Tires

[thunder938]

I don’t really understand the complaint about the cost of these tires.  I race on pavement and last year my cut tires were 2 seasons old, not the fastest but still would hold air.  I am going to get new tires today and expect to get a season out of them, if not in a crash and mess them up. Then they will become spares for the following year.  That is one of the cheapest tire bill in racing.  Heck even a go carts with soft slicks could spend thousands $$$$ if raced a lot.  Street stock could spend 2 grand a year and I talk to a buddy that runs a sportsman pavement car and 125 bucks each for tires and 2 to 3 weeks they are done.  So, what are we talking about here?

$550.00 for new cut tires that could last a whole season, again I don’t see that problem..

[fastmantom]

Please read the entire thread to understand where I am coming from. Thanks.

[justfreaky]

The whole tire cutting thing, and RB stated it best, has to do with the the rubber folding over while in the turns.
Cutting the tires changes the slip angles that the tires work best at.

When I was running  Mods' (pavement), we used the Hoosiers or Goodyears. It was ALL about the grip! Same deal with over powered and under tired. Ya gotta remember that these cars have a lot of horsepower, and weigh very little. Same with Legends Cars.

Different track surfaces, give different  abuse to the tires (black top, cement, dirt). Cutting, or shaving the tires (in any form), will lower the effective use of the tire. Will it give better grip? Yes!  But it will limit the amount of tire life (to some extent).

As I am going to run autocross; I will likely go with the slick type tire. It's a grip thing!
OldDawg has some very good info on tire cutting, as does The Tire Rack. (both good sites)
I think Megamang (Mike) has them listed in the reference material.

Tire rules will likely need to be brought up to INEX and 600 Racing. I don't want to get caught up in the politics of the rules. Not my thing! Would there be a better tire choice? .............. I can't say as of yet. Rules being what they are..... Ya have to make due with what the rules allow. It's the same whatever class, or type, of racing you do. At this point, cutting the tires seems to work for most.


Steve

[JGRacing]

From my perspective, I do not have a problem with cutting the tires as long as it does not get to the point where I will only be able to get a couple races out of them, and will have to show up with 2 or 3 sets cuts at various angles for adjustments just to be competetive.  I'm just throwing out an idea of how they might police the situation before we all figure out more ways to waste stupid amounts of money on a class that is meant to be affordable.      

[MegaMang]

Tom brought up an interesting point regarding tire composition.  I understand that last year the BFGoodrich tires were tackier than the year before, so it's entirely possible that the tires may have held up better without cutting than the previous year's composition.  It's entirely likely that we all continued to cut tires because we were in the habit.  I would like to see the manufacturer make subtle changes to composition to eliminate the need for cutting tires.  I'd love to be able to use one to two sets a year and not have to cut tires to keep them from getting destroyed.  This would indeed bring this class back to where it was intended to be.  Affordable racing was one of the main reasons behind the legend, and not having to cut tires would help to bring it back there.  I do know that some of the guys at our track were swapping tires every 3 or 4 weeks, and that is way too expensive for affordable racing.  Those lads are trying to be as competitive as possible, and to be honest, I'm inclined to think that at that point you need to move on to another class of car.  If you like spending lots of money on your race car, move on to a class that encourages it.

The cost of tire cutting for us is $25 a tire, so $500 for tires is not a huge cost, but if you start getting obsessive, it can cost a bundle.  Change the composition to keep tires lasting longer and not needing cutting, and you discourage this kind of trend.

Good point Tom.

Mike

PS I'll still be getting my first set cut this year.  Maybe next set...

[JGRacing]

I would bet that the legends tire come off of the same line with the same compound as the street tire and then get the INEX stamp.  I had thought about a shallower tread to prevent the chunking on asphalt (if they put me in charge of 600 for the day  .   At $100 for a tire, there probably is not much customization by BFG.  Any difference in compound from one year to the next is probably just them tweaking the formula for the street tires.     

[VMS Motorsports]

Im glad we dont have these issues in the dirt.   
I had heard that the first run of the tires last year were softer than they were supposed to be, but there were only like 500 of them or something, then they were back to normal...?