Spec Miata tires

the 949 supported "super miata" class is a dyno class. which is a good idea except the whole dynamometer being super terrible. 

 

You can check the #GRIDLIFE guys. They have a points based system. I'm kind of annoyed SCCA hasn't tried to partner with them, they are probably what a modern car club should look like. They even require SCCA/NASA licenses because they don't administer that themselves.

Well, I'm going to have to pony up and admit fault. I went back to the current gcr and there is no requirement that i can find. I must have mixed solo and club racing rules. In solo you must have the plugs when removing a/c as the factory car without a/c came with those plugs. Sorry boys got excited and didn't double check myself.

No harm, no fowl, I couldn't find the rule. 

You can check the #GRIDLIFE guys. They have a points based system. I'm kind of annoyed SCCA hasn't tried to partner with them, they are probably what a modern car club should look like. They even require SCCA/NASA licenses because they don't administer that themselves.

yeah ... gridelife .... we could have a whole thread on gridlife .... 

i didn't know they did wheel to wheel, i thought they just did time attack stuff. 

points based systems make sense until you actually look at them. every modification then has to be judged on a "is what points this costs worth it?" rather than just trying to optimize a car, you are trying to optimize a points economy, for a car, for racing. 

put it this way, there is a reason i picked spec miata to compete in. id even be interested in sealed engines, sealed shocks, spec brake pads like the SRF guys run. the problem there is SRFs are like double or triple the cost of a spec miata. you can buy the runnoffs winning spec miata for the cost of a a decent SRF. 

I have nothing against Hoosier/Conti but I’ve never understood all the fawning over them or the talk of “support”. Their business is (was) race tires. It wasn’t sideline or a marketing ploy, it’s all they did. They had retailers at most races before SM and when we were all on Toyos, and they’ll still be there if we change again. It’s what they do. They negotiate a deal which they fully expect will be more profitable than not making the deal, like any company. Beyond selling tires and charging $25 each for M&B, remind me again what support you are getting?? I don’t know what they would tell you today, but as recently as a few years ago when asked for advice on tire pressures the answer was higher than anyone runs. No offense, but what exactly is that worth? So-called contingencies in a spec class are, and always have been, a tax on the poor to subsidize the rich. Real contingency programs are to get your business in a competitive market. Here they are part of the contract and cost Hoosier NOTHING. That hardly qualifies as “support” or “service”. I don’t know what if anything the club gets from the deal but it absolutely should be public knowledge.

What exactly is all this other support I’ve been hearing about for years?

 

Ignoring the Super Tour sponsorship (and what the SCCA receives) at your peril in terms of the club's longevity. It's my understanding that was a driving factor in getting the Super Tour up and running was these larger businesses were wanting to provide input to the club but absent a national series with significant reach to customers there were no takers in terms of sponsoring "SCCA things".

 

Those agreements between sponsors and the club are kept confidential for a reason else second-guessing and false accusations quickly follow.

 

Note also we're not the only class running Hoosier spec tires (FV & SRF3 I believe are the others) and we can't presume folks to be making these decisions or offering these suggestions being done in a vacuum.

Whether you feel a M&B at $15/$20/$25 per corner is a value or otherwise would be irrelevant to those who made the decision to tie-up with Hoosier. If you want prettier or more accurate language in what Hoosier is doing by all means, petition the SCCA to change their marketing material to best suit your proclivities.

SM tire contracts go back more than a decade, long before Super Tour, or the Majors Tour, and we switched from Hoosier to Toyo then back to Hoosier. No doubt each time there were multiple considerations, but that has little to do with my point which I think you missed or misunderstood, although to some extent you help me make it. In the end it’s a simple business deal with each side expecting to gain from it, which is fine but I fail to see where Hoosier has in any way earned special consideration through their much talked about “support”. Simple as that. With the pole running 3:1 in favor of Toyo over Hoosier it appears that a large majority of those voting agree.

