Explain this treadwear to me

[Bill I.]

Back page of Hot Rod (Sept) issue has an ad for a drag tire. On the sidewall, shows treadwear as 00.
I understand treadwear as being the higher the #, the longer the tire lasts, ex: 500 better than 300, etc. What is 00? Thanks, Bill

[John H.]

Re: Explain this treadwear to me

What is 00? Thanks, Bill

Bill -

Probably means "good for this weekend".

[Jack H.]

Re: Explain this treadwear to me

Could it be as simple as 00 does not have any treadwear life since it's a drag slick with no tread? Or is the tire advertised one of the dot-approved street/strip variety that can be driven on the street?

[Bill M.]

Re: Explain this treadwear to me

I'll guess it means untested for treadwear.

[Duke W.]

Re: Explain this treadwear to me

Any DOT legal tire designed primary for competition use has to have the same DOT placarded information - including the load and speed rating, traction and temperature ratings - as a tire designed for road use.

Most DOT legal racing tires - autocross, road race, or drag race - have wear ratings under 100. and I recall seeing some DOT legal autocross or road race tires that carry a wear rating of 00.

What they are trying to tell you is that even though the tire is technically legal for road use, it's not designed for road use - primarily due to short tread life.

As far as this tire is concerned, my recommendation would be to use it on the road only for driving to and from a competition event, but it would be best to bolt them on and off at the track.

DOT legal autocross and drag racing tires have very soft compounds that are designed to heat up very fast, and even sustained running at freeway speeds in warm weather can cause extremely rapid wear, and extremely cold weather can cause the tread rubber to crack!

DOT Legal road racing tires are designed to achieve optimum grip at tread temperatures of 180-220 degrees F in sustained high speed driving with lots of high speed cornering as you would expect on a road racing track. As a result, they don't wear as fast in normal driving as autocross or drag racing tires because they don't get up to this temperature range where the compound gets super soft and sticky.

My experience is that DOT legal road racing tires with wear ratings of 40-80 and new tread depths of 6-8/32s will give about 10K miles in normal road use, including sporty driving whenever possible, but track mileage could be as little as 200 miles for a heavy high powered car.

Despite rarely achieving optimum grip temperatures in road use they will still provide substantially more grip than the best "ultra high performance" summer tires, so DOT legal road racing tires are a good choice for collector cars where you want maximum grip.

For vintage Corvettes the V-rated 215/70R-15 Avon CR6ZZ is a good choice.

Duke

[Clem Z.]

Re: Explain this treadwear to me

Any DOT legal tire designed primary for competition use has to have the same DOT placarded information - including the load and speed rating, traction and temperature ratings - as a tire designed for road use.

Most DOT legal racing tires - autocross, road race, or drag race - have wear ratings under 100. and I recall seeing some DOT legal autocross or road race tires that carry a wear rating of 00.

What they are trying to tell you is that even though the tire is technically legal for road use, it's not designed for road use - primarily due to short tread life.

As far as this tire is concerned, my recommendation would be to use it on the road only for driving to and from a competition event, but it would be best to bolt them on and off at the track.

DOT legal autocross and drag racing tires have very soft compounds that are designed to heat up very fast, and even sustained running at freeway speeds in warm weather can cause extremely rapid wear, and extremely cold weather can cause the tread rubber to crack!

DOT Legal road racing tires are designed to achieve optimum grip at tread temperatures of 180-220 degrees F in sustained high speed driving with lots of high speed cornering as you would expect on a road racing track. As a result, they don't wear as fast in normal driving as autocross or drag racing tires because they don't get up to this temperature range where the compound gets super soft and sticky.

My experience is that DOT legal road racing tires with wear ratings of 40-80 and new tread depths of 6-8/32s will give about 10K miles in normal road use, including sporty driving whenever possible, but track mileage could be as little as 200 miles for a heavy high powered car.

Despite rarely achieving optimum grip temperatures in road use they will still provide substantially more grip than the best "ultra high performance" summer tires, so DOT legal road racing tires are a good choice for collector cars where you want maximum grip.

For vintage Corvettes the V-rated 215/70R-15 Avon CR6ZZ is a good choice.

Duke

that is why the tires on a new corvette ZO-6 don't last very long.