I had harder REARS, and my fronts were all soft that I am aware of (I still have some in bags I haven't checked)

Chris, sorry mate, understand you correcting people making assumptions and you are rightly doing so.

I don't want or expect my money back, I don't want to fall out with any people or companies as CML are good people and it isn't there fault, they are just the middlemen, and so is everyone here, I just would like an acknowledgement of an issue existing and some word of it not continueing so I can have faith in the product.

This is toy car racing, I do it because I enjoy it, and I won;t enjoy it if I am running wrongly bagged tyres (if that is what happened). What I will do if I have no confidence in one product is use another product until I have confirmation that that issue has been dealt with. Id like to use GRP's but we can;t at nationals, except on the front (which I did, in 2wd)

Chris

Don't get me wrong Tom, I totally agree with you 100%, I'm just pointing out the potential legal side of it.

This is the downside of control tires, in an open market we could all switch to GRP or another supplier in protest and hit BB and Sch in the wallet where it hurts!

PMSL, your a legend.

no i agree with you Tom , but just had to correct you slightly ;).

I think there were more than just "soft" and "hard" Greens in use over the weekend. I sampled a bit of a range from a fellow racer, and there was defenetly a "medium" in there as well!!!

Tire rules have been change mid-season before, albeit for a different situation, with TR32's a few years ago, 3a Raceway if I remember correctly. The drivers voted on it at Batley National at driver's briefing.

it all depends on what arrangement that said shop had done with his sales rep or CML direct. There are options.

I won't go into details on the different types of arrangements, if someone like Dom wish to, up to him. It all depends on what the deal is between the shop and rep.

I dont want to speak out of term here but it would be good to have a safe option also, i know why we have the 2 different tyres ie to keep cost down and keep it simple but we already have the option of 2 componds per manufacturer and thats just for the rears. what real difference would throwing another "spike" into the ring really do apart from give the drivers an option.

We all pretty much know what tyre works before we get to the track thanks to forums etc so its not like we would turn up and find out the tyre we have bought doesn`t work.


Just an option and im sure it will not happen this season, but some consistency would be nice.

the tr32 was voted againt for holbeach i thnk tom since we couldnt get them at the time.

this isnt the first time that ballistic have dropped the ball regards tyres,i remember a few yrs ago when no onehad stock of them at kiddy when it rained one year.

you should all get a letter or petition signed up and sent in to the brca expressing your concerns about what tyres were chosen and demand another tyre choice..afterall its YOUR brca.

How or when the shops pay for tyres is immaterial. It is not viable to hold thousands of pounds worth of tyres in stock "just in case".

My tyres for Kiddy were all new stock from the distributors, delivered/collected last week.

There was a notable difference between front and rear for sure, but has it occurred to anyone that it may have been the rears that were too soft?
The rears I have in stock don't seem much different to pinks, but the fronts are definitely softer than blues.

Whatever the outcome of any investigation by the supplier, I hope it is sorted before Oswestry.

Incidentally, I only had one pair of fronts returned at the weekend and I gave the chap his money back.

Control tyres are such a stupid idea. Rallycross has no control tyres..... and that's hardly a struggling class.

Anyway, I would strongly urge people to refrain from commenting that certain companies actions are illegal. It show a lack of legal knowledge and could land you in trouble yourself (although I doubt very much in this case it would).

I strongly dissagree with this statement.

When I attend a venue like Kiddy, which i can;t get to between nationals, I don't want to be carrying Schuey spikes, pins; BB spikes, pins; GRP's. I want to turn up with the control tyre, research the compound recommended and hit the track just working on setup, not tyre choice.

This is exactly why the BRCA have a nominated choice, and why I 100% agree with it being there.

Agree`d chris

(if everyone gets the same tyres ;))

control tyre is a must have!!!!!!!!

trust its very different in Rallyx.............

so many people make tyres in it and our sponsered for tyres etc......
control tyre meetings are the only way to do business!

control tyres are not a stupid idea at all. it saves us a lot of money

Andy Newbound had a set of the harder tyres too (and i think they were rears), he just took them out of the bag and instantly noticed that they were like a blue compound. At the time, i told him he was being gay, but i didn't realise that he was right!!

Maybe i was running the harder compound too. Balls, if i had the softer compound, i would've lapped Craggy :drool:

...but seriously though (:lol:), irrespective of whether Pidge had the harder compound and still drove immaculately on Sunday, this is pretty damn bad. If this is really the case, then i am very reluctant to buy any more BB's.

