Your Thoughts on Mandating 200+TW "Street Tires" in Improved Touring?

[Flyinglizard]

Most of you may be over thinking it. .. It's all about cost reduction. Cheaper is better .
You will not get any Chumpers in anything but ITEZ. There is no reason for them to make the car legal in the letter classes.
The Chumpers are way too developed and way faster.

Some crossover, and come backs, could be Vintage. Many ITcars are Vintage legal when run on ***200TW tires*** . Not all tho.

IT simply needs a definite difference from the ST/Prod, look and classing. Not another class. The ITAC should step up the calendar and get this done in the next month and not next year or later. as the time frame has been 5 yrs in the past.

Make the change now for ITC and ITB. Max Spec the tire size and increase the rim size.

 

[jjjanos]

Most of you may be over thinking it. .. It's all about cost reduction. Cheaper is better .

And it has not been established that this proposal is less expensive.

You will not get any Chumpers in anything but ITEZ. There is no reason for them to make the car legal in the letter classes.
The Chumpers are way too developed and way faster.

Which undercuts one of the points used to support the switch.

Some crossover, and come backs, could be Vintage. Many ITcars are Vintage legal when run on ***200TW tires*** . Not all tho.

Which is not a point that supports the switch. There are VERY few IT cars that are legal in the two big vintage groups, so no advantage there. And since the vintage guys are 7/10ths racers who scream about getting too close to them when you leave a 4-foot gap between cars while passing them, I don't see car counts increasing from someone who has an unsatisfied, burning desire to come race against 1990's cars that drive close to 10/10ths. Moreover, the same scarcity of eligible cars impacts moving from vintage to IT.

IT simply needs a definite difference from the ST/Prod, look and classing. Not another class. The ITAC should step up the calendar and get this done in the next month and not next year or later. as the time frame has been 5 yrs in the past.

Assertion offered without a single thread of evidence suggesting why.

Make the change now for ITC and ITB. Max Spec the tire size and increase the rim size.

And it's THOSE very classes that are going to be screwed the most by the switch. By all means, start with them.

Be VERY careful for what you ask. You make a bunch of guys buy wheels for a 200TW tire and that change requires a host of other changes to remain competitive, they'll just go whole-hog on it. Remove the glass, swap out the engine and go play with ChampCar where the cost/minute of track time is far, far better than with SCCA.

 

[kgobey]

Some information I've been able to figure out since this thread started:

1. Not all 200TW tires are made equaly fast or resiliant. There is a huge disparity between tires, we'll end up on one or other of the currently fast tires.
2. Rain competence is not inherent in the 200TW tires group. We will all need to have tires for rain and tires for dry.
3. Not all 200TW tires are compatible with cold weather. As cold weather compatibility is also not guaranteed the wet weather tires will likely be the only choice for cold weather driving.

The 2 or 3 brands that work in the warm and dry do last longer than 40TW tires, and grip to the very end, but after playing with the Hoosier R7's this year, I was able to race the R7's to the cords with proper maintenance (wrapping them, storing them in my basement between races) and got excellent results, 3 more cycles than last year.

 

[Flyinglizard]

You can buy a set of wheels with mounted tires for the same or maybe less then 1 set of Hoes.

I run R 7s on my HP VW and they go about as fast as the radial slicks- But are a touch shorter and wider. The fall off from new to 4 heats is a little higher with R7 tho. Both will go 8-10 heats or cords.

We get 30hrs on the rears of the Super truck, 315 Nittos. They work fine , some are faster , some like water better,. etc all true.
But, there are choices that play in the same few percent of each other for overall speed.

Stand back and look at the classes from the stands. The tires on that(Prod x) car cost 1200$ per set and they toss them at 4 heats. The tires on that GTL car 1200 per set, etc.
But the tires on that IT car cost 600$ and they play all year until they cord .

Funny how looking at the names on the tire letters, the younger racers want to go fast and spend lots of money while the old coots know that it is about the racing and the cheaper the racing can be the more racers will race.
It's not rocket science ,it's basic marketing .
When the tires cost as much as 50% of the car , you can do better. Many of these ITB cars sell for 2000$

 

[gran racing]

I absolutely won't disagree that the cost of tires is a big factor in many peoples' budgets. Personally, when the street tire proposal came out I didn't have enough concrete evidence it would truly provide a cost savings. I had multiple very smart people close to racing who are absolutely convinced it would not result in a cost savings with some good points. I tended to think it could, but without really being convinced it was a tough sell at that time given what I knew (or didn't know) as facts. I don't think this is totally dead but more people need to have a better understanding of the street tire facts.

 

[Greg Amy]

Data point: I bought six Nitto NT-01 tires at the beginning of the year for the historics 914. I've driven three weekends thus far:

- Thompson Historics. One 20-min qualifier and three 20-min races;
- New Jersey Historics. Two 20-min qualifiers, three 20-min races, one 40(?)-min 'bonus' HRG race.
- Lime Rock Historics. One ~1 hour jaunt on backroads to Falls Village green and back to LRP, one 45-minute qualifier, two 20-minute races.

(Session counts are from memory; may be more or less).

The initial four tires are still on the car. They are driving the same as the first time I drove them at Thompson. Plan on driving them at Thompson again in October, not even going to rotate them.

I've rotated them once (cross), before the LRP event, just "because". The other two new tires are still on the tire rack in the trailer, haven't touched the ground except to get rolled into the trailer. I can't tell if they're worn. I've attempted to measure tread "depth" of the old ones compared to the new ones but it's hard to say, since the "depth" on new is actually higher on the old ones due to light debris pickup to/from pit lane/trailer/garage (I was on asphalt all weekend at LRP).

These are 100TW tires.

$860 delivered from Discount Tire for all six (coupon and a rebate card). 205/50-15.

Just a single anecdotal data point.

 

[dickita15]

I have been running the Nitto 100 TW for 4 or 5 years in IT7. they last 6-8 weekends I bought a set in May form Jegs for $612.00 delivered. the Hoosiers used to fall off a lot on the third weekend. the Nittos are about the same until they cord.
when we switched to Nittos we went from a 13" to 15" wheel. the first set of tires with new wheels was about the same price as a set of Hoosiers.

since changing i have had much lower failure rate on front rotors and wheel bearings. not sure if it just the reduced force or it may help that the 15" wheels provide better cooling.

 

[Flyinglizard]

Dave, maybe those racers are simply bad at math? Many are. Buy cheaper tires, race all year . You should save enough to race an extra race or two.
The only downside that I can see is that lap records will have to be reset. Alignments may require change. Nothing huge or costly .
Wheel size may change a little if you want to go as fast as the tires will let you, but you have the option , if the rule change is smartly written.