On Fri, May 24, 2002 at 12:51:42PM -0400, Larrybsp@aol.com wrote:
> from:larrybsp@aol.com (Larry Stark)
> > the threat to stop making r-tires doesnt make sense to me- scca and other
> > orgs can just change what tires are allowed in certain classes. thats just
> > changing some words on some paper somewhere.
> >
> > -james c
> James,
>What planet are you on? You have no idea of the implications of
>banning "R" rated tires would have. First and foremost its big
>brother telling you what can and can't do once again. Secondly there
>is no logical reason to ban "R" tires. How many SUVs have seen with
>them. Thats beside the point that as far as I know "R" rated tires
>aren't made in SUV sizes. The loss of "R" tires would force many
>people to have to give up racing.
Larry, I think you misinterpreted James' statement. I think he means
that SCCA can change the "Tires" rule to allow "the tires formerly
known as DOT competition tires" in stock class.
As I understand it, the law increases the testing requirements for DOT
certification. That will lead to higher fixed costs when developing a
new tire, which will impact the prices of low production tires more
than high production tires. It is not a ban on any tire that's not
DOT certified, so if there are many other people like you who find
Victoracers to be a necessity there is no reason you can't keep them
in production by continuing to buy the tires despite their lack of DOT
certification.
If it goes through, then Hoosiers and V700s may or may not remain DOT
certified, and it will be up to the SCCA to decide whether the "stock"
and "street prepared" classes should be allowed to run on tires that
are not, strictly speaking, street legal street tires.
I'm sure that some tire company (Falken? Hankook?) would be happy to
step in and supply race tires to Soloists if Hoosier and Kumho get
discouraged by the extra testing. I suspect that Kumho won't have any
trouble getting their current tires to pass the tests, although
Hoosier might.
Yes, it's standard issue bullshit from the government. No, they are
not taking away your racecar; they are just telling you that Hoosiers
aren't really street tires (which, if you've visited their web page
recently, Hoosier is also doing very prominently).
--
john@idsfa.net John Stimson
http://www.idsfa.net/~john/ HMC Physics '94
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