The 24 Hours of Lemons Forums → Lemons Tech → Why the 190 Treadwear Requirement?
my goal for this winter is how to stuff 225 45 15 under the 914, not because we need them but because we bought three sets of them when the RS-2 were on clearance for the Q45
Now THAT'S Lemons thinking.
Troy,
Get some wheel adapters to be able to use different wheels than the stock 4 lug. 5 lug wheels in 16" or 17" and you are done.
The Dunlop Star Spec Z1 are really great tires. Drive'em hard, they don't change, really an excellent tire. Especially for heavy ass cars like our Taurus. I've driven on the Azenias and the Dunlops are better.
Troy, if harder tires mean you lock up more easily, modulate the pedal! And if you do flat spot a set, harder compounds won't wear to the cord in a millisecond.....seems to me that the rookies (and old guys with stone hands) don't need square tires after the first lap...and less grip equalizes the horsepower issue nicely.....put F78-15 Goodyear Custom Power Cushion Suburbanites on that 911 and watch the Size Matters guys reel 'em in...
Troy,
Get some wheel adapters to be able to use different wheels than the stock 4 lug. 5 lug wheels in 16" or 17" and you are done.
The Dunlop Star Spec Z1 are really great tires. Drive'em hard, they don't change, really an excellent tire. Especially for heavy ass cars like our Taurus. I've driven on the Azenias and the Dunlops are better.
Sergio,
I am thinking I need to go to 5 lug for better tire and wheel options.
Glad to hear you like the Star Specs. They're a little pricey but very interesting.
Troy
I just wanted to say +1 on possibly raising tire rating for 2011, 2010 tires have already been purchased by many a team, but I think 300ish would be fun.
I'm with you go to 300 tire wear
All you guys in favor of 300 treadwear tires are welcome to run them. There is nothing stopping you.
My current tires are 280 and I think there are better options for my car.
Somebody should run the five hundred-something treadwear Michelins my old Grand Marquis had as an experiment...
It would be interesting to require all drivers to run the same tire.
'Spec Lemons' tire.
KT
Mandatory Discount Tire $19.99 specials. They have a dozen or so different sizes, so there's bound to be something for everyone. 
Raising the treadwear would suit our team (because there aren't any 225/45-15 or 225/50-15 tires made <280 treadwear, at least that I can find). Still, think of raising the treadwear as racing in the drizzle. When you or the car next to you start sliding around, the judges are going to get even more cranky at 10pm.
If it is raised, I hope the minimum will be chosen to keep legal some relatively good, very cheap tire that comes in a huge variety of sizes.
Raising the treadwear would suit our team (because there aren't any 225/45-15 or 225/50-15 tires made <280 treadwear, at least that I can find).
I feel ya. I want to upgrade to 225 width tires on our car which would necessitate going to 15" wheels. We've been using 195/60/14 Azenis 615s because I have a hook up for them, but they only make 205s in 15" (which isn't so bad considering their tread is 1" wider than the 195/14s). There are no other cheap options for 225/15s. The cheapskate in me is leaning towards just sticking with the 14s.
Here's a thought that occurred to me while on my drive into the office this morning. Troy and I were talking about "Truth in 24" the other day, and this morning I remembered that McNish (or somebody) talks about how they'll do 35 or 40 pit stops during Le Mans. No wonder that they spend so much time choreographing their pit stops. Races are often won or lost in the pits, but I would imagine that in a race that length with that many stops, it's even more so.
One thing that's clear in Lemons is that good pit work is important, but maybe more important is staying out of the pits altogether. So if a softer treadwear tire would mean more pit stops, wouldn't it be ultimately counterproductive to run a softer tire? I guess ideally you'd run a tire that will wear out in about 9 or 10 hours in our typical races so you wouldn't have to do a tire change until the race was done on Saturday.
Personally, I think that Troy's team should be given a single-team exemption from the tire wear rating for one race. Higher speeds would just facilitate blowing up his Z sooner and make more room on the track for the rest of us. 
Troy is doing it wrong.
Troy and I were talking about "Truth in 24" the other day, and this morning I remembered that McNish (or somebody) talks about how they'll do 35 or 40 pit stops during Le Mans.
33... I've seen that a "few" times
the head wrote:my goal for this winter is how to stuff 225 45 15 under the 914, not because we need them but because we bought three sets of them when the RS-2 were on clearance for the Q45
I have some ideas on how to make $50 flares.
KT
Let me know I will attempt almost anything...
trekkor wrote:the head wrote:my goal for this winter is how to stuff 225 45 15 under the 914, not because we need them but because we bought three sets of them when the RS-2 were on clearance for the Q45
I have some ideas on how to make $50 flares.
KT
Let me know I will attempt almost anything...
You can make anything with HVAC ducting and a rivet gun... just saying
Raising the treadwear would suit our team (because there aren't any 225/45-15 or 225/50-15 tires made <280 treadwear, at least that I can find). Still, think of raising the treadwear as racing in the drizzle. When you or the car next to you start sliding around, the judges are going to get even more cranky at 10pm.
