So I have been running Firestone Firehawk SS20s for nearly 4 years now. 275/60/15 on the rear mounted on 8 1/2" rims. Always seemed to think they did pretty good. Good looks, good traction, nice handling. Never could do a full burn out on them, even with 3.73 gears. Didn't seem to be for lack of power, the car just honestly accellerated so fast that it would catch up with the tires about early to mid 2nd. Best 60' time on them was a 1.90 with quite a bit of tread. They were finally getting worn and there was very little tread left. I watched my 60' times climb up to 2.20 but I was still getting good acceleraton on asphalt burn outs.
I recently bought a set of wheels from a member of this board and he had a set of hardly worn BFGoodrich T/A Radials 295/50/15 on 10 inch rims. Mind you the 50s are about 1 1/2 inches shorter than the 60 series Firestones. Still, with the extra width I was expecting a noticible improvement in traction.
WRONG!!! Much to my surprise these BFGs get WAY less traction than the near bald Firestone Firehawks did. I noticed the loss of traction instantly! Comming out of the neighborhood I got on the gas a bit like I often do and the back end quickly let go and gave a bit of a fishtail. I proceeded to my usual "tuning" location, an industrial road with only one access and little to no traffic after hours, to do a "proper"
traction test on the tires. From a dead stop I hit full throttle... I wrapped through first gear much faster than usual... shifted into second and was quite surprised at how fast the RPMs continued to climb... and climb... and climb... OK, time to shift again... I hit 3rd and the RPMs continue to climb... 3500-4000-4500-5000... JEEZ, WTF!!! looked at the Speedo, yup over 100 mph... 5500 rpms, time to let off! Let the tires grab and I was only going about 40 mph or so.
I can understand the 1 1/2 inch difference in tire diameter making a bit of a diference in the tire to asphalt ratio vs. the Firestones, but damn!!! The Firestones were almost bald and nearly an inch and a half more narrow on the contact patch!!! Could the Firestones simply be that much better of a tire?
I'm hoping to hit the strip again next Friday to see what kind of 60' times I get now, but the way it's acting right now, I'm going to have to get reaquainted with my launch all over again.
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Ja Whitfield
