Street tires in IT? My Review

[JeffYoung]

And high torque, heavier RWD cars on 205/50/15 street tires? Fail again.

[forestdweller37]

The street tires and how well they perform is also VERY dependant on the car, suspension, etc...

Years ago when I ran shaved RA1's on the Integra to test what you guys are talking about I quickly said hell no and removed them to never go back on the car again.

Heavy FWD cars on street tires = FALE

IT7 dinosaurs (light and RWD) are fine, etc

And high torque, heavier RWD cars on 205/50/15 street tires? Fail again.

This is similar to what we found in Solo. Street tires and wheels must be sized appropriately for each other and the weight of the car.

(BTW, I retracted my letter.)

[JeffYoung]

FWIW we do have "informal" dicussions about street tires even without the letters. And we all monitor or participate to differing degrees in the forums and the discussions on street tires.

It's not being ignored and there are many positives for it.

[Xian]

And high torque, heavier RWD cars on 205/50/15 street tires? Fail again.

You're being intentionally silly.

#1- there are wider 15" tires than the 205.
#2- if there were a rewrite of the tire rules it would damn near require a rewrite of the wheel rules to go with it.

Which, as I think about it, IT will have to get around to #2 at some point just due to new vehicles being bigger and coming with wider wheels. How long before something gets classed into ITS that came from the factory with 7.5 or 8" wide wheels?

[Chip42]

there have been cars in S with OEM wheels >7" for a few years now.

cars in ITB have had this issue for a while.

it's one of the "performance limitations" that keep class parity more or less in check, just because it's there.

but yes IF we were to adopt street tire rules in IT, tread section width would need to be the limit, not rim width, and wheel diameter would need to be opened up some to accommodate that.

I repeat, for those joining us on page 11, that I am NOT trying to get "street tires" to be the rule in IT.

[Chip42]

The street tires and how well they perform is also VERY dependant on the car, suspension, etc...

Years ago when I ran shaved RA1's on the Integra to test what you guys are talking about I quickly said hell no and removed them to never go back on the car again.

Heavy FWD cars on street tires = FALE

IT7 dinosaurs (light and RWD) are fine, etc

many people ran similar combos for a long time not too long ago. the toyo RA1s are not streets - though their ultimate lap time is more similar than modern R comps. in either case, a car well set up to run HoHos is not going to be as happy on RA1s. needs a bit of toe in to accommodate the higher slip angles and such. other wise the car is very wishy washy when unloaded, and takes more time to take a set at turn in, usually with a lot more wheel input, but you can toss the car all over the place and the tires just seem to like it, while R6s are much happier when finessed.

I actually found the ZIIs to be more comfortable to drive than the RA1s, honestly. (underpowered 2350# RWD car) I gave them a smidge of rear toe in and found that while they do take a bit longer to take a set (vs R6s) they were less wallowy than the RA1s and felt more firmly planted. I did need to toss the car at the corner harder than I had been accustomed to, but that was easy to learn, and actually kinda fun.

[seckerich]

Already is, the ITS BMW can run a 16" wheel.

Great you come up with this idea after I sell my shaving machine to a legends team. You know, the series that runs cheap street tires.

You screw with our lifetime stash of light 15 x 7 wheels and you will piss off way more people than you bring in.

I have to laugh at the horror stories of how little use some of the proponents claim to get out of a set of Hoosiers. Very poor tire management or abuse when they are stickers. You would be shocked at the age of some of the tires I ran this year and the lap times they ran.

I remember the days of Toyo, etc, and it is not a good memory.

[Xian]

Already is, the ITS BMW can run a 16" wheel.

Great you come up with this idea after I sell my shaving machine to a legends team. You know, the series that runs cheap street tires.

You screw with our lifetime stash of light 15 x 7 wheels and you will piss off way more people than you bring in.

I have to laugh at the horror stories of how little use some of the proponents claim to get out of a set of Hoosiers. Very poor tire management or abuse when they are stickers. You would be shocked at the age of some of the tires I ran this year and the lap times they ran.

I remember the days of Toyo, etc, and it is not a good memory.

Which is why changing the IT rules to street tires would be less than ideal... The front guys will shave them and kill any possible cost savings. Just let the mid-pack and back guys do what they want to do... They're still legal to the rules so what's it matter?

[Ron Earp]

I have to laugh at the horror stories of how little use some of the proponents claim to get out of a set of Hoosiers. Very poor tire management or abuse when they are stickers. You would be shocked at the age of some of the tires I ran this year and the lap times they ran. .

^^^^This.

Hoosiers aren't perfect. But with proper management I get a decent life out of them and nothing like what Lizard claims with them falling off a second a lap. I ran some old Hoosers in a CCPS down at CMP until one blew out, and the time was only 2.5 seconds off my fastest SARRC time - and it blew out because it was heat cycled over 21 times and run down to the cords.