If it is raised, I hope the minimum will be chosen to keep legal some relatively good, very cheap tire that comes in a huge variety of sizes.
Hankook Ventus RS-2, RS-3
Pirelli Pzero
are all under 280
and the Yokohama ES100 is amazingly grippy for a 280 treadwear tire
the RS-3's treadwear rating is under 190, IIRC. that's why we switched to the Dunlops; we were pretty happy w/ the RS-2s, but the Dunlops are better. they're awesome.
So if a softer treadwear tire would mean more pit stops, wouldn't it be ultimately counterproductive to run a softer tire?
i don't think we're at the point where the tires are causing more pit stops. 190 is relatively soft for street tires, but is not THAT soft. if we had the option of running, say, Hoosier R6s, then the choice between them and 190 tires would be more important. i don't think there is quite as big a difference when you're talking 190 vs 300 treadwear.
as it is, the tires haven't really been the limiting factor for our stops. things like gas, head gaskets, and transmissions have been. if you really want to cut down on pit stops, install a 40-gallon fuel cell. that should cut them by >50% in most cars. of course, then you have guys out there for 4-5 hours at a time.
If I know that I have to come in every 2 hours for fuel - I'll run a tire that lasts 2 hours (and get 10 people over the wall to get driver/fuel/tires changed). Hoosier R6s would be a hot tire in that case. BUT, I don't see them being worth the extra 10 sets of tires and rims that we would need to run them for 24 hours. So scaling back a bit - If we say that we are going to want a tire that lasts 12 hours, half the race, then we start looking for something in the 140+ treadwear area. Then, given the Lemons enviroment, where driving over people's left over cars parts are common, I'd opt for an even more robust tread compound and run full tread tires. And then we are actually back to 190ish tires. They can last the entire race and are trash as they roll over the finish line. The purse in this race does not cover expenses, so why would people want to increase thier per race costs with tires that get trashed faster/easier.
For those of you running 16's or larger, may I suggest the Sumitomo HTR Z II? I know a couple of guys that use these as DE tires and are amazed at the performance given their price. They are a unidirectional pattern and used to be rated at 220 until this year. (For some reason, they were rated at 220, then Sumitomo went back and re-rated them at 360 for 2009, even though they "feature the same design, materials and manufacturing methods previously rated 220.")
You can pick them up for $60 in a 205/50 16" or 17" from Tire Rack.
Does anyone actually race this event to win??
Im really happy to make 3 races on a set of $220 DZ 101's... expenses down = more racing
I believe I could talk our team into donating a used set of 0 treadwear rated american racer dirt track tires to Troy for a trial run 15x8 like an 79-81" rollout they are dot stamped too.
I believe I could talk our team into donating a used set of 0 treadwear rated american racer dirt track tires to Troy for a trial run 15x8 like an 79-81" rollout
I want to see your rock crawler tires on Troy's Z
When I ran on Hoosier slicks, they were a lot of fun. You could smell them burning off like a fan belt the whole time. They weren't new but a couple were corded after about 1 1/2 hours of track time in a DE. As much fun as they were, they are not practical for our race.
Right now the 200 tread wear options are not real great and the sizes those tires offer in 14" and 15" sizes are very limited. There seem to be more 180 tread wear options but I don't know if they offer any better size options for 14" or 15" tires. They do have more tread and style options though.
To you guys with the Hankook RS-2, especially the 225/45r15s, they are discontinued. I have not been able to find any remaining tires so far and the RS-3 is a 140 and not legal. Those are also one of the few tires that offered a 200ish tread wear 225 for 15s.
Tread wear rates are set by the manufacturer. So a 180 Yokohama might be the equivalent of a 140 or 300 Toyo. There are probably some kind of general guidelines for this determination but it is not set by some kind of third party like DOT through testing. So it's about as factually based as BS Laps.
All that said, I don't know how differently a 180 would perform compared to a 190 or greater.
As others have pointed out in various posts, we are tire limited. We can only use as much power as we can get to the ground and our brakes are only as affective as our tires. Getting more rubber on the road seems to be the best way to improve all this.
Speaking of The Truth in 24, they have cars that are ultra light and super powerful. Did you notice how huge the tires are?
I NASCAR is not running on 195 or 205s either. They'd be all over the place.
Tread wear is really only one factor that is going to affect tire performance on a particular chassis.
Try some 205/50r15s on a Crown Vic, 5.0 Mustang or Camaro, you'll have your hands full. Put them on a Miata and it's a go kart.
Tire size will affect wear too. Taller tires turn less RPMs so you should be able to expect more miles per tire. They offer a longer contact patch with the pavement as well. Increasing the width widens the car and contact patch as well. I think a larger contact patch will reduce tire wear too and result in longer tire life.
Currently, we get multiple races out of a set of tires. I think we could run a true 24 hour race on a set but with our camber it is better to flip the tires about every 8 hours. So we run two sets and change them Saturday night.
Regarding debris, we have lost 1 tire in 4 races to something. Not sure how it happened but we have about a 2"x2" hole in a rear inner sidewall.
The 24 Hours of Lemons Forums → Lemons Tech → Why the 190 Treadwear Requirement?