Thanks everyone for your kind input. I especially appreciated & enjoyed the telephone conversations about this.
And Raymond you might get a kick out of this, but I had a 1st hand report on your tire situation via a old friend who also had attended PUB-11. That report came in while PUB was still underway. Thank goodness your tire situation worked out okay & safely. It's pretty amazing that a local tire shop along the way had a set of tires, particularly nice looking whitewalls, there waiting for you.
I will be flying from Idaho to Maine in a couple of weeks to pick up the car. The good news at this point is that the handling issue may not be coming from the tires, but rather some front axle problems, which have just been corrected. Still, a set of Vredesteins will be tested just to see if we can get any better performance in terms of handling. If that is the case then I will likely wait until after I've driven the car back to Idaho to make the change. If I do go ahead with that then I will probably work through Diamond Back Classics. They can supply the Vredestein Sprint Classic 185HR 14, which comes only blackwall, and then they can apply the whitewalls at their facility. Since I have the original spare that came on my 280SL we ought to be able to get the placement of the whitewall where it should be (i.e., starting 1/2 inch out from the rim). The primary question to ponder at this point is, "would Paul Bracq maybe prefer the whitewall to be a just little bit wider than 3/4 inch on a 280SL with full wheelcovers?" Say, 1 inch wide perhaps?
BTW, after departing Maine we will head to Essex, MA to visit the good folks at Paul Russell's place in order to thank them for the contribution they made to the thorough going over this car has received during the past 8 months. Then we will begin a driving trip of approx. 4,000 miles back to Boise.
