2018 Test World Summer Tire Test

Test Summary
Wet Braking	Michelin Pilot Sport 4 Continental Premium Contact 6 Vredestein Ultrac Vorti Hankook Ventus S1 evo2
Dry Braking	Michelin Pilot Sport 4
Wear	Michelin Pilot Sport 4
Rolling Resistance	Bridgestone Turanza T005
Snow Handling	Continental Premium Contact 6
Snow Handling	Gislaved Ultra Speed Cooper Zeon CS8 Falken Azenis FK510
Ice Handling	Michelin Pilot Sport 4 Nokian Hakka Black 2 Bridgestone Turanza T005

It's rare you find tire tests specifically scoring subjective handling qualities as it's a very difficult thing for tire testers to quantify, but this latest tire test from the Finish publication Test World scores the tires subjective behaviour out of a possible ten points in both the dry and wet. This is particularly interesting if you're not worried about that final 0.1 seconds of dry lap time, but do rate the subjective qualities of a tire such as steering feel, feedback and car balance.

This test covers sixteen 225/45 R17 UHP tire patterns using an Audi A3 - perhaps not the last word in dynamic handling but it is still an insight to the tires we don't usually get.

Dry

Strangely Test World didn't publish dry handling lap times, instead looking at dry braking from 90 km/h and subjective points. Continental, Hankook and Michelin all scored well in the dry tests, offering short dry braking and good subjective handling.

Wet

In the wet, Test World added wet handling and an aquaplaning test. As we've previously seen in 2018, the new Falken dominated wet braking, and was 0.4 seconds off during the wet handling lap.

Environment

Test world published the rolling resistance scoring as a percentage difference from the best tire on test. The Bridgestone had the lowest rolling resistance so was the 100% reference, Pirelli was mid pack using 2.6% more fuel than the Bridgestone, and the Yokohama tire finished last but still only 5.7% more fuel use than the winning tire.

Again, the in-cabin noise levels were very close, with the best and worst tires on test less than 2 dB apart.

Results