At 09:20 AM 8/22/2002 -0400, jkryder@mindspring.com wrote:
>I bought a set of Diamonds... 13 x 7 Road Race wheels... this year. I talked
>to Bill T. at Diamond and asked some of your questions, and he said the safety
>bead isn't really necessary for Solo stuff. He even said some dirt trackers
>run under 20 lb pressures with no saftey bead.
In most cases I'm sure that it's not a problem, but on a wheel with a
limited bead seating surface on the outside (for example, a three-piece
wheel with a large offset), a safety bead can be a good idea. We tried a
set of 13x7 three-piece wheels on our EP car with something in the
neighborhood of 5.625" of backspacing, which (from that particular
manufacturer) created a very small outer half with no safety bead (in other
words, the sidewall didn't have far to go before the wheel surface dropped
away). It wasn't an issue until we tried it at Forbes, but at the practice
event in 2001 we were de-beading (and subsequently deflating) tires left
and right. So, I wouldn't recommend using a wheel without a safety bead in
a case where you're trying to maximize the offset and running cantilever
slicks.
--
Kevin Wenzel
kwenzel@rmsolo.org
EP 117
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