The goal of the day was to understand the tyre and look at what pressures worked best on this car. The car weighs only 975kg so the tyre is well within the load tolerances during the use.
The overall result was that the tyre behaved very progressively and predictably at all pressures.
We had an ambient temperature of around 20 degrees C with a track surface temperature of 45 degrees C.
Tyre temperatures and pressures were taken at the start of each run with the longest run being 8 laps at race speed.
Overall the tyre was always hotter in the centre (average 5 degrees C) of the tread regardless of what pressures that were being run.
The net result of the test was that the optimum cold starting pressure of the tyres should be between 22-24 psi with a hot running temperature of between 32- 34 psi
No tyre degradation of any sort was experienced and the tyre behaved in a totally predictable manner at all times. The highest pressure that was run hot was 40 psi. At this pressure the car slid but was