I get it that Hoosiers do not last as long as a street tire, but they are not nearly as short lived as some street tire proponents claim.

[adamjabaay]

^^^^This.

Hoosiers aren't perfect. But with proper management I get a decent life out of them and nothing like what Lizard claims with them falling off a second a lap. I ran some old Hoosers in a CCPS down at CMP until one blew out, and the time was only 2.5 seconds off my fastest SARRC time - and it blew out because it was heat cycled over 21 times and run down to the cords.

I get it that Hoosiers do not last as long as a street tire, but they are not nearly as short lived as some street tire proponents claim.

I regularly run hoosiers down to the no-lines-almost-corded level...and corded 3-4 this year doing hpde crap.
the laptimes are only a few seconds slower than he best that I can get out of them, until corded... I agree with ron completely here. Old hoosiers aren't complete throw aways

[XelderX]

Great you come up with this idea after I sell my shaving machine to a legends team. You know, the series that runs cheap street tires.

They are shaving camber into them to go around in circles. Not really apples to apples.

There is evidence that the Hankook RS3 doesn't really get any faster when shaved. I think anyone spending money to shave the current crop of top street tires is only going to see a negligible gain. The new crop of tires don't have the same tread squirm/chunking issues the tires of a few years ago had.

[pfcs]

There's truth in your post. But some of it ignores the reality of IT for the last fifteen years, half the time the class has been in existence. IT is the destination for many of us.

I'd go race Prod or GT. Except for I don't see any cars in Prod that I'm interested in racing. The displacement limit in Prod, I think 3L, ensures I'll be racing imports and very old cars. I don't want to race a hand grenade engine, and while my car, a 1994-2004 chassis is old, it ain't British spridget old.

And beyond that, I'm not at all interested in the National/Majors scene as I'm not going to tow to the middle of the country for a championship race (fixed now), and I'm far more interested in what regional races have to offer such as the SARRC, Cup races, and ECRs (not fixed).

So, I, and many others like me, stay in IT where the racing groups are large, the competitive fields are deep, and most importantly it is where our friends race.

Ron-one of my points was that IT HAS become a destination class, partly because of the failure of ALL the national sedan classes (GT, Production, SS) as well as the failure of national racing in general. And that's a problem!
IT was envisioned as a cheap, fun, low rent entry level class and it WAS.
I have hung around here and occasionally put my 2 cents in because I still care about the class, and I have argued for rules stasis. The realignment was OK and the ITAC operations manual a good thing. The rules creep, even due to seemingly benign changes, not good!! People argue that if everyone ran street tires, the serious guys would still, by driving skill and/or car development, prevail, and of course, they would.
But the also rans would be a lot closer to the point of the spear when a tire budget was no longer such an effective band-aid to well heeled contestants! I like that idea a lot! I've raced on REALLY slick street tires and am here to tell ya', it's just as exciting and challenging at 11/10s when you are restrained by traction as it is on purple crack, maybe even more so. I'm thinking B and C should go for it and see how it fleshes out.



And while on my soapbox, Another pet idea: start classifying newer cars into B&C with stock engines and manifolds (no headers) and stock ECUs*. IT B&C are suffering because newer cars are becoming more powerful and sophisticated and thus, little suited for B and C. Requiring stock engines would realign the power to weight calculus and make many econoboxes (CHEAP!!) available and eligible! A huge amount of development is required to be highly competitive (header design, +.040 overbore, blueprinting, raising compression to spec+.49!) which requires unnecessary $$$. This might bring an astonishing rebirth of the real IT entry level classes. A junkyard engine @$400 could become a pretty attractive deal.

*old rules-rewrite chips if you want; don't allow other changes inside the box but don't worry about how thou police it because with stock motors a/ there's not much to gain and b/how seriously are we supposed to take this shit? A lot of what is wrong IMO (free ECU/management stuff) was because we were too intellectual and not practical about enforcement issues. And the old "but look what happened to showroom stock" argument. Again, if someone is SO serious about winning that they cheat, which would entail blueprinting, etc, what else is new?
we have the same problem now, and enforcement/detection is perhaps even more difficult with the existing IT rules. Who has an Opel GT cam profile? B20E Volvo? There may be a template for a 2002 cam, but who is going to risk paying for a teardown, or for that matter, how to practically teardown and check an E46 cam?
Reality! What a concept. We must be practical unless we're all millionaires, but then we should race Porsche Cup and get the fuck out of IT and return it to the young dreamers that started it so long ago.

rant mode off

[jjjanos]

There is evidence that the Hankook RS3 doesn't really get any faster when shaved. I think anyone spending money to shave the current crop of top street tires is only going to see a negligible gain. The new crop of tires don't have the same tread squirm/chunking issues the tires of a few years ago had.

Please post the independently tested technical data showing the gain and durability.

