remember seeing a comment about this somewhere. Is it a known issue with Falken Azeni's compound getting harder as you get close to the wear indicators? I ask because over the last couple of months I have been really burning up the front tires getting used to whatever the hell is causing my traction control/boost control issues and the front tires have abruptly gotten very close to the wear indicators. I noticed that when I push hard in a 90 degree corner, the car is developing a tendency to plow instead of just pulling around the corner. There still appears to be what I would normally think of as plenty of tread judging by the wear bars, so unless the compound is less sticky near the bars, I have no explanation for what is going on.
 
How cold is it down there? Tires of course are less sticky as temps drop so if it's 50-60 degrees they aren't going to grab like they did on a 100 degree July afternoon.
 
Mid_Life_Crisis said:
I think I remember seeing a comment about this somewhere. Is it a known issue with Falken Azeni's compound getting harder as you get close to the wear indicators? I ask because over the last couple of months I have been really burning up the front tires getting used to whatever the hell is causing my traction control/boost control issues and the front tires have abruptly gotten very close to the wear indicators. I noticed that when I push hard in a 90 degree corner, the car is developing a tendency to plow instead of just pulling around the corner. There still appears to be what I would normally think of as plenty of tread judging by the wear bars, so unless the compound is less sticky near the bars, I have no explanation for what is going on.
Click to expand...

i have run them at auto-x's for years and have run them bald and had traction. there has to be another element causing the pushing
 
bacarl said:
How cold is it down there? Tires of course are less sticky as temps drop so if it's 50-60 degrees they aren't going to grab like they did on a 100 degree July afternoon.
Click to expand...

Especially these ones. I'm in North Carolina. A couple of days ago I was outside in short sleeves, yesterday it was 36 degrees. I expect these tires to not perform as well in the cold, but it's happening on warm days too.
In fact, I'm well overdue by my schedule to swap back the stock rims and Kuhmo (sp?) all seasons for the winter.
The corners in question are also close to work, so I've been driving for 30 - 40 minutes, which is plenty of time to warm them up. I don't know, maybe I'm driving differently and don't realize it.
 
I haven't really noticed a loss in traction on mine.. what I do notice when they get low on tread is how much the car wants to follow every little rut in the road, really takes some of the pleasure out of driving it. Here recently I finally gave up on performance street tires and moved to R-comps for autocross. Will be daily driving on some all seasons (kuhmo ecsta asx) When's the last time you had your alignment checked. I just had mine aligned and the toe in the rear was a bit off.. Another local MS3 guy to me has been having trouble with the alignment in the back of his (keeps coming out of alignment). Alignment could cause your issue.
 
mordant80 said:
I haven't really noticed a loss in traction on mine.. what I do notice when they get low on tread is how much the car wants to follow every little rut in the road, really takes some of the pleasure out of driving it. Here recently I finally gave up on performance street tires and moved to R-comps for autocross. Will be daily driving on some all seasons (kuhmo ecsta asx) When's the last time you had your alignment checked. I just had mine aligned and the toe in the rear was a bit off.. Another local MS3 guy to me has been having trouble with the alignment in the back of his (keeps coming out of alignment). Alignment could cause your issue.
Click to expand...

The roads around here, in a word, SUCK. It could very well be that. On the way in to work I have to go over a frost heave the size of a speedbump.
The oncoming lane is a lot smaller, so if no one is coming I swing wide to go over that section. I'm going to love explaining it the first time a cop comes around the next bend and sees me on the wrong side of the road. Especially since the previous bend is to the right, so it'll look like I was flying and drifted across the road as a result.
 
Which Azenis are these? Assuming they are 615's, and also assuming they have been driven to the point they are at now (not AutoX'ed/tracked for wear), I can tell you some things about this tire.

I had 615's for a while on my WRX. They were awesome starting out doing track/autoX and daily driving. As they wore down, I started losing seconds at the track and AutoX and noticing less grip on the street. The heat cycling really kills the 615's fast, especially if youre driving them daily. By the time I got rid of them, they sucked dick.

Oh, nice to see another local too. :)

<-Wake Forest
 
If it is happening on warm days too than it is possible you overheated them. That happened to me on a different car from too much spinning and the traction was never the same since. They seemed hard as rocks too.

I think I'm going to try the Hankook Ventus RS2's when these wear out.
 
john blutarski said:
If it is happening on warm days too than it is possible you overheated them. That happened to me on a different car from too much spinning and the traction was never the same since. They seemed hard as rocks too.

I think I'm going to try the Hankook Ventus RS2's when these wear out.
Click to expand...

I personally like them better. Had great results with them.
 
The RS2's definately handle the heat better and are more suited for tracking events, but they are like 95% of the grip the RT-615's. I have used both tire setups on my Miata for DD and AutoX. The Azenis really suck below 60*F and when they become heatcycled too many times, will get hard and slipperey at the end of their life. And if they reach a temp over 125-130*F, they become really greasy.

So if you DD them for a year, the grip isn't going to be like it was when you first broke them in after the mold-release wore off. After a year of AutoXing, (80 runs or so) and DD'ing with the tires, they started to lose their grip right around 10k miles @ 1/32nd tread depth. YMMV depending of road conditons and the way you drive.

Other good tires would be:

HankookRS3's coming soon
Nitto NT-05's coming soon
Bridgestone RE-01R's kinda pricey
Toyo R1R's
Kumoh XS
 
Last edited:
ZyrehT said:
You do a lot of auto-x in the winter?
Click to expand...

Me! I even ran my stickies for the first time earlier this month. Even though I couldn't get much heat in them, still much better than anything else I've ran. As for the Azenis in the winter, I never really noticed a big traction loss, I mean my times were always still in line compared to everyone else. My biggest problem with the Azenis again is just how they feel when daily driving when they are getting low on tread. Hate it. Sure other brands will follow ruts in the road when low on tread, but the Azenis for me have been the worst by far for that.

I have 2 kuhmo ecsta mx's sitting around that I got before I found a deal on some stickies, I'll be replacing the 2 Azenis I have left on the car with them when it warms back up. But I've finally decided after the kuhmo's are done, I'll be switching to all seasons and autocross on stickies. Alot of the locals here run kuhmo asx all seasons and everyone loves them, so I'll be following suite especially since the prices for that tire are great.
 
mr_mazda329 said:
The RS2's definately handle the heat better and are more suited for tracking events, but they are like 95% of the grip the RT-615's. I have used both tire setups on my Miata for DD and AutoX. The Azenis really suck below 60*F and when they become heatcycled too many times, will get hard and slipperey at the end of their life. And if they reach a temp over 125-130*F, they become really greasy.

So if you DD them for a year, the grip isn't going to be like it was when you first broke them in after the mold-release wore off. After a year of AutoXing, (80 runs or so) and DD'ing with the tires, they started to lose their grip right around 10k miles @ 1/32nd tread depth. YMMV depending of road conditons and the way you drive.

Other good tires would be:

HankookRS3's coming soon
Nitto NT-05's coming soon
Bridgestone RE-01R's kinda pricey
Toyo R1R's
Kumoh XS
Click to expand...
Add in the Dunlop Z1's. They are the stickiest street tires I have ever driven on. They are far better than the Hancooks, Falkens and Bridgestones.

Tony
 
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