After 24,000 miles the tires on the 2003 CL Type-S are quite shot. They squeal like angry pigs in all but the most conservative accelerations. They squeal in 2nd gear and sometimes even in 3rd gear. I can’t get a decent run with my nifty G-Meter at all.

They made it through winter, but there were not fun to drive on by a long shot. They didn’t last long considering they were stock tires, Michelin Pilot HX MXM4 – Grand Touring All-Season. I’m sure my driving style had a lot to do with it, but they’ve been going down hill since around 17,000 miles.

So today I ordered up some Ultra High Performance Summer tires. I held back and didn’t go with Max Performance, Protenza S-03’s that I wanted. They would have required new wheels and I’m not ready to spend that kind of money on a leased car. I ended up getting Yokohama AVS ES100’s. I was a little hesitant at first since my only experience with Yok’s in the past was on a friend’s car and to put it gently, they sucked. The reviews are all pretty good for this tire though and it came out top in a competition with others in it’s class, “value” summer performance tires. They are pretty cheap, $114 a pop compared to the $176 each for the stock tires and $204 for the Protenza’s.

I’m looking forward to them. The last car I put summer tires on was my 1995 Eclipse GSX. Dunlop SP8000’s and they were incredible. About a 10,000 mile tread life, but they made the car handle like it was on rails. I miss that feeling.