Well I lost to my friends mustang. It was an awesome race but he won by like 2 cars. I had a very bad start no traction a i have the ****tyest tire ever. And second gear lost alot of traction also. I think it would have been a close race if i had better tires. Oh and i had my friend in the car who weighs 200lbs. I want to run him again once i get new tires. This is the same mustang that was in one of my other posts.

 

ditch the weight (your friend can watch from the sidelines) and get a set of good tires (like Michelin Pilots) and you should be set

 

200 pounds is a huge anchor. drop the tire pressure a bit and do a little tiny burnout. What kind of Mustang was it?

 

The mustang is a 94 gt 5 spd. I dont know much else. It was a close race. He thought i would get smoked and i didtn so im happy. In a couple of weeks I'll have new tires and Hopefully whole new exaust. Headers and Cat back. What else should i do to the car if i have say $2000. I made a post in the TPI section about how everyone did stuff to thier TPI so please reply there letting me know what i should do, thanks.

 

Just like everyone said, leave your friend on the sideline next time you race. Buy a pair of Nitto NT-555R (245/50R-16) tires and mount them on your stock 16" rims. These drag radials will help you hook up. Good luck, keep us posted.

 

Sometimes it is hard to leave your buddy on the sidelines. Specially if the race is a spur of the moment one. But never the less the weight will kill you. Good tires are a must whether you are raceing or not.

Laters,
Conrad

 

A burnout won't help your street radial; street tires are made to run cool and getting too warm allows them to lose traction easier.

 

i dont know about that... ive always thought a warm tire will hook better than a cold one.

for instance... last time i was at cecil, i was on street tires instead of my usual DRs. on my first run i didnt do a burnout cause i heard from sooo many people that it will hurt more than help. my 60ft was PATHETIC (2.2 something). then on my 2nd pass, i heated them up for about 5 seconds. next 60ft was 1.86!!!

and to back it up i have both passes on video

 

It depends on the quality and design of the tire. If you have regular or low grade performance tires that are designed to run at low temps then it'll hurt more than it helps since you'll just be tearing up the tread. If you have some high grade performance tires that are designed to hook better when heated or drag radials then sure it'll help. Find out the optimal operating range of your tire and act accordingly.

 

I have heard that a lot too. I was doing a burnout on some crappy old 215/xx/15 tires one time. So these things are skinny, I sat in one spot spinning them for about 60-70 seconds. Now they're are super hot, get on a smooth road and I'm rolling at like 5-10 mph. Usually first gear will go up in smoke from this speed, I floor it and it hooked up perfectly. No spin at all. And all of this from an old 215 tire. It was super hot though. I tend to always cut better 60's at the track too after a burnout (on radials).

 

Large Tube runners are a GREAT upgrade for tpi engines you can expect about 25 horsepower and 30 torque at least off the stock engine

 

I agree. From what Ive experienced, and i could be wrong, there are a few factors ive noticed about tire quality that are more important than the name on them. One, and this is from my personal experiance. The width, tread design, and compound are what too look at. I currently have cheap-o pepboys futuras on my 91Z. Whats funny is I cut a 2.01 60 ft at the track with those. They are 255-50-16 and have a treadwear of 300. To my knowledge, again correct me if im wrong, the lower the # the softer the tire. I get better traction in these than my friend who has BFG comp TA's that are the same size. His are a 330 treadwear, and have smaller treads than mine. BTW the futuras are made by Cooper. At the track I do a low RPM (3500-4k) for around 8-10 sec, and i get a minute amount of spin. Not too bad for $104 a pop.

 

I always believed that BS about not heating up street tires but I found this past fall with temps in the 40's-50's, that a small dry burnout of maybe 5 seconds made a dramatic difference in my 60 ft. times. They went from 2.1 to 1.9. My Nitto DR's were only slightly better. The time in my sig was on regular Nitto's, last fall with a 1.9 60 ft.