From http://www.mickeythompsontires.com/faq_drag.html

They'd probably sell fewer tires if people followed these burn-out recommendations:

"17. Q: What kind of burnout is recommended with Mickey Thompson slicks?
A: 1. Automatic transmissions: 1st pass or two, do a fairly hard burnout. After that a light burnout should be sufficient. 2. Standard transmissions: -Stockers- No burnout or short, dry burnout is sufficient. Super Stock or Comp cars- light burnout, haze tires and stage immediately. Generally, tires work better with a light burnout, rather than a hard burnout. This also increases tire life. Note: ET Street™ tires may require a fairly hard burnout on the 1st and 2nd pass to break in."

About wear:
"22. Q: How long will my Mickey Thompson drag slicks last?
A: This will vary from car to car. Inconsistent 60' and 330' times caused by tread wear or carcass break down will be your signals to change the tires. Your tires have wear indicators in the tread to give you an idea of how much rubber is left on the tire. Cars that launch hard can cause the carcass material to break down. You should inspect your tires every 30 passes. More frequently in high horsepower cars."

I'm running 26.0/8.5x14 ET/D's & inspect them every race, since I drive the car to the track and switch back & forth between street tires, BFG DR's (Fri. race series), & the D/ET's (Sat. race series). Fellow racer tells me my M/T's are worn out. I can still see the wear indicators, but short times can vary in a given day. So, I'm looking at replacing these at $170+ a piece, or wondering if I should get some Hoosier DOT Pros or M&H Racemaster DOT. I race one series that requires DOT tires, and another that allows slicks (not all that impressed with the DR's, although they do drive nicer on the top end since I have radials on the front). I'd like to stay around the same size on a 14" rim - ET Street's don't come in 14". Hoosiers are 9.5 tread & M/H's 7.5 - why can't they just be 8.5 like I already have?

Any thoughts on the course I should pursue?

 

Wear indicators only tell you how much tread is left on the tires. I've seen racers buy new tires after 30 runs because the old tires wouldn't hook up or wouldn't run consistant 60' times. New tires fixed the problem. Sometimes you can get a bad set of new tires. I usually get 2 seasons or about 200 passes on mine depending on how much of a burnout I do. After 2 years most drag tires are dried out and won't hook up even if there's lots of rubber left on them.

The course you should pursue is to buy some 15" rims and keep buying new tires when they wear out. Don't expect high mileage from any "slick" type tire.

 

You seem to have a knack at derailing my train of thought...

The '57 requires 4-1/2" backspacing w/8" rims, not always easy to find. I bought 15x8 Wheel Vintiques Rallys to mount the DR's - not sure if the wheels or tires are contributing more, but the car weighs 40 lbs more with the DR's mounted than with the ET's (mounted with tubes on 70's Nova or something steel 14x8" with the proper backspacing). Suppose I could use those WV rims if I got good 15" DOTs to run full-time (racing, that is). Bye-bye DRs in that case.

I've heard the extra sidewall with same-height tire will allow the smaller rimsize to bite better than the larger rim version. No clue if that's true.

I did borrow 28.0/10.5x15" ET Streets last year, and 60' were worse than with the Drag ETs - probably due to the larger height as much as anything. So, I'd like to stay with 26" tall. Don't want to buy more rims. ET Streets minimum width is 10.5, which probably won't help me over Hoosier DOT 9.5's.

I don't ask for much...