Track Tac

A GO TO thread for the new or newer dirt oval racers offering Info & Support

JPMKarting said:
Tracks (generally) come in the following ways:

-Wet/No Bite
-Dry Slick
-Hard/Fast

Wet/No Bite tracks are surfaces that have a lot of moisture, require an aggressive tire. These surfaces generally will take a softer tire, and an aggressive softening/bite chemical.

Dry Slick surfaces are tracks that have a harder base, but are dusty/dry and don't build a lot of bite. A sandy type of track would fall in to this category as well. This will generally take a harder tire to with stand the hardness of the track, but a tire that is wiped with a bite chemical (not soften), or rolled internally

Hard/Fast tracks are tracks that have a hard surface, and build a lot of bite by laying down rubber. These tracks call for a hard tire, minimal internal prepping, and a non agressive external wipe to light the tires off.

Again, a very general crash course, but this covers about 80% of it. Applications will vary based on the tire rule, time of year, etc.

Our Premier Blend prep that we make comes in 4 ways...Lite, Medium, Heavy, and Agressive. Our labels even instruct how to use the prep, and for which track conditions.
Click to expand...
This is the information that I was looking for. This is great info right here. Seems to be to me anyway.
 
racing promotor said:
Any rigid Straight Edge long enough, Key is have it pinched tight across the rear wheels, And you have a profound edge to get a measurement to.
Click to expand...

Also can take a couple pieces of angle, notch them out for hub, drill out for studs and put one on each front hub, level them, tighten castle nut so they dont roll on you and measure front and back to see the difference
 
Totally new to dirt karting. Been racing at GoPro but rental kart races. I was the idiot who went out and bought a kart to go racing without doing homework. I’ll be asking a lot of questions. Thanks for this Thead. HUGE help for me
 
there are many ways to go about it... you can buy new everything buy the best and then get help with what you have from someone that knows... Not everyone can do this... but here are a few points.. 10yr old kart can win races... we win regularly and a championship last year with a 1999 kart... do what works for you... learn as much as you can and make your own decisions, I don't care what anyone says no 2 tires are the same from day to day and race to race every cycle on them induces changes and what worked last week might not work this week on the same tires, Prep is an educated guess at best.. scale'n a kart is a baseline... period.. it will never race in a static position on a perfectly level surface... one tire has no idea what brand the other tires are on the other 3 corners, more races are lost because of stupid things you should have caught before the kart ever reached the track... get your basics down make sure you can finish the race, that is the only way you will get better... learn to understand what your kart is doing and where... then research and think about it... make one change at a time... and never be afraid to ask for input from others

when we first started there was no question in our mind that people that were killing us HAD to be cheating... the more we learned the more we understood that they were not... we worked hard and got better we didn't do it alone we got a ton of help from folks we have never met that we will be forever in debt to... but we pass it on.. if anyone asks we tell them exactly what we have and what we do... it might not work for them... but we have never misled anyone... and have more than once bolted an engine out of our trailer onto a kart that did not belong to us...
 
I have not read all of the posts yet, I will sit down and go through everything as soon as I have time.
Racing Promoter, thanks for this thread..... and for all the help you have given us. Your first post summed up our first season exactly. Wrong tires, wrong gear, wrong setup, everything wrong. Patience and asking a lot of questions and slowly we got on the right track. This website and a few great people here helped put both of my kids out front. It took a couple of years for me to listen to and learn what I was being told, and a couple of years for my kids to learn how to drive.
For all the parents, have a lot of patience with your drivers! Make sure to include them in the learning process. The biggest thing we had to do in the beginning was figure out how to communicate. My son and I took a few weeks to figure out how he could tell me what the kart was doing. Just because I saw it one way, he felt it another. Listen to your driver and find terms you can use for handling issues.
 
Just bought some rims that have a red label maxxis t on the rims for the right side tires wondering what they are and if they are just as good as the pinks. Left side has the maxxis blues on them just the right sides are red in color instead of pink.
 
akenson16 said:
Just bought some rims that have a red label maxxis t on the rims for the right side tires wondering what they are and if they are just as good as the pinks. Left side has the maxxis blues on them just the right sides are red in color instead of pink.
Click to expand...
I'll have to leave one of the tire guy's answer Sorry I only know the Maxxis Pinks, IF no one responds soon I'll try to find out for you.
 
I don’t know if it applies here but back when we started racing my sons kart had Maxxis tires with red lettering. It did not handle well. Someone, I think on here, told me those were old tires designed for pavement. I don’t claim to know anything about tires, just passing on something I was told. I am sure someone with some knowledge will give a better answer.
 
akenson16 said:
Just bought some rims that have a red label maxxis t on the rims for the right side tires wondering what they are and if they are just as good as the pinks. Left side has the maxxis blues on them just the right sides are red in color instead of pink.
Click to expand...
Probably pinks that have faded. Get me the date code and i can tell you what they are, and also do they say HT3 on the sidewall?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
If I prep my tires and end up not racing that weekend how would I go about prepping them for the next weekend. I usually only race every 2 weeks so ill prep with black sand and let cure. But what if I don't get to race and it will be 2 more weeks before I race again.
 
poboyracer said:
If I prep my tires and end up not racing that weekend how would I go about prepping them for the next weekend. I usually only race every 2 weeks so ill prep with black sand and let cure. But what if I don't get to race and it will be 2 more weeks before I race again.
Click to expand...
Do you prep at track ? If so with what ?
 
Last weekend I hit the setup pretty good, but a couple of times i felt the motor bog coming out of the corner and it felt like thentires were biting really hard. What caused this to happen only a couple of times? Is it driver error or a slight setup issue?

Thanks
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top