Michelin Pilot Sport A/S 3+ vs Michelin Pilot Sport 4 S — Compared

“I have had the Michelin Pilot sport A/S3+ for my last two sets of tires, and I had the hydro-edge before that on my old Toyota. So much grip around corners and good rain performance.”

“The Michelin Pilot Sport A/S 3+ was amazing on my STI in cold and wet in the Seattle area. But I never had a chance to drive them on proper snow/ice, so I can't vouch for them in a northeast winter, unfortunately. :/”

“Are you talking about the all seasons or the summer tires? The summer tires are a terrible choice and you will likely go off the road at some point. Summer tires get hard as a rock in cold temps since they are not meant to be used in winter. If you're talking about the all seasons, I had Pilot Sport A/S 3+ on my 2016 S6 and they were just terrible in snow. So bad that I replaced them after only ~10k miles and put on some Conti Extreme Contact DWS, which were far superior in bad weather. If you want a true all season that can be useful in winter, I'd go with the Contis. But if you are going to be driving in bad weather regularly, get dedicated snows. All seasons are passable here and there but not confidence inspiring.”

“A note about the pilot sport 4 S: in cold weather (below 5 degrees) even if it isn't icy, the tyre compound hardens and has dramatically reduced grip. They are excellent summer tyres though, good in the wet too. These days I run Uniroyal rainsport 5 and they're very good.”

“I tried conti’s and took them off the car after 2 days and went back to ps4s. Obviously on a closed course they feel very floaty around 130 and I’ve had the Michelin’s up to 165-170 and they stay planted. Depends if you drive those speeds, but like Watkins glen you’ll legally notice the difference. It was shocking at first.”

“If you can burn through a set of rock hard Bridgestones in 8k miles then you must be driving like a nutter. Most will see 20k miles on the fronts. You also talk about "throwing" the car around. If you're flinging the car around, I think you'd find the car a lot more predictable on 4 tyres of the same type rather than those on the front axle being a lot gripper than those on the rear axle. I'd recommend 35psi fronts and 33psi backs, if you were running 4 x PS4s. Back end stability is a little way off the likes of a Golf GTI when you start flinging it around - rear axle grip for both wheels on a bend would be far better with multilink rear suspension (which the Polo doesn't have). I've momentarily lost the back end once when I had all Bridgestones on. My 2018 Polo GTI went tail happy doing some moderate acceleration out of a large roundabout (so large it was almost straight) when I had 4000.miles on - bone dry road on a warm day. In the outside lane, a Golf GTD gunned it at twice my rate of acceleration, with no drama. That was the incident that made me decide to ditch the Bridgestones for PS4s.”