2022 AutoBild Sports Cars UHP Summer Tire Test

The 2022 Autobild Sportscars summer tire test has tested eleven 225/45 R18 sizes using a BMW 3 Series, but has also tested four of the SAME sets in a staggered 225/45 R18 front and 255/4 R18 rear size to compare the two different options.

First up, the main test. Sadly the test was missing Goodyear and Pirelli, and interestingly the testers found the Michelin Pilot Sport 4 not only to be the best, but also to have the sportiest handling, something we're don't see often.

Even more surprising was that the Vredestein Ultrac Vorti+ finished joint first, beating every tire in the wet handling test and ending up with enough points to match the Pilot Sport 4.

It was the test of ties, with the Falken FK510 and Toyo Proxes Sport A finishing joint third and the Bridgestone Potenza Sport and Hankook Ventus S1 Evo 3 finishing joint fifth.

Square vs Staggered Setup

The most interesting part of the test was the square vs staggered setup. Unfortunately the Tire Reviews database can't list both results, just the square, so we'll have to explain the differences below referencing the square data we have already.

The tires tested in both square and staggered were the Michelin Pilot Sport 4, the Vredestein Ultrac Vorti+, Falken FK510 and Nexen N'Fera Sport.

In the dry, the staggered setup with the wider rear tire stopped 0.1 meters worse for the Falken and 0.2m behind for Michelin and Vredestein which is certainly counter intuitive, but the Nexen was 0.3 meters better with the wider rear tire. 

Dry handling made no more sense with the Michelin finishing 0.8 km/h faster with the wider rear tire, 1.3 km/h faster for the Vredestein, 1.5 km/h faster for the Nexen, but 1.3 km/h slower for the Falken.

Wet braking had the Michelin stopping the BMW 0.5 meters shorter with the wider rear, 1.3 meters shorter for Nexen but exactly the same for Vredestein and 0.5 longer for the Falken!

Finally, every set of tires was significantly slower in the wet with the wider rear tire.

What can we conclude regarding square vs staggered tires? The data shows that there's not a huge amount of difference with the extra 20 mm of rear tire width, and whether you get better or worse performance varies between what test is being tested, and the tire brand used!

There's more information in the full Auto Bild test, so we suggest you check that out if you're interested in further information.

Below is all the data from the 225/45 R18 square test.

Dry

Bridgestone, Hankook and Toyo had an impressive lead in dry braking.

Michelin aced the dry handling test with the quickest lap time and the sportiest handling.

Wet

Bridgestone again led the way in wet braking.

But couldn't quite beat Vredestein for the top place in wet handling.

GT Radial and Toyo led the way in the aquaplaning testing.

Environment

The budget Tomket had the lowest external noise on test.

And the lowest rolling resistance.

And the lowest price.

Results