I agree pidge was awesome (not bad for a reserve;)) and if he was on the hard green then pidge has proven that you can polish a turd :thumbsup:

10th isn't a struggling class. I've no problem with the Tire rules just the piss poor Quality Control that has ruined my meeting.

control tyres are best, saves you cash in the end, just got to ensure that the control tyres are 'correct'!

Reading this thread. I don't think that you can do much to resolve the situation for this year, other than to check your new tyres before you leave the shop.
Also make a proposal to the BRCA 1/10 committee for the AGM to have xxxx tyre as a control tyre for 2009.
Then go to the AGM to vote it in.
So get together and make your voice count..
Rich

RallyX cars don't work the same as 1/10th though so from what i've seen / been told you can get away with other tyres and it doesn't matter quite so much.

Can you imagine going back to the days of a set of Losi Pins per run front and rear? What a nightmare! Let along having to carry enough sets of every single possible combination!

No be we may be all using GRP.
Yes you have my full support on your thread [ but I could be accused of being bias]

thats not nice reffering to Pidge as a Turd :thumbdown::p

WILL YOU ACCEPT TYRES THAT ARE GLUED ON WHEELS

NO...

REASON BEING what do we do with all our old wheels/inserts and not exactly enviromentaly friendly getting a new set of wheels for every pair of tyres! i re-sue my wheels several times, keeps cost right down

..............................

LOL!! Interesting to watch the 3 legs of the A. To be fair, people were screaming up to Pidge, but then just not getting past him due to some seriously accurate and smooth driving from the gay boy.


...dare i say that Mossy's Cat looked pretty damned awesome, especially in the second leg!!

My issue I had with BB tyres was that some of the rear greens were too soft... I am not so sure whether it is a case of the fronts being too hard, and whether the big difference between front and rear is caused by the rear softness.
some of my new BB green rears felt rather pink and I ran a set like that in leg 1 and 2 of the A on the saturday (2wd, at this point I wasn't using BB fronts) and my car was pants... leg 3 I switched back to a harder pair used earlier in the day and it was fine.

The variance in compound front to rear will have a big impact on balance regardless, and if the fronts and rears are labelled as the same compound they should be. Having said this, I had only 1 problem all weekend with the BB tyres as mentioned previously and will remain on the fence in this situation.

I've had a reply form Dave Duggan from CML.

CML had no idea of any problem with the compound or mis-packaging of BB tires. They have had no complaints about the tires previous to this thread, therefore have not know about this problem, however long it has been going on. CML do not make the tires, they are just the distributor so they will be taking the matter up with their suppliers.

I have asked when they expect the situation to be sorted out, hopefully before the next national.

Now all we need is the 'new' yellow mini-spikes from Schumacher in case its dry.

PS I have edited/deleted some of my posts that were too much. I am not out to slander/slag off any specific company, just improve the tires for our nationals so everyone has an equal chance.

Hi guys, can I please ask people to only post the FACTS and from their own personal experience. No talk about conspiracys or other assumed shennanigans.
It's in no ones interest to upset the RC community (us racers) so please remember that before posting your thoughts.

[QUOTE=Cockerill;115931]Does anyone think I have been out of order here by starting the thread or what I have said.

So far I have had only support and not one person comment that what I am saying is wrong/out of order.

pm sent tom

I just read this very long thread from start to finish and now I feel i need a hug.. how depressing :cry:

If some tyres have been wrongly bagged then I hope the companies in question do the decent thing and swap them out.

Does anyone ever conduct shore hardness tests on tyres? someone must have this facility at their work? or college?

I would expect that the manufacturer must be able to show that a batch of tyres falls between certain specification limits, even if they dont do it all the time, they should be able to get it done if there is a question over material?

I have heard reliably that there is no specified specification for the rubber nominated as a compound. Therefore green could be anything, blue could be anything. etc... doesn;t make it right tho in my opinion..

Neil i think you are onto something. Id like to see manufacturers have a shore hardness specification for there compounds with stated tolerences.

This to me, does sound extreme - but if it restore confidence and means we get what we expect, then its good. As at the moment its the racers who are loosing out. Sure, few, if anybody will test them, but if anything like this does raise its grizzly head again then there is a measurement for the test to be conducted.

There are emails behind the scenes, and hopefully a resolution, so I am not going to run away with accusations or presumptions, that isn't fair on the vendors, the distributors, the shops or the people who represent the racers.

Chris

but the tyre compound is more complex than just shore hardness, but then it would be a good indicator of compound. I know Greens and Yellow Schumachers are different rubber completely, one is synthetic and other is natural and have distinct smells.

