I recently had a '09 MCS "loaner" which had OEM 205/45/17 Dunlop Sport rft's. It had been a while since I had driven a Mini with 17" wheels/tires, so this gave me the opportunity compare the 17" Crown-spoke wheels/tires with my 16" Bridge-spoke wheels and Goodyear rft's. Both the '09 and my '08 had approximately the same mileage on their respective tires (8600 mi +-)

The first thing readily noticable was that the "17 Dunlops were much quieter than my 16" Goodyears. The Goodyears have always made a kind of "singing" whine that is especially noticable on smooth pavement. This quietness was a good thing and something that I wouldn't have predicted....maybe some of you guys would've.

The other thing was the ride comfort. The 17" wheels are definitely a little harsher than the 16" bridge spokes. You can feel the bumps and seams in the rear seams of your pants a little more with the 17" tires...unreasonably so? I don't think so and this is a change from how I once felt about these wheels. In fact it was the main reason I didn't order the 17" wheels on my MCS. I've always liked the "looks" of 17" wheels.

Finally, the handling was much more responsive with the 17" Dunlops making the whole experience of driving a little more fun.

So will I be ordering 17" wheels on my next Mini? If I had to drive over a lot of rough roads and highways on a daily basis I might rethink this decision but since I don't....YES and in fact, I've already started looking into replacing my existing 16" wheels.

 

which Dunlop was it, what model. I had SP 5000's on my 16" rims until last week and they were horribly uncomfortable and little noisy. You could feel every little imperfection in the surface and it was spine breaking to go over any patches or cross grooves.

Maybe you the dunlops you tested are less noisy due to the fact that they were newer with more thread than your Goodyear's ?

Handling and comfort are mutually exclusive as they both tie to the sidewall stiffness
It's a trade off, a tire that will be more comfortable will not have same response in handling.

 

They were the 205/45/17 Dunlop Sport SP 01s and my tires are the German made 195/55/16 Goodyears (Excellence). And they both had almost identical mileage, so that wouldn't account for the difference. I can't offer any explanation for what I heard but it was definitely a quieter ride. I guess I had expected that an all season tire would run quieter than sport tires but that was not the case here. And I don't have enough experience to draw any general conclusions. If all SP 01's were like these they would be on my short list if I were shopping for 17" run flats.

I agree with your point regarding handling vs comfort. On the roads around where I live the sport 17" Dunlop tires weren't too harsh for my tastes...as I had originally thought they would be. And the increase in "fun" factor was enough to offset the slight loss of comfort. But having said that, they do provide a harsher ride which could be objectionable on a daily commute over rough highways.

What tires and wheels did you change to?

 

I bought used set of 16" OZ Superleggera's back in March and they had fairly worn out Dunlop SP 5000 in 195/55/16 on them. I didn't hate the tire as I loved the responsiveness of the stiff sidewall but sometimes the bumps during the commute were getting annoying. But then again, there was smile on my face every time i could take the turn fast. The tire was also pretty old (6 years) and I didn't feel comfortable pushing such old tire to the limit so I bit the bullet, researched for over a month and finally picked up set of brand new Potenzas RE760's from TireRack as they had a special.

The new tire has faaaaar more gripp than the dunlop did but the sidewall is somewhat less stiff. It's not mushy by any means but it's just not as sharp and you can feel a bit of a roll on a turn in. It doesn't bother me too much as it's offset by the much more laterall grip. Plus the added comfort and less tire noise is nice on a daily commute.
Teh new tire is in 205/50/16

good luck

 

I think the Portenzas are at the top of my list...price, comfort and perfomance. BeeUteeful images....BTW