Ritchie, I certainly agree with you that N-rating is not a must. I, for one, use Toyo Proxes 1 for my street tires, they are better performing for my needs for daily and 4-season driving, and I'd recommend them to anyone.

However, I don't understand the "marketing ploy" part of your argument. How does Porsche make money with N-spec tires? They do go through extensive tire test that is actually costing them a small fortune. If anyone is making money, that is Michelin, which of course they have every right to it.

I though N-rating was just some adjustments to tire/suspension spring rates and thread designs. After Larry Cable came back from Dubai, he was clearly explained the process is much more technical than that. And one of the engineers comments, for what ever it is worth, was that N-spec tire of same brand/model will outperform and non-rated one on the specific vehicle it is rated for.

And frankly that's all I care when it comes to performance driving. But again, I do agree it is not a requirement, at least not for me. I also use Toyos for tracking

Cheers,

 

Faith, IMO Michelin is gaining far more out of this than Porsche, I believe their relationship is such that Porsche is not really paying for the testing. Because Porsche's N-rating means that thousands upon thousands of people will now buy those tires thereby giving Michelin money. Not to mention how many Porsche's come with OEM Michelins and also the racing tire industry of which Porsche cups and RSR's running Michelins is a huge money maker.

The changes aren't that drastic over the other tires. Most of that stuff can probably be done in simulation and then tested shortly and approved.

What I know is that there is a lot we don't know about that business relationships. I do think that Porsche calls some of the shots at Michelin though. Because all of the bigger sized (>295) 18" tires were discontinued after the 997's came out (almost instantaneously) with 19" wheels. With Corvette's and Vipers now privy to the performance of MPSC and some even coming with them, there is NO WAY they would not be making large sums of money on bigger sized 18" MPSC. And now they won't even make the PSS in those sizes either. So Michelin has NOTHING but slicks in the wider sizes.

 

Back in 1997 I was visiting the Nurburgring and I stumbled across the Porsche tire testing center near the track. The place was where I could see rows of tires mounted on wheels and the guys were busy putting on new sets for logging data. I met the head engineer in charge and later read about them doing extensive testing of various tires for OEM use with N-ratings conferred to those which met Porsche's stringent specifications on how these street tires felt at the limits, tire noise, heat rating, wear characteristics, response to steering input, etc. Just like Porsche's suspensions are tuned to be pretty good for street driving and occasional DE track from selection of proper spring rates, shock rates, anti-roll bar stiffness, etc, tires are also optimized for each model car. All the tire companies want Porsche to choose them for OEM applications and to get their tire N-certified (really a stamp of approval that has to pass all the strict requirements that Porsche specified). The tire companies get the certification and gets fame and marketing benefits like Fatih said above because people who sees the ads think if its good enough for Porsche , Ferrari, etc then it must be worth the money.

 

I can not confirm with factual information that Porsche is getting some kind of kick back from Michelin for using its tires. I would say that it would be naive to think that they are not though.