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Oh not even remotely the same thing. Carbs still rule racing for the most part, but 1960's tire tech aint ruling anything.



Guess we'll have to agree to disagree on that one. While all top series use radials, there are probably more weekend racers on bias plys than radials.


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Isn't that kinda like saying that cars should be slow and dangerous so that people can learn to drive better? I'M talking about the best performance for the money here. I dont want a tire to teach me how to drive, i want a tire to keep me out ov the canyon (the actual canyon), or off the guardrail... ie: ahead ov the other guy.



I guess I'm not making the point correctly. Not sure how exactly to explain it unless you've driven both in the same situation under the watchful eye of a stop watch. Both can be fast, both are safe, but the feel between them is different. A bias ply sounds and feels different as you reach the threshold of its grip. It takes a long time period to loose that grip and it can be recovered quickly. By contrast the radial will loose grip more abruptly with less warning and take longer to recover. Unless you have learned how to quickly identify where that threshold is.

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But again, i'm talking about those old styles like ProTrac, or Formula One Super Stocks... that old crap i used in high school (late 80's) because it was the only way to buy a 12" wide tire for $20 (no one else wanted to use them!). I am fully aware that companies are making new design racing tires in bias ply... I'm sure THAT stuff is fine.



Bias ply is bias ply. The only thing that has changed is rubber compounds and the broad square shoulder the resto guys love. Guess what the I treads have that Pro-Trac and Super Stocks didn't. The Is are a copy of a road racing design that was prolific in its day and is still used extensively in vintage racing under the Dunlap name. It is not nearly as bad a tire as a Wide Oval or Polyglas

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You are recommending that some guy put 40 year old tires with a durometer rating somewhere in between that ov a forklift tire and a bowling ball on his classic car and try to go fast around corners. Or am i missing something?



He already has them and they are considerably softer than most 17" street tires. Lets start with what he has and I'm trying to explain why that isn't that bad of a decision given the circumstances. IMO, Rapom, go to the American Racer website. Find the regional distributor for the IMCA G60 tires, pick up a couple for $110 each, slap em on, and tear up the asphalt. Or you swap them out for an entire new set of SRs at $250 each.

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Well now you've got me looking high and low for these things. Not an easy tire to find. No Tire Rack means no cheap shipped prices. I refuse to buy anything from Canada (though a store in town carries them), and even Discount Tire doesn't carry them. Hmmm...



I told you it wouldn't be easy. I have a local distributor and he won't pick up the sizes I want because he doesn't normally stock them. That's why I picked up SRs.

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Incidentally, what do you think ov the Marauder's 360 treadwear rating? The old T/A is 400, the KDW's start at 300. Wonder what the old Comp T/A's were... Is that number so important? Many guys say a GOOD tire starts at 200...



Can't say. However, despite what some sanctioning bodies rule books say, I hope we all understand that tread wear ratings are not universal but instead are relative. The ratings only matter within the context of that manufacturers product lines. If everything they make is rock hard at 400, then half that hardness at 200 could still be a higher durometer than someone else's 300. Heck, MT won't even rate their tires that way because everything they have is so specialized. If an MT SR was 400, a drag slick would be a 200 and I bet it would grip a whole lot better than a Nitto 200. IMO, treadwear ratings aren't a fair comparison and when Dan W's shoot out is published, we'll all see the difference between similar ratings.