Thoughts on the new 200 treadwear rule?

[riceracer]

So what you are saying is that you do care if we run off the rest of our 140tw tires. We are just asking as we still do have some 140tw tire left. We did try and run them all off last season but we were unable to run them all completely off, and no we did not buy any tiers last year in the anticipation of the 200tw rule coming into effect, but we were using tires we bought way back in 2013. Also for the toyo tires only got their 200tw stamp over the winter (2014) so it was impossible to buy 200tw toyo's for the season Please understand that not all of us buy a new car every year, so we may have tires from previous years still leftover.

[See23]

I believe anyone who was classified in the higher group for the 2014 Eliminator is beyond newbie and should be following current rules.
Weren't we talking about this in 2013?
But in the name of good sportsmanship...
If you have less then 50% tread then maybe you tried and showed up to a few races knowing full well that the 140s were on their way out. If that's the case then I think that, at the very least, no tires with more then 50% tread remaining should be allowed.
(Go burn em up on the street)
Maybe we could have an end date 1/3 of the way through the season before enforcing the 200 tread wear.
Definitely 200 for the Eliminator.
I understand if your in a club that has 4 to 10 events a year, you might stretch the 200 date, but we have over 20 so I don't see how anyone who knew the rule change was coming did not have the chance to burn up some rubber.
Guys running Hoosier while their 140 were sitting on the side lines have no excuse unless you are at VCMC, a national or the Eliminator.
Sorry Ron but buying new 140s in January 2015 just doesn't make a lot of sense to me.
This year it's tires. What next?
Should we give Aaron another year with the STC pax? Poor fella.

[angryturtle]

Sorry Ron but buying new 140s in January 2015 just doesn't make a lot of sense to me.
This year it's tires. What next?
Should we give Aaron another year with the STC pax? Poor fella.

I bought the tires (180 TW not 140) in July because there wasn't anything else in my size available and I was corded so couldn't wait 2 months for something else to possibly become available. I actually ended up with a size smaller than I usually run because of lack of availability. I will only be running these tires in the rain. In the rain you can't catch me anyway even when I ran 200 TW tires. If I am at Pitt Meadows my class is on Hoosier tires and running 180 TW tires in the rain won't matter. If you want to make me run without tire pax at Vernon even in the rain so you can win the Eliminator, I can live with that.

[Brain]

Just as I suspected.....a bunch of illogical arguments based on individual preference. That's why I started the thread

So my take so far....

Someone is on crack....quoting random treadwear numbers for R888's that have never been anything but 100 TW and are advertised exclusively as R-Compounds. I don't follow the logic....

The next guy created his own rant thread about competition....yet at the same time wants Aaron and Matt to run in SMF because that's where the rules will put them with their 140TW tires. Shouldn't be hard to beat them considering they will have an R-Comp pax, but how does that generate competition when they are your closest competitors? Funny thing is if they were to grind the TW number and build date off of the tires there would be absolutely no way to tell if they were legal or not

And yes - I ran Hoosiers at the Eliminator while my 140 TW Toyos sat on the sidelines. But my Toyos are still legal on the Miata in CSP as rain tires (as I pointed out in the first thread), so I'm relatively impartial. If I run my Toyos locally then I need new rain tires - I have to buy something either way. So if I'm understanding correctly you would rather I go buy 200 TW Toyos, shaved to 3/32nd's and heat-cycled. That's 100% legal but somehow you think my 3/4 tread - 3 year old - 140TW exact same tires should be illegal?

Oh and another thing just to clarify for everyone. The SCCA rules are strictly enforced for US national level events. ASN/CACC - ie Canada - chooses to use the SCCA rules for simplicity sakes - why reinvent the wheel. Local clubs in any region including SCCA clubs are free to change rules, classing structure etc in anyway that they should choose. Seriously we could have a vote and choose to ban red cars and Hondas....and I would win...wait what?

Oh and if anybody is looking for a serious loophole.....the rules say that at he local/regional level cars are legal with stock tires irregardless of TW. Lotus Elise in SS - comes with A048 R-Comps. Or Fiesta ST which some believe will dominate HS, others like me think they will just roll over a whole lot, but wither way they come with 140 TW tires.

Oh and I see while I was typing Ron has brought up the dreaded tire pax debate. Oh no....what do we do about that? Wait I know how about .975 for 200 TW tires, but .9725684569 for formerly legal 140 and 180TW?

I'm tired now.....I'm sure I can come up with more sarcasm later

[See23]

Sorry again Ron. You said "just got" and I assumed "just" meant this year. My mistake.

Brian. How could anyone even begin to respond to your 101, ummmm... points?
You know to much.
Shouldn't you be studying?

[See23]

Brian; you need to start your own "Rant" page.
Wayne started mine as a joke.

Oh and shaving tires?!? Really?

[riceracer]

If you really want to be fast and competive then you should have at least one set of shaved heat cycled tires. That is what the national guys do....anyway I don't really have too much in the way of tires left from last year as we did know that the change was coming, I was just going to finish them off on Thursday nights (kind of like we did last year) instead of just throwing them out. But I undersatnd where you are coming from as none of us are getting paid to do this we are really "just doing it for fun" anyway.

[Char]

We are all in this 'just for fun'!! I suggest we all race on Michelin X-Ice for the season, very grippy!! (at least on ice)

[5centSi]

Someone is on crack....quoting random treadwear numbers for R888's that have never been anything but 100 TW and are advertised exclusively as R-Compounds. I don't follow the logic....

Young Grasshopper has never been on crack... and is not quoting random treadwear numbers.
My anaology is logical for R888s 100 TW to 160 TW in comparison to the Manufacturers rating their 'newer' tires 200 TW when there are rumours they could very well be the same 140 TW tire. But, because the R888 is advertised as R-Compound... Ooops, I fail!

Consider this, who's to say just because the R1R is not advertised as R-Compound, there isn't any in this tire? The chemical compounds are the Manufacturer's secret. The R1R tire could have R-Compound (why is there 'R' in the tire name?). Maybe there's a percentage amount that specs a tire as R-Compound. Maybe a certain amount doesn't require advertising as R-Compound. Or, advertising a TW specification really means nothing if the first 1/32nd of the tire is now rated 200 TW but the remaining wear drops quickly through the blocks to 140 TW. (Who's going to really know how good the treadwear will be when we beat the heck out of the tires in AutoX!). Is this the Tire Manufacturers' workaround to meet the new SCCA requirements for Street? Or you shave the tire to 3/32nds to get into the sweet R-Compound rubber that's layered at that depth. Also consider this, some 200 TW tires have outperformed lower TW tires, depending on the vehicle and set-up, road surface type and conditions, temperature, rain, hot, cold, 0.10101 PAX differences...Or maybe my Dunlop Direzza ZII with 200 TW have some variable TW lowering, or a bit of R-Compound, or...whatever....

140-180-200-220 TW...It really doesn't matter with so many variables! Remember, "We just do it for fun" driving competition.

[See23]

Confessions:
I didn't read Brains whole post and barely understood it.
I got lost in 5centSi's posts
My posts are to long

I don't care what you decide to do. It's not up to me.
You asked for "thoughts" and we gave them, illogical and all.

I'm not "just" in it for the fun. Im in it for the chicks and money!