l98tpi

What would the symptoms be of a worn out A6, besides chords showing? What would they feel like on track? I ran a set this past weekend and felt like I was on casters. Started 30psi cold and I dropped them to 29psi hot. They got a little better, but still "greasy". Ran 315/17's.

Timz06

No grip. A6's don't last long. I get about 2 decent 30 min races and then they fall off bad. On my 4th 30 min race my lap times dropped 6 seconds over the course of the race.

Han Solo

I bought one set of "3 heat cycle" A6 scrubs and they were awful for track use. Put my car in the fence with them. The same set went on to work okay for autocross on concrete for a few events but I'll never waste my money on another set. It's new or nearly new Kumho V710s from now on for me. I'm not looking to **** away that much money for a couple of tenths of a second for a few sessions when I can get reliable traction for many miles for less money. The guys I autocross with that buy new A6s might beat me the first event they get them then I'm right back in front of them the rest of the events until they buy a new set. They will buy 2 to 3 sets for the time I run one set of 710s. I have also run both scrubs and new 710s on track and never had them fall off during a run.

l98tpi

I'm with you on the used 3-4 heat cycle tires. I have learned my lesson. I do not plan to buy these used tires anymore. $600 got me 1 autox and one f'd up, pain in the *** day on the track. From now on it is new.

RX-Ben

In my experience, A6s are fast until corded. Maybe I have been lucky.

drivinhard

my experience to.

clubracer6

A higher level of entertainment! We ran some A6's at Autobahn that had 5 or 6 heat cycles on them and the car was a bit all over the place. But once you get used to it, you can drive through it. I considered it good training for additional car control. On their 6th cycle they were still good enough to win a race with! For 2012, I've put us on a tighter tire budget, so we are using them until I loose the argument with Joel and we put the newer stuff on!

RX-Ben

I set my fastest lap at NASA nats on a set with 5 h/cs and they felt fine. Maybe all heat cycles (TT vs race) don't have the same effect.

JRL

Same here, not as fast as the first few heat cycles but still good, then maybe some drop off just before cording.



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John

drivinhard

I have a set on my car now that have done 9 TT days (2 of which at CMP where I ran almost every session), 3 of those weekends (Road Atlanta) drove to and from the track so they have about 60-70 hwy miles to. At last outing they were only about 1.5 sec off a sticker tire pace. (33's in traffic)

I'd race them next weekend if I thought they would last (tread wise). They might do 1 race.

RX-Ben

Highway miles??!!

drivinhard

track is 4 miles away, 8 round trip. 2x per day if I go home for lunch

it's faster than spending 20 mins putting it on a trailer, driving for 4 mins, and then spending 20 mins pulling it off the trailer.

it's still got a tag

Kubs

Auto-X heat cycles beat up the tire a LOT more. The A6s are fast until they cord in road racing, but in auto-x you only get about half the tread life in usable grip. I made the mistake of buying used A6s from an autocrosser once because they had good date codes and lots of life left, but they were hard as a rock and slicker on track than my 5 year old V710s.

Han Solo

Sounds like they are inconsistent at best. The only set I tried supposedly had only 3 heat cycles of track use. The first time I tried them was on track and they sucked at the beginning and after 15 minutes they were terrible. I was able to treat them with my special sauce and get some autocross use out of them on coarse concrete but I wouldn't dare try them on track again.

PushinTheLimit

I've had decent luck out of A6's wear wise. But some of that depends on setup, driving style and the track. I ran the same A6's at Road Atlanta and VIR last year (2 qualifying sessions and 4 race sessions) and the tires still felt pretty good and look good. Took a brand new set of A6's to CMP and the rear's were shredded that you couldn't even see the grove lines anymore.

The A6's seem to be very fast the first 15 minutes of a race. After that, they start sliding around some and only get worse and you really have to watch about sliding them around at the end of a race. I'm still a newbie when it comes to managing my tires in a race, but they are better than R6's anyday at least in my experience.

travisnd

My experience matched what some others have already said. They get very greasy as they heat cycle away, but they're still fast. After 12-13 heat cycles they're pretty much done for competition to me.

I've never had an experience on them like Mark's (drivinhard) where I took them out past 15 heat cycles. 9 TT days @ 2 sessions a day average is 18 cycles, maybe more!

The tires I'm racing on this weekend have 7 heat cycles, but one was in the rain so not sure if that counts for much. All have been TT sessions from February and March at VIR. I do plan on flipping the tires on the rims to get the most meat on the outer edge in an attempt to get them to last the weekend and not cord.

Jim_Harrison

I've found that the A6 does not like a lot of heat. Many of us AutoXr's cool our tires after every run in the summer. I've found they get greasy above 120F but are good all the way down to 60F. Isn't that why Hoosier makes R6's?

ScaryFast

Don't equate "feels greasy" with "is slow". A6's slip but still grip.

Certainly one can be junk if heat cycle'd out or poorly stored, but in general they seem to last a long time.

This track record:

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/auto...d-grattan.html

was set on a set of corded front A6's that I pulled off my car when the radiator went and loaned to Rob for the last session. That set was bought used from Phoenix last summer, stored in my non-climate controlled garage in Michigan for a year, and mounted a couple of weeks ago. I put 8 HC on them over two track days before taking them off because my car's lack of - camber ate them.

In other words, bad A6's are the exception, not the norm.

travisnd

No... A6s are a solid 2 seconds a lap faster than Rs. Most everyone races on As. If you're on Rs you won't keep up.