I think thats a good point, what is green compound ballistic buggy or yellow schumacher? I think we have to expect the compound to change a little from batch to batch after all these are only rc car tyres, we are dealing with small companys selling to a very small market place there are not to many other places in the world use these tyres.

I think if you find two diffrent tyres in one pack thats not on and you should return them as for £7.50ish both tyres should be the same.

What we should get tho is tyres that are the right shape, have the correct amount of spikes and both tyres should be made of the same stuff. NOT what we have been getting in the past few months!

Hi DCM, you might need to explain to me, I appreciate you are likely to know far more than me on the subject of materials, but I am a fast learner, so please do...

What I meant is a spec from each manufacturer for each compound within. So:
Schumacher green =
Schumacher yellow =
Schumacher Blue
BB Pink =
BB Green =
BB Blue =

So we'd have 6 different values. But with a single acceptable tolerance of a set (sensible) value. This would be accross the mould tho, so a yellow Minipin is equivalent in shore to a yellow minispike (unless this cannot be done due to thickness or shape of the rubber?)

What are you saying? That the shore value cannot be measured? I am not talking about comparing Greens vs Yellows, but Schumacher Greens vs Shumacher Greens. It doesn't matter what the 6 individual values are, as long as each batch of tyres within can be quality checked against the specified shore rating.

This would be very good, as it stops all this shananigans and if a fault is discovered - the buck stops with the vendor. But with this means that this fault may never ever re-occur! :thumbsup: and if this is not possible, then my idea is void from the beginning.

It may be a bit extreme, bit like measuring the bend in bananas.... but it does matter.

Chris

I think the shore rating would be very hard to measure, the rubber is so thin and the spikes are too small to be consistent. Possibly we could get a data sheet from each batch which would actually give a percentage of whatever goes into making the tyre. The vendor must have these other wise they would not know how to make the tyre. If someone then suspects there is a fault then the tyre can be tested to see what it contains, this is the difficult bit, you would need a gas chromatograph, not something that could be done at the track but still very possible to get a result in an hour, from the tip of a spike;)

Like has been said its not just soft or hard tyres its the actual composition that affects its performance.

I think you are underestimating massively the complexity of material testing. You can't measure properties using tyres, you need test samples. This needs to be done within the companies themselves.

When tyres are made, test samples are also made using the same rubber. These compounds are of suitable size to use in material testing machines. A durometer (to measure shore hardness) is just one of many pieces of test apperatus required. The modulus, and also (perhaps surprisingly) the yield and tensile are quite important to in tyre dynamics.

Therefore the proper practice is to mould the testing samples, check their material properties and make sure they are in suitable tolerance with their own defined standards. This is also done at the end, and at any number of intervals that is felt appropriate during the batch. If any are found out of material tolerance, all tyres between that and the previous point should be scraped and the the problem rectified and the process continues.

This is how it should be done, and as you can see there is very little you can do as a consumer. Or anyone else, like shops for that matter. I will admit I've never used a durometer (shore), but when I've tested rubbers and soft polymers it has been using the appropriate version of the Vickers and Rockwell tests. However I'm sure the same limitations apply with the shore hardness, that you will need appropriate test samples and not the final product (tyre). Even things like environmental temperature and humidity can affect the materials, so tests need to be done under control conditions in the factory.

Who knows, the companies might already be doing this, but there could be mix-ups else where, such as in packaging as mentioned previously. Either way self testing tyres is not practical or possible, and would undoubtedly cause more problems then it solves. You wouldn't be able to get data from the companies to compare against either, the material properties define the compound, which is data sensitive to the company. If you were a tyre company, you wouldn't want the competition knowing your compound would you?

Therefore I would suggest people urge the companies to take into account better quality control if they are having problems, rather than self testing/regulation. And by the sounds of things one company is listening at least, with Schumacher developing this new tyre to improve quality. The BRCA is everyone's organisation, and perhaps even the threat of a change in control tyre could be enough to persuade a company to improve their practices.

Jason, I could not agree more. Thanks for saving me the effort of typing a similar response to this thread.

I think that voting with your feet, or at least the potential threat to do so, is the only way of focing change in this sort of debate.

Lets also remember though that mistakes do happen and you should not judge people / companies by their mistakes but by their corrective actions to solve the problem.

Thank you Jason, that is very good information.

Just going slightly off topic here....... but if people knew that there would of been a problem with the BB tyres, ie blue available but no green fronts, would they still of been nominated as one of the control tyres? If the answer is yes then there is no problem but if the answer is no then why are we not using a better alternative?