New Nittos on the Bullitt

I recently bought tires for the Bullitt. The wheels are custom Bullitt 5-spokes in 17x9 (front) and 17x10.5 (rear). The tire sizes required are 275/40/ZR17 (front) and 315/35ZR17 (rear). The Dunlop Star-Specs that I bought for the '66, and really like, don't come in these sizes.

The tires that were on the Bullitt were BFGoodrich T/A G-Force KD, issued in 2007 for this car's final One Lap of America race. The BFG's are great tires, particularly back then, and generally run wider than other brands.

This marking on the old BFGs denotes "2007 One Lap Of America".

Today, this 315 tire size with a 17" diameter is considered very unusual. Most performance cars today run at least 19- or 20-inch wheels. Even economy cars are running 17-inch wheels today, and definitely not this wide. Nitto makes tires in this size, in their popular NT-05 among others. Nittos are also known to be a little narrow, which worked out well for me.

The Nitto 315/35/ZR17 is a bit narrower than the BFG, but this isn't a bad thing.

The BFGs stuck out a bit.

The Nittos fit the wheels better, and fit the car better too.

The performance of the Nitto is just great—very quiet, responsive, and sticky compared to the BFG. I've used them in the rain already too, and they perform fine in normal driving. The tread is not particularly deep, Nitto claims 7/32" tread depth on this tire (6/32" on the race version NT-05R), while other tires seem to be in the 9-10/32" category. But drivers aren't buying the NT-05 for long life, but rather maximum performance. The price is fantastic too, if that weren't enough.

But wait, there's more. :-) Reducing unsprung weight at the corners of a car is a good thing, and the NT-05 delivered for me here too.

Here are the weights, compared to the used, but not used up, BFGs:
Nitto: 275/40zr17 98w
27.5# vs. BFG 29.2#
Nitto: 315/35zr17 102w
29.9# vs. BFG 31.6#


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