Warning - potentially stupid ideas below.
Has anybody here ever tried H2O’s on dry pavement, either on purpose or incidentally due to a rapidly drying surface?
I’m considering trying them for this situation specifically:
- Rears ONLY, with wider A7’s up front
- Light, powerful, FWD car with 65% front weight
- Events with short courses (sub 30-sec typically)
I would be using half-worn take offs, which Hoosier considers an “intermediate tire”. Ultimate wear rate is not a huge concern because… cheap take offs & wrong wheel drive. Even if they were made out of pencil eraser they should last a few events, I really only use one rear tire at a time anyway :)
Primarily I’m wondering what sort of grip levels they are capable of in the dry, compared to say an A7 or an RE71R. I’m not opposed to spraying them between runs on warm days, assuming they work well otherwise.
https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/grm/a7s-front-slicks-on-the-back/145303/page1/
This thread seems to indicate mixing tires is just a bad idea regardless. I have no experience there though.
That thread seems to be about mixing radials and bias plys on the same car which I agree may not be the best idea. I have mixed various radials front/rear before with mixed results.
I’ve had mixed results with matching tires too, due to the car’s layout… at a longer course this fall (very cool weather) with R7’s all the way around I could get enough heat into the fronts via turbo shenanigans that they would start working about 1/2 way into the run… but the rears never warmed beyond ambient. That made for an interesting day… normally “offs” are not a thing that can happen at autocross, but I managed to do it that day!
I’m hoping the H2O might give me similar grip levels to the A7 for short bursts, with likely tradeoffs being less heat tolerance and relatively higher wear rates.
Not sure how the H2Os would do, but I would believe that if it did work, someone would be running that combo. Might be worth a try, but rain tires aren't cheap either, so if they didn't last long, could get expensive.
Want to see what Hoosier Wets are like in the dry? Watch Opening Scene of this video
In reply to 81cpcamaro :
It’s true that they are expensive new… but half-worn ones that are no longer good for heavy rain are pretty easy to find on the cheap, in Miata size.
In reply to loosecannon :
Hmm… that’s not quite what I was hoping for. The exact opposite in fact. However... I still have hope. How old were those tires any idea? The video caption says:
"It was a chilly day but the car performed flawlessly. The old rain tires are years past their prime and overall grip was low"
In reply to therieldeal :
I have no idea. I bought them from a used race tire dealer and they were full tread depth but had very little grip
