Bridgestone RE-71Rs rapid wear

Both my front RE-71Rs bit the dust today at Mineral Wells. They wore more quickly than I expected. They started and ended life at Mineral Wells.

Mounted on 07/02/2016. First autocross was at Mineral Wells on 07/13. Last was at Mineral Wells on 9/24.

Total of 74 autocross runs over 10 events, plus Miatas @ Hallett, plus PCA Time Trials at MSR in Cresson. They were driven a total of 2,445 miles.

The rears still look OK. I rotated them front to back twice, so the ones that wore out saw more duty on the front than on the rear. I never flipped them on their rims during that time. How often should that be done?

I find myself pushing the front end quite a bit in corners. I think I don't brake enough or soon enough sometimes. I could only get -1.7 camber on the fronts with my stock ride height, so that might also be a factor.

I'm about to install a set of Koni Sports and a big front anti-sway bar. I'm keeping the stock springs, since I want to stay in C-Street for next year. The Koni's should drop my ride height a little, so I might be able to get more negative camber. Besides driving better (improving braking to reduce pushing through corners) and flipping on rims sooner, what else will help extend tire life?

Driver front:

Attachment 7024

Passenger front:

Attachment 7025

Are those your only tires/wheels? If so, get another set of wheels.

PS - MW is really hard on tires.

I plan on ordering two RE-71R's tomorrow. I need them for the SCCA Road Course Solo on 10/9. There's also the ER autocross on 10/2. If I don't have my replacement RE-71r's before next weekend, I've got a couple of heat-cycled Hankook RS3's that still have some tread left. They won't be great, but they'll roll.

I thought this looked familiar. Hope you can see this.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?f...type=3&theater

Rotating the tires each event front to rear and flipping them on the rim every few events should help prolong life . We are asking a lot from these tires to race at a high level AND street drive them. On a stock type car as mentioned, I bet it's normal for the outsides to wear faster. Using up and replacing tires often is expected if you want to be fast . It was common for the last generation of tires to heat cycle out before the tread was gone . These new ones are street legal RACE tires

You are going into turns too fast and using the outside edge as a brake. No amount of camber will fix this. The car still has too much forward momentum to turn. The wheel is turned so the edge is now exposed and not the contact patch. You need to brake more before turning the wheel. In slow, out fast.

Thanks for the feedback, guys.

The picture of the tire on facebook looks like it suffered exactly the same kind of wear as mine, alright, but I'm inclined to think that it's caused by my driving more than anything, like Ken said. I doubt a bad batch of tires, or more people, including better drivers, would have found it and reported it too.

So I'm going with Ken's explanation. I'll rotate and flip like John says, and make "In slow, out fast" my mantra.

You definitely need to rotate tires F-R every event, and flip them once there is a noticeable rounding of the outside edge. Baker at Tire Store Service Center will do it very reasonably.

As Ken mentioned, you are overdriving the front tires. The NC in particular HATES trail braking, and will be very pushy on corner entry if you are too hot, still braking, or both. Brake hard in a straight line (you should try to get into the abs when coming hot into a tight turn - the nc has very good abs). I bever had wear like that in 4.5 seasons in my NC, on a wide variety of tires.

I definitely need to brake sooner and harder, and not while turning. Brakes are better at braking than tires are, and they're cheaper too. :)

Baker is far away from me. Do you happen to know any low cost tire flippers in the Carrollton, Plano, Addison area?

I don’t know if this applies to you or not, but many new autocrossers will turn the wheel even more when a car is pushing in the corners. This is the natural reaction when the car is not turning like you want (turn more). That only makes the car push more eating up the front tires. You need to unwind the wheel and let the tires regain grip then turn in again. I see it all the time with novices. The car is plowing around the turn and the driver is cranking in more steering killing their tires.

The upside to turning the wheel more is that it slows the car down enough (same as hitting the breaks) that it eventually turns.

Guilty as charged, Robert. Really, it depends on how close I am to a cone when I'm pushing like that. Sometimes I think I can save the poor cone's dignity, not to mention my own plus a 2 second penalty, by turning even harder, like you said. But if I have a lot of room, I'm more likely to unwind.

Practicing my new mantra now:

In slow, out fast.
In slow, out fast.
In slow, out fast.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 865

I definitely need to brake sooner and harder, and not while turning. Brakes are better at braking than tires are, and they're cheaper too. :)

Baker is far away from me. Do you happen to know any low cost tire flippers in the Carrollton, Plano, Addison area?

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Baker is open till 8 on weekdays. I make the drive from the White Rock Lake area, as there isn't anyone else that compares. If you are time crunched, and Discount Tire will do a good job, but will cost a little more.

Baker is probably ~15-20 minutes from Carrollton.

Baker is literally one of the best guys I've ever met. Excellent customer service and you can't beat his price. I make the drive to Bedford from Denton just to give him my business. He will be getting all my business for tires and such for my Celica GTS as well. Tire Store Service Center. Give em a call.

If you just want cheap flipping and Bake is too far, just go to any "was a gas station and now it's a used tire shop" and pay $10 per tire to flip and re-balance.

That's what happens when street tires aren't street tires anymore

Quote:

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Originally Posted by sammm

Baker is probably ~15-20 minutes from Carrollton.

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29 minutes with no traffic, says Google Maps.

It's good to know he's open 'til 8pm. That helps.