Federal RS-RR Review

HapaZ

I haven't seen anyone take the time to write up a review of the Federal Rs-RR's on our cars so here's my take.

Tires Compared:
Continental DSW & DSW06
Pilot Super Sports
RS-RR

Continental: Road trips (they're quiet), fall/winter-ish conditions.
These are my all seasons that I primarily use for long road trips and when the weather in my area starts to turn cold. I am in the mountains and winters usually see several feet of snow at a time. No these are not winter tires, and no I don't routinely use my Z with these tires in the snow. I did have the fortune of running an early season auto-x with them on once so I can actually compare. There is a significant steering response difference between the DWS and DWS06 with the 06's being better. They're not to the level of even the Super Sports, but they are a step in that direction.

Super Sport: Summers and previous auto-x
These tires are old news and you've probably read up on them a ton already. I don't have much new to add about daily driving other than they lasted me around 28k miles and the rears last about 1/2 as long as the fronts. Loved them. For auto-x they were worlds better than the Continentals (yeah no duh), but it's interesting to talk about how they were different. With the all-seasons, I had a TON of understeer on turn-in/mid-corner and it had to be very cautious on throttle application out of a turn. With the Super Sports I had more grip, better braking, and they were more precise in pretty much every aspect. But then again they really should be so no huge surprises here.

RS-RR: Auto-x and a few runs to the grocery store in the summer
More outright grip than the Continental's, but you knew that already so let's dig with the SS's. The Federal tire has a much stiffer sidewall than the Michelin's and turn-in is much quicker and mid-turn corrections are more precise. This is most noticeable on decreasing radius turns where I have to add more steering angle as I progress through the turn. The Michelins left me wondering how much angle to put in the wheel to get the car to point toward the apex, but the Federal's never left me with any doubt. At 39psi hot the RS-RR's are progressive all the way up to their limits and let you know when you're close to the limit which gave me a good amount of confidence in them. I will need a little more experience monitoring temps/pressure to comment on the "greasy" nature some people have experienced. It might be that the short runs in auto-x don't generate enough heat to have this happen. The SS's are also progressive, but their steering response just is a 1/2 step slower and made it slightly harder to find the exact point between grip and slip. The limits on the SS's are also slightly lower so managing understeer and throttle application is more critical on them. On the RS-RR's I can gas on more aggressively and earlier coming out of a turn than the SS's. Braking performance was surprisingly similar with the RR's having a slight edge. Even with aggressive pads (EBC Bluestuff), it was difficult to trip abs with the RR's. I haven't been on the Bridgestone RE71r's but I'm pretty sure they are a better race tire if you have the budget for them.

Daily:
This is obviously where the continentals shine. Even in the summer morning temps can be below freezing and when I need to pick up a gallon of milk before the missus wakes up because I went on a cereal tear the night before isn't an issue. The SS's don't like anything below 40sh and turn very hard. I haven't tried anything below 45 with the RS-RR's which makes getting to the course in the morning early in the season a challenge. The stars kind of have to align for me to drive on them to an event before July.

Conti's are the quietest, followed by the Super Sports, and the RS-RR's are loud. It's actually kind of fun thinking about comparisons for the road noise. There's a storm in the beginning of the 1st Alien movie with the wind howling on the planet. The RS-RR's sound EXACTLY like that on one type of asphalt in town when I'm going 50-60mph. On smooth new asphalt they literally sound like a small propeller airplane slowly rolling off its throttle on descent. On mixed asphalt they do sound a little like an all-terrain tire with constant whirring. I didn't buy these tires for their noise profile and I'll bet you can guess which tire I picked for that I run for that duty.

Overall:
I'm happy with these Federal's. They were about $600 delivered to my door in stock 245/275 sizes which is less than 1/2 what I paid for the Super Sports or Conti's. I have a spare 275 set and am considering going square stance for my next event. I'm guessing this will improve the braking and overall corner grip limit some.

That's it.... hope this helps someone!

vq37818

They have a successor to the RS-RR coming soon called the 595 RS-PRO which is supposed to perform similarly to the RS-RR. Supposedly wet traction is improved and noise is reduced significantly. Gonna try them next time around.

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2019 370z Sport 6MT | Magnetic Black

HapaZ

Interesting! Didn’t Federal have a tire aimed at the drift crowd also?