[quadzjr]

^^^^This.

Hoosiers aren't perfect. But with proper management I get a decent life out of them and nothing like what Lizard claims with them falling off a second a lap. I ran some old Hoosers in a CCPS down at CMP until one blew out, and the time was only 2.5 seconds off my fastest SARRC time - and it blew out because it was heat cycled over 21 times and run down to the cords.

I get it that Hoosiers do not last as long as a street tire, but they are not nearly as short lived as some street tire proponents claim.

At Sebring you do see those large differences in time due to the size of the track, amount of corners, and surface. This last weekend my car was actually faster after testing (splitter and such) but was on 6-9 heat cycled hoosiers. I was 2 seconds off my pace with new hoosiers.

Just part of my upbrining and being an Engineer, but I follow the recomendations of the tire, brake, etc.. about break in proceedures.

My tires will last a while on hoosiers if I just drive the car around. If I go for a win I really have to push to make up time in the corners.. life of the tire quickly reduces then.

I know the tire wear is even worse for the FWD guys. I feel bad for them.. sometimes..haha

[gran racing]

You screw with our lifetime stash of light 15 x 7 wheels and you will piss off way more people than you bring in.

Seriously!! The way I better manage my tire wear is by having ample wheels - at least three sets of dry wheels. If people are doing HPDEs it especially makes sense and saves costs.
Regarding the stock engines - love it in theory but don't know how to avoid the mess which happens in "show room stock". Their engine builds are not cheap if someone wants to be competitive, and it's within the tolerances so legal. Sealed engines would be nice but comes with its own series of issues.

[lateapex911]

^^^^This.

Hoosiers aren't perfect. But with proper management I get a decent life out of them and nothing like what Lizard claims with them falling off a second a lap. I ran some old Hoosers in a CCPS down at CMP until one blew out, and the time was only 2.5 seconds off my fastest SARRC time - and it blew out because it was heat cycled over 21 times and run down to the cords.

I get it that Hoosiers do not last as long as a street tire, but they are not nearly as short lived as some street tire proponents claim.

Still, two and a half seconds is a LOT of time. I understand the best time you did is just that, a pinnacle time. But still they DO degrade. And I understand these were VERY cycled.
Of course, they degrade to street tire time levels.

In my experience, if i was able to properly cycle and rest them, they were off a strong second or so (on a 65 second track) around 8 - 12 cycles. Lap record times though, were on FRESH tires, in good conditions, in morning races, usually.

Maybe we allow Hoosiers into the Street Tire sub class if they have a certain number of cycles minimum on them? Like say, 8?

[Greg Amy]

Can't remember if it was discussed in this thread, but Hoosier is replacing Spec Miata's "SM6" - which is nothing more than a re-branded 205/50-15 Hoosier R6 - with the "SM7". The SM7 is the R6 carcass using a harder, longer-lasting compound from the Grand-Am Continental series (the Contis are re-branded Ho-Hos). Reasons for this are likely two-fold: one, longer lasting tire means SM competitors spend less money*; two, a slower tire creates disincentives for competitors in other DOT classes from buying the 205/50-15 tire at the SM-subsidized price (the SM6 was ~2/3 the cost of the R6).

However...I have absolutely no doubt that once the supply chain gets filled for the Majors program, you'll see a lot of IT competitors trying out the new SM7. If I were using 205/50-15, I certainly would (I regularly bought the SM6 for the rear of my STL car). So, here's a "gateway tire" that proponents of Street Tire Evolution (c2013, Kakashi Racing) can use to attract other competitors to their cause. I have not yet found out what its "ttw" number is, but I'd not be surprised if it was a lot closer to 200 than you think...

Greg

* Which, of course, given all the discussion in this thread we know it won't do. We know that Majors SM'rs will get it in their heads that they need a new set of tires each session. Nothing you can do about that, short of marking tires and limiting the number of tires per weekend, which we can't do because of resource limitations.

[Greg Amy]

Maybe we allow Hoosiers into the Street Tire sub class if they have a certain number of cycles minimum on them? Like say, 8?

Impossibru to enforce.

[lateapex911]

Impossibru to enforce.

yea, you caught me between edits to add a forgotten sarcastic icon

[lawtonglenn]

.

...they DO degrade...In my experience, ...off a strong second or so (on a 65 second track) around 8 - 12 cycles. Lap record times though, were on FRESH tires, in good conditions, in morning races...

Let me suggest that the people who aren't seeing the degradation aren't as "tire-limited", but instead have
comparatively more potential to be wrung out in their driving style.

Specifically, I speculate that the tires degrade from 100% to 90% over the 6 or 8 or 10 heat cycles, but if you are
only using them at 90% from the git-go you may never see the dropoff.

(I tried several edits of the above sentences to unsuccessfully reduce my sounding like a dick)

.