SM tire contracts go back more than a decade, long before Super Tour, or the Majors Tour, and we switched from Hoosier to Toyo then back to Hoosier. No doubt each time there were multiple considerations, but that has little to do with my point which I think you missed or misunderstood, although to some extent you help me make it. In the end it’s a simple business deal with each side expecting to gain from it, which is fine but I fail to see where Hoosier has in any way earned special consideration through their much talked about “support”. Simple as that. With the pole running 3:1 in favor of Toyo over Hoosier it appears that a large majority of those voting agree.

76 votes is not much of a statistic to base much of a trend.

Steve you made some good points and yes a case can be made that tire contingencies don't have broad benefit.  As for Hoosier support, I do think they've done better in that regard than Toyo.  Being in the Midwest we might have more exposure to Hoosier than do racers in other parts of the country as many of our events have been staffed by actual Hoosier employees.  I've found them all to be friendly, knowledgeable (even considering the flawed air pressure advice) and willing to go the extra mile a few times when I've been in a pinch for time or some extra help or encountered a bad tire which happened once.  Additionally, if you call them or send an email you get a timely response.  While this may seem like ordinary customer service, it's less and less common these days.  I have literally never seen or spoken with a Toyo rep at the track except for a brief presentation at a championship event or two.  In the only instance when I had a problem and needed some support from Toyo, I had to go to great lengths to demonstrate the issue and then was compensated with shipping labels to return a set of tires to them and the expected replacements never materialized and the line of communication simply went dark.  Toyo mostly provided us a very good product but there isn't much support experience upon which to judge.    

 

We certainly need a more cost effective tire so why not go for the best possible outcome which to me is an improved for our class Hoosier tire offered by the same good company that we've worked with?  Leaning in the direction of a known very good overall provider makes sense to me as long as they can deliver us a great new tire. 

76 votes is not much of a statistic to base much of a trend.

Statistically that’s a huge sample, though certainly not scientifically obtained. Still, at 3:1 I’d wager a few sets of tires that Toyo would win in a proper vote.

Mind you, I have not voted in the poll because I don’t have a strong preference of supplier. If the choices were the current SM7 vs the RR I would want to see some testing done and results published. To Tom’s point, all else being equal I’d probably choose Hoosier, but still see their “support” as little more than a tie-breaker

 

We certainly need a more cost effective tire so why not go for the best possible outcome which to me is an improved for our class Hoosier tire offered by the same good company that we've worked with?  

 

Mildly off-topic, but I wonder where the tire "company" formerly known as Hoosier will land if Continental AG follows through with plans to break itself up ....

 

https://www.bloomber...ossible-breakup

Mildly off-topic, but I wonder where the tire "company" formerly known as Hoosier will land if Continental AG follows through with plans to break itself up ....

 

https://www.bloomber...ossible-breakup

 

Not going anywhere, " Under scenarios being considered, the manufacturer could create a holding company for its divisions and then sell shares in the more profitable units, such as the tire business, "

As I entered SM, a chunk of the reason I started with NASA over SCCA was the tire budget and competetiveness/safety over time.  Even for the SCCA races I want to do, the tire bill, particularly to be competetive, is highly discouraging.  My hope is to run takeoffs in SCCA until the new tire comes out. 

 

Sounds like SMAC has communicated well to Hoosier what we want in the next generation tire.  Whether or not we get it all depends on how good of a partner Hoosier is inclined to be...

 

While having it all be the same tire is a pipe dream at the moment... boy, it sure would make a whole lot of stuff a whole heck of alot easier, for a whole lot of people.  I would just hope that the tire chosen was more of an RR than an SM7...

What is the additional cost associated with having a tire DOT certified? The whole idea of DOT certification dates back to showroom stock and an effort to keep them on “street” tires. Perhaps that’s still relevant today for T and ST classes etc. but couldn’t the same thing be accomplished with minimum wear ratings? Or is that effectively yhe same thing and the costs associated with official DOT designation is near enough nil?

Maybe a better question, if we are having an SM specific/branded tire, why not insist on one that doesn’t need so much negative camber and actually performs worse above 2.5 or so? How many problems would that solve? Shouldn’t that be on our list of requirements for the next contract?

Maybe we should be on bias-ply tires. They don’t like lots of camber and should be a lot cheaper. Are our other requirements more or less difficult to achieve in a bias-ply vs. a steel radial?

I know that Hoosier has done some tire testing up at Gingerman a few weeks back, do not know any more than that but they were testing several sets of tires. So they are working on it. Steve i think that the technology of the radial tire would not make any cost savings, if in fact there was a cost savings worth it. IMO, it comes down to sidewall stiffness and compound adjustment, yes easier said than done, but a less stiff sidewall i would assume is less cost.

The price we pay mostly reflects what the market will bear, like most products. Look at other tires of similar size and purpose. Regular price for an R7 is as high as it is because it’s faster than other options and there are enough people willing to pay a lot for that. Once the R&D is done I doubt I that there is anything about production costs to justify their price. Sure, we get a substantial “discount” off the comparable R7 but we still pay at least $50/tire more than seems reasonable under the circumstances. Even Hoosier sells tires of similar and larger size fo oval & dirt for under $150 FULL RETAIL. Whatever their justification might be, we don’t need most of the attributes which might make their tire “better” than brand X. I suspect that there is enough competition and volume in other forms of racing to keep prices down while our’s have increased steadily every year. The sticker price on the R7 reflects a top tier no-compromise race tire with DOT certification. I did a bit of vintage racing recently and most of those guys not on unlimited budgets know Hoosiers are fastest but run other DOTs for the huge price difference. Like them, we don’t NEED the fastest tires so even with what appears to be a steep discount we are WAY overpaying. If tire construction can also limit the need for 3+ degrees camber then it’s a double win. Let’s at least get THAT into our priorities for a new tire.

The price we pay mostly reflects what the market will bear, like most products. Look at other tires of similar size and purpose. Regular price for an R7 is as high as it is because it’s faster than other options and there are enough people willing to pay a lot for that. Once the R&D is done I doubt I that there is anything about production costs to justify their price. Sure, we get a substantial “discount” off the comparable R7 but we still pay at least $50/tire more than seems reasonable under the circumstances. Even Hoosier sells tires of similar and larger size fo oval & dirt for under $150 FULL RETAIL. Whatever their justification might be, we don’t need most of the attributes which might make their tire “better” than brand X. I suspect that there is enough competition and volume in other forms of racing to keep prices down while our’s have increased steadily every year. The sticker price on the R7 reflects a top tier no-compromise race tire with DOT certification. I did a bit of vintage racing recently and most of those guys not on unlimited budgets know Hoosiers are fastest but run other DOTs for the huge price difference. Like them, we don’t NEED the fastest tires so even with what appears to be a steep discount we are WAY overpaying. If tire construction can also limit the need for 3+ degrees camber then it’s a double win. Let’s at least get THAT into our priorities for a new tire.

Pipe down troublemaker. Hosier SM8 it shall be, and it shall be $185 per tire...and you will like it and shall say thank you (sir, may I have another)!

$185? Guess again.

WTF? This is a big f’ing deal. I tried twice to get more discussion about what WE want and need in a new tire. First time I got a snide non-reply and the topic was locked, second time my entire topic was deleted! Since then there has been an effective blackout on the most consequential topic we have. I don’t know about you but I sure as hell don’t feel well served as a club member.

...and you will like it and shall say thank you (sir, may I have another)!

 

"Cocaine Hoosiers is a hell of a drug ..." - Rick James

NASA may have its relationship with TOYO as SCCA does with Hoosier...But after 3 years of being on one or the other every other race weekend...the RR is such a better tire for our class IMO!!

 

All you need to know is for the same price you can expect TWICE as many usable heat cycles...period!

NASA may have its relationship with TOYO as SCCA does with Hoosier...But after 3 years of being on one or the other every other race weekend...the RR is such a better tire for our class IMO!!

 

All you need to know is for the same price you can expect TWICE as many usable heat cycles...period!

 

Hoooooly sh*t Ron Alan and I can agree on something. WTF is going on in the world!

Hoooooly sh*t Ron Alan and I can agree on something. WTF is going on in the world!

that's the problem with this forum! Everyone just goes around agreeing on everything! W.T.F.?!