Could any of these nine low cost offerings knock off the Pilot Sport PS2? The Michelin Pilot Sport PS2 in the test size of 225/45-17 costs $192.00.

Here's where the challengers come in price wise:
BF Goodrich G-Force T/A KDW2 ($126)
Bridgestone Potenza RE760 Sport ($132)
Dunlop Direzza Sport Z1 Star Spec ($137)
Falken Azenis RT-615 ($121)
Hankook Ventus V12 EVO ($106)
Kumho Ecsta XS ($120)
Ling Long L688 ($57)
Nitto Invo ($117)
Yokohama S-Drive ($115)

The test covered several different areas of performance. AutoX , skid pad , braking , price and ride quality. I am not going to reproduce the entire article but, here are some of the numbers

AutoX times wet/dry

Michelin Pilot Sport PS2 60.7 / 60.1

BF Goodrich G-Force T/A KDW2 61.3 / 59.6
Bridgestone Potenza RE760 Sport 62.5 / 60.1
Dunlop Direzza Sport Z1 Star Spec 60.8 / 59.3
Falken Azenis RT-615 64.2 / 59.8
Hankook Ventus V12 EVO 61.0 / 59.8
Kumho Ecsta XS 65.4 / 59.0
Ling Long L688 61.1 / 65.8
Nitto Invo 61.9 / 60.5
Yokohama S-Drive 61.5 / 60.3

SKIDPAD, g's wet / dry

Michelin Pilot Sport PS2 0.88 / 0.92

BF Goodrich G-Force T/A KDW2 0.85 / 0.91
Bridgestone Potenza RE760 Sport 0.80 / 0.90
Dunlop Direzza Sport Z1 Star Spec 0.86 / 0.92
Falken Azenis RT-615 0.80 / 0.91
Hankook Ventus V12 EVO 0.87 / 0.93
Kumho Ecsta XS 0.77 / 0.94
Ling Long L688 0.73 / 0.88
Nitto Invo 0.82 / 0.91
Yokohama S-Drive 0.84 / 0.88

after the testing the Car and Driver test drivers and staffers still consider the Pilot Sport PS2 the top summer performance tire.

Final Results for the challengers

#1 Dunlop Star Spec
#2 Hankook V12 EVO
#3 Kumho Ecsta XS
#4 Bridgestone RE760
#5 BF Goodrich KDW2
#6 Yokohama S-Drive
#7 Falken Azenis
#8 Nitto Invo
#9 Lin Long L688

 

Wow the hankooks did great

 

X2 on that.Im gonna be putting a set of these on mine when the time comes

 

I have the Hankook Ventus V12 Evo K110s' on the rears on my car and I love em. Sometimes I feel like there is a grip issue, but that is normally under very light rain conditions when it just makes the road oily and doesn't actually wash the oil away like heavy rains do...

...and right after I am done running the car through a touch free car wash...then I'm spinning all over the place haha.

I like them, and they were very fairly priced through Discount Tire. I think I paid five hundred and change for them installed...maybe less, don't have the receipt on me it is in the car.

 

"after the testing the Car and Driver test drivers and staffers still consider the Pilot Sport PS2 the top summer performance tire."

not surprised. with pirelli, michelin, vredstein, et al...you get a history of proven performance and a very high-quality tire. i love my ps2's and they're worth the extra price.

 

I love my PS2's and even had them on my old GTI. I will consider the Hankcooks since they did substantially well and would save me a lot of money...

 

Interesting. The Falkens tested are not available in my sizes. I wonder how my choice (Falken FK452) would have fared?

 

I KNEW IT.

I had a feeling these were going to do well.
Price is right and there is a rebate too.

 

i really did not care for how the car handled with the ps2's on it. the car felt unbalanced to me.

 

Dunlops ran a whole second faster in dry and only .1 slower in the wet thats nice. I think i might try the dunlops next.

 

I wonder about this....

I've driven 3 cars with Kumho Ecsta's on them, each one felt like it was on ice. One was an BMW M5, Corvette C6, and a Mustang GT500KR. Not sure what car they used for testing in the article, but each of the owners of the aforementioned cars replaced the Kumho's almost immediately with something else.

 

Test car was a 3 Series BMW.

No doubt the Dunlop was the best overall with 116 total points, but those Hankooks were a very close second at 113 points. The price difference makes the Hankooks a no brainer. The Kumhos were tops in the dry by a significant margin but almost worthless in the wet (diabolical was the word used in the article!!). For a pure summer only, 100% dry weather tire, they look to be an excellent choice. Just don't get caught in the rain - you may not make it home!