Announcement

**slothead** · February 18, 2021, 08:36 PM

Thanks for this info Denny. I totally agree with you about tires on any size car. I use silicone tires on all my oval track cars but was thinking I might go with the OEM tires on the Legend cars. Many of my oval cars have Maxxtrac tires on them and now I'm thinking about using the M6X tires too, not for overall speed but for more reliable handling due to better traction.

Questions - are the lap times posted fast laps or average lap times? (Average data tends to be more reliable.) Where the times recorded using the same car? Where you racing with or without magnets?

Has anyone done a similar tire test with the Legends using Quick Slicks or other silicone tires? More data to consider will support making the best choice.

**Dundee Denny** · February 18, 2021, 08:50 PM

I used the same car exchanging the tires out.

Use Scalextric plastic track, and yes, the magnets are in place.

**Broman62** · February 18, 2021, 09:58 PM

Good info...I like to switch between Quick Slicks and Maxxtrac tires for the plastic track and pretty much either of the PG's on the wooden oval...depending on the car!!

**dinglebery** · February 18, 2021, 10:06 PM

What, no info on real Rubber tires like NSR Supergrips or Ultragrips, or BRM soft rubber tires?

**Kevan** · February 19, 2021, 05:07 AM

Tyres are 90% of your cars handling.

**RichD** · March 10, 2021, 06:29 AM

My club races cars without traction magnets and all of our tracks but one are wood. We race our own cars on silicone tires, but we run some IROC style races using cars with rubber tires and we also host proxy races for cars with rubber of urethane tires. I do a lot of testing for a major tire maker that sells both silicone and urethane tires.
If you run with traction magnets the differences between the tires will not be as great. You should always be sure that the tires are fully seated on the wheels when you change tires. If you run without traction magnets tires that are glued and trued should out perform ones that are not. Some tires will work better once they have been scuffed in, some tires that have been trued need to be polished to get maximum performance. Silicone tires like a perfectly clean track, urethane or rubber tires may not be so fussy. Silicone tires can leave some residue on the track and if you switch to urethane tires they will get coated with the residue and loose a lot of grip. Rubber tires work best if the track has been rubbered in. If you must clean your track use a method that does not remove the rubber.
When my club does a proxy race the track is conditioned by running many laps with a car using the designated type of tire, silicone tires are not run until the proxy racing is finished.

**Michael Squier** · March 10, 2021, 09:00 AM

Being a total new guy to tuning my cars I was very impressed with how much stickier the stock tires can get after a good sanding of the fresh rubber. I assume the outer casing somehow isn’t as sticky as the rubber underneath. At least that’s how it worked on a new Carrera for me.

**Dogsbody** · March 10, 2021, 09:47 AM

RichD, you have this backward "Silicone tires can leave some residue on the track and if you switch to urethane tires they will get coated with the residue and lose a lot of grip." It's urethane and rubber that sheds, not silicone.

**mattb** · March 10, 2021, 10:45 AM

Actually silicone and urethane both leave a residue on the track and the two usually do not mix well. Whichever type of rubber you use, your cars will run best if you stick with the same rubber on all cars.

Silicone is a bit more picky than urethane and works best on a nice dust free surface, wipe with a tack cloth and tires also should be cleaned. Once it's all cleaned, it's usually good for a racing session, just maybe clean tires every now and then.

Urethane seems to not require a track perfectly dust free. A light sanding seems to bring back grippiness to any urethane.

My opinion (opinion) is that silicone is the absolute best when conditions are perfect for them. Urethane seems the easiest upgrade and also seems to be the tire of choice for most HRW home racers.

One thing to not do is to clean the track with a strong cleaner and remove whatever type of residue your tire of choice leaves

Add a little weight and toss the magnets and silicone is probably always quicker than urethane.

**RichD** · March 10, 2021, 11:04 AM

I stand by my statement. Silicone tires do not leave marbles on the track, but they will coat it. When I am testing both silicone and urethane tires and I have been running on silicone tires I have to strip down the track and condition it for urethane tires or those will get coated with silicone residue. I have never had to take any special precautions when I go back to using silicone tires. I mostly test HO tires, the situation may be somewhat different with tires for bigger scale cars, but my 1/32nd club has used both silicone and urethane tires. In that case we noticed that if we run on urethane tires first at the start of the first race with silicone tires those would not have their usual grip. The reason for that is that dust sticks to silicone tires, but not to urethane tires. If you run on silicone tires those will pick up any dust that is on the track and if you keep cleaning the tires the track will eventually be perfectly clean. If you were only using silicone tires the track would get cleaned up during the pre-race practice session. That would not be the case if urethane tires were run first. In that case the people running in the first few heats with silicone tires would be at a disadvantage. We have seen a coating on urethane tires that needed to be removed by washing them. In a club racing situation I recommend sticking with a single type of tire.
Rubber tires are subject to a certain amount of deterioration as they age. Some of them can last a very long time while others will get rock hard or turn to slush after a year or two. There can be significant batch to batch differences between the same make and model tire, which is one reason that my club does not race on rubber tires. If the surface of a tire has become hard sanding the tire will usually improve the grip, you might have to sand the tires on a fairly regular basis.

**Mikeinclover** · March 10, 2021, 11:20 AM

If you keep an eye out in a couple weeks you will see Quick Slicks may just have the perfect tires for that car in a silicone compound or two.
Mike

**chappyman66** · March 10, 2021, 03:22 PM

Ahh......
Begun anew, the tire wars have... 🍿🍿

**REL13** · March 10, 2021, 03:22 PM

Yes, Tires do matter, Without them the car would just sit there and spin on the rims.

**HomeRacingWorld** · March 10, 2021, 04:18 PM

Regardless of the myths (which most are in this thread) one thing is certain:

A CLEAN tire is a HAPPY tire.

SO no matter what your decide to run, make sure it's clean. Roll across masking tape, water/alcohol sponge...whatever you feel is the best way.

And then hammer down :0

Announcement

Tires do Matter!!!

Tires do Matter!!!

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment