Tire combination
- Thread starter dracing70
- Start date
nah thats just more wieght to slow me down... :rofl:
pending my job and $$ you might too pull against meoke: i aint jumping the 2.8/3.0 class jsut yet
Who said anything about going to 2.8/3.0 to see us next year?
I agree with Mat (glad to see you over here posting BTW - we need some more pullers in here). The STS is a great all around tire. I think it is a bit much for a WS truck and they will not work if you daily driver on them because of the soft compound. STS tires were made for pulling and show trucks.
Who said anything about going to 2.8/3.0 to see us next year?
I agree with Mat (glad to see you over here posting BTW - we need some more pullers in here). The STS is a great all around tire. I think it is a bit much for a WS truck and they will not work if you daily driver on them because of the soft compound. STS tires were made for pulling and show trucks.
didnt know how big your 05 is
Sure you do, it only went about 300 ft last year (combined on about 4 hooks)
Back to tires boys!
OK, I'll talk a little bit about it and the thought process.
At 550-600 rwhp you're kinda on the verge of being able to hang 4th gear. It will depend a lot on the surface, the sled, the track length, and whether or not you can run front hanging weight.
If the sled lets you run 290', you won't have much time to hang 4th and really sail. So you need to run 3rd low and "bulldog" the sled, let the motor wind out as best you can. In this situation you do not want ANY wheel slip. 100% traction is what you're looking for. The best advice I got was from Kyle Michael - 45 rear, 30 front and work your way down until she hops. I found that anything below 38 in the rear would get bouncy, but in between those numbers, I could find fantastic traction with the 35" STS. I've run the fronts as low as 18, but in the mid 20s seems to work fine for most tracks.
I embarrassed the hell out of myself twice trying to run the recipe that some people use - full hard in the rear (65 psi) and half that in the front (32ish). Terrible...motor would get up on the charger and just absolutely annihilate the tires. Just awful. Now, had I had more cojones, when that happened, I should have tried to shift her to 4th....but most of the time I had my CoPilot set on kill and it would have snuffed me out with the locked 3-4 upshift. If the CoPilot was immediately changeable (or if I had put in the tricky switch) then you can kinda "slide" through the 3-4 without the violent and immediate 40% rpm drop. But live and learn.
Now, for the roadrunner sleds, if you go 3rd gear, you won't get the speed you need to play the inertia game at the end when the pan drops. Kyle used to tell me that he loved the hard hitting sleds because up until then, you can run like hell. So this is where you need the wheelspeed. And 100% traction will likely kill you - you need some slip to keep the RPMs up to make it though the 3-4 upshift and TC lock. So up we go with the pressures to something like say 48 and 27 (or higher; 50/30 is not bad) and you get the slip you need. When you do it just right, the truck feels like it's on a gumband....motor whizzes up and the wheels start churnin' real hard, and you think you're going to do a sit 'n spin, but doggone, it just catches up and takes off like a stick truck.
This summer, I had been convinced by a few folks that when running a good amount of front hanging weight, that I "should" be able to come up with the pressures a bit and do better with more ground speed. Well, make a long story short, I ended up doing a lot of spinning. When I finally got my head wired back up to my ass, I went back to down to the "sweet spot" where I had learned to run the truck with no FHW, and man she came right back and felt a whole lot better. I was kinda miffed because I felt like I left a lot on the table at some hooks, but again, I learned something.
Now at 800 hp or thereabouts, you need 4th gear, period, and getting that fine balance of slip out of the hole and grip at the big end is everything. I think Tomac had this mastered first and then guys like Scrimager and Burkhart came along and proved without a doubt that it works.
Hope this makes sense. You have to know what your truck can do, then go look at the track and sled, and adapt your pressures and driving style to suit. There is no universal recipe!
One common error that I see all the time, is guys BSing and fiddling with their stuff, instead of being out on the track where they should be.
Best advice is, have your truck 100% squared away when you get there, so you can spend more time on the dirt.
At 550-600 rwhp you're kinda on the verge of being able to hang 4th gear. It will depend a lot on the surface, the sled, the track length, and whether or not you can run front hanging weight.
If the sled lets you run 290', you won't have much time to hang 4th and really sail. So you need to run 3rd low and "bulldog" the sled, let the motor wind out as best you can. In this situation you do not want ANY wheel slip. 100% traction is what you're looking for. The best advice I got was from Kyle Michael - 45 rear, 30 front and work your way down until she hops. I found that anything below 38 in the rear would get bouncy, but in between those numbers, I could find fantastic traction with the 35" STS. I've run the fronts as low as 18, but in the mid 20s seems to work fine for most tracks.
I embarrassed the hell out of myself twice trying to run the recipe that some people use - full hard in the rear (65 psi) and half that in the front (32ish). Terrible...motor would get up on the charger and just absolutely annihilate the tires. Just awful. Now, had I had more cojones, when that happened, I should have tried to shift her to 4th....but most of the time I had my CoPilot set on kill and it would have snuffed me out with the locked 3-4 upshift. If the CoPilot was immediately changeable (or if I had put in the tricky switch) then you can kinda "slide" through the 3-4 without the violent and immediate 40% rpm drop. But live and learn.
Now, for the roadrunner sleds, if you go 3rd gear, you won't get the speed you need to play the inertia game at the end when the pan drops. Kyle used to tell me that he loved the hard hitting sleds because up until then, you can run like hell. So this is where you need the wheelspeed. And 100% traction will likely kill you - you need some slip to keep the RPMs up to make it though the 3-4 upshift and TC lock. So up we go with the pressures to something like say 48 and 27 (or higher; 50/30 is not bad) and you get the slip you need. When you do it just right, the truck feels like it's on a gumband....motor whizzes up and the wheels start churnin' real hard, and you think you're going to do a sit 'n spin, but doggone, it just catches up and takes off like a stick truck.
This summer, I had been convinced by a few folks that when running a good amount of front hanging weight, that I "should" be able to come up with the pressures a bit and do better with more ground speed. Well, make a long story short, I ended up doing a lot of spinning. When I finally got my head wired back up to my ass, I went back to down to the "sweet spot" where I had learned to run the truck with no FHW, and man she came right back and felt a whole lot better. I was kinda miffed because I felt like I left a lot on the table at some hooks, but again, I learned something.
Now at 800 hp or thereabouts, you need 4th gear, period, and getting that fine balance of slip out of the hole and grip at the big end is everything. I think Tomac had this mastered first and then guys like Scrimager and Burkhart came along and proved without a doubt that it works.
Hope this makes sense. You have to know what your truck can do, then go look at the track and sled, and adapt your pressures and driving style to suit. There is no universal recipe!
One common error that I see all the time, is guys BSing and fiddling with their stuff, instead of being out on the track where they should be.
Best advice is, have your truck 100% squared away when you get there, so you can spend more time on the dirt.
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Come on we desereve more credit then just the tires we choose
We came to Michigan & won with boggers
It all depends on what has been done to your boggers. Mine are special 
Nice post nwpadmax thanks for the info.
Also my buddy runs nitto mud grappers for pullin that are about 75% wore out. He has had some really good hooks and has won a right good amount of pulls with them. They have been run on clay tracks, dirt tracks, sand tracks all of them he has won. And most of them had 20 to 30 trucks in the class. He also won the points for The Buck street diesel pull. There was about 60 trucks at each event, four total. I am currenty lookin for a used set now cause they will be what i will run next year. Just my 2 cents.
Also my buddy runs nitto mud grappers for pullin that are about 75% wore out. He has had some really good hooks and has won a right good amount of pulls with them. They have been run on clay tracks, dirt tracks, sand tracks all of them he has won. And most of them had 20 to 30 trucks in the class. He also won the points for The Buck street diesel pull. There was about 60 trucks at each event, four total. I am currenty lookin for a used set now cause they will be what i will run next year. Just my 2 cents.
Come on we desereve more credit then just the tires we choose
We came to Michigan & won with boggers
Boggers are "proven" for muddy tracks although I have never had the chance to run them. But the number of times you have to run in the mud is limited. At least with the groups I run with, if it's a mess, they just cancel it. I've only had to pull twice on total BS tracks where the promoter kept it going for some reason or another. A lot of times, mud up in the sled is bad news and as such the sled owners kinda say "that's enough."
One pull we went to, first third of the class hooked and the skies opened up. My time came and it was so slippery I couldn't even get the sled started. The operator bumped me and I got going. Horrible hook. I hit 4th all locked up and she died. Stupid. But it was the right direction. The only thing you can do in the rain is grab a giant gear that lugs the motor hard and keeps the tires cleaned out.
Everyone was pretty mad. So the pullers all got together and went and talked to the promoter, told him that since this was a points pull, it could not stand as it was since it wasn't fair competition. So we suggested that everyone just take 20 rain points and split the pot up equally to all trucks. He agreed, and everyone went home semi-happy.
There's times where if you all work together, you can change things.
Pulling
Good post Matt! Thats some good info for people to use and better(hopefully) there pulling setup's. Jeff
Good post Matt! Thats some good info for people to use and better(hopefully) there pulling setup's. Jeff
Absolutely not true. I had a massive hook with STSes on a horse track this year, and had several other great hooks on varying tracks. However you must know the right pressures for the surface and the gear combo you want to run. STSes at high pressures will spin out....been there, done it.
The STS is the best pulling tire all-around. The only thing they suck on is greasy/muddy tracks.
Go to any of the midwest pulls and they're about all you see on dedicated trucks. The guy from Ohio that won our unlimited-single class ran 6 of 'em on his dually CTD. Pops gave me a really hard time once when I said "winners run STSes" and then it wasn't too long after that, guess who had a set
The BFG is OK but they tend to need to be spun hard once they lose their edges. Tomac and Burkhart ran them for a long time. Burkhart was sporting STSes the last time JB saw him.
I have never seen the Pro-comps work at all.
And the thing is, if you truly have 700 rwhp, you're going to need 33" or 35" STS (3rd or 4th low range depending on pressure) or the 35" BFG and go 4th gear and spin the tar out of 'em.
If you want to be near the front, don't street drive your pulling tires....because most of the competition is running sharp tires!
One last thing, just from experience. At 500rwhp, many sharp tires will work fine; it's more of an idiot-proof situation. It's at 600 and above where things get decidedly more tricky and you've got to have a really biting tire that's properly inflated for the surface and the gearing you're trying to run.
thanks for the advice i have yet to try the fourth gear shift have been considerin it. i also have thought of carryin an extra set of tires for pullin but it gets pricy . I am the only guy around that runs with the top guys in the area and drives his truck in once in a while i trailer but my truck is a everyday truck to so its tough.
I have seen BFG's absolutely whoop on STS's 7 out of 10 tracks we pull on. The other 3 tracks the STS's will dominate because they are good clay hard biting tracks. If the track is too dry, or too wet (which we had a lot of) the STS's wouldn't hook very well at all and would just blaze away reguardless of pressure they would grip way late and spin out too early.
A guy around here beat a lot of guys that were running much more hp on BFG's. He does now own a set of STS's and time will tell if we can make them hook. He just had to try them.
I wouldn't give a plug nickel for a set of BFGs. I know because I ran them for the better part of a year, and putting on STSes turned things around dramatically for me. I still have the BFGs, but I just use 'em for testing on the street.
Dmaximizer, I find it hard to believe that you can factually say "regardless of pressure." How do you know what everyone runs? No puller I know of would cough that info up, and even if they did, it wouldn't be the truth.
BFG "domination" just doesn't jive with my experience. Before the STS came out, that was probably true.
Dmaximizer, I find it hard to believe that you can factually say "regardless of pressure." How do you know what everyone runs? No puller I know of would cough that info up, and even if they did, it wouldn't be the truth.
BFG "domination" just doesn't jive with my experience. Before the STS came out, that was probably true.
The only note worthy puller I can think of off hand that still runs BFG ATs is Terry Coppess. I actually asked him about still running them at Zanesville NADM. He said the STS bite to hard and break to much driveline so he took them off.
nwpadmax ran BFGs for a good while. They where sitting in the corner of his shop last I knew. There is a good reason for that.
Go head run them I sure will not mind!
nwpadmax ran BFGs for a good while. They where sitting in the corner of his shop last I knew. There is a good reason for that.
Go head run them I sure will not mind!
Thanks for all of the info Matt and Johnboy, this is good stuff!! If they have the indoor pull at harrisburg, PA this winter are you guys going to come??? It would be great to see you again!!
Go head run them I sure will not mind!
There ya go! I am a huge fan of BFGs....on everyone else's trucks! :rofl:
Bear in mind that Coppess is in 6-wheel drive; it makes a difference. Like I was saying above, if you've got big HP, management of slip is what decides the winner from the loser. If the BFGs give the right combo, then go with 'em.
03, when is the Harrisburg pull? I guess I better get my motor program in gear...
The dates are 3/26-3/28.
www.angelfire.com/extreme2/eastpulling/KEYSTONENATIONALS.html has the schedule and the rules.
www.angelfire.com/extreme2/eastpulling/KEYSTONENATIONALS.html has the schedule and the rules.
