Originally Posted by
Jack Rimer
Honestly, this is the first I have heard about our tires peeling. I'm not saying it hasn't happened (obviously it has if you say so), but in the thousands and thousands of tires we have made, I had NO idea it was an issue. You mention that the first thing you do when you get our tires is "peel the outside edge 5-7mm". How is this possible? I just went into the back and took 50-75 tires and tried to peel them. There was no way the foam was coming off. We roughen every wheel and then use super glue to bond the foam to the wheel. This doesn't mean that from time to time a few tires get through that aren't glued as well as others, but it would seem to me that if it was as much of a problem as you say we would have heard about it. Since we warranty tires for coming unglued, and we have not had any returns, I would have no way of knowing this was an issue.
By the way, we intentionally make our wheels more flexible to prevent breakage. Trust me, it is much better to have people complain about flex than to have them be upset about breaking a wheel. We don't feel the flex compromises the performance so we tend to lean towards caution.
Jack, thanks for coming on an taking an interest, it is appreciated. We have the same experience in Europe despite using different additive and track markings. Just to be clear, the problem is confined to the yellow compound, and not to others.
As the tyres get used, they all soak up additive. This does weaken them a bit, but nonetheless the yellow compound gets to the point where the outer edge just breaks up. It isn't always a function of tyre diameter, but smaller diameters make the problem worse.
Even in a clean run, where you don't touch the barriers or get clipped by another car, the tyres simply break up on the outer edge. There is still foam and glue on the wheel, but the edges break away. This does not happen with pink, 2x pink, magenta, etc.
We thought you knew about this, and that was why you brought out the orange compound with stiffer foam on the edge! In my experience, I have had no problems like this with orange.
Please be careful with the data you take in here about this problem. Most posts here blame clipping the track markers, but in my experience, most chunking damage is done when one is hit from behind by another competitor. One clip from a carbon chassis on a foam tyre is enough!
Whilst your concern is appreciated, like Gadget I regard it as one of those things, and get on with it. After switching to orange compound, with the harder outer edge, the problem has gone away. I hope this information helps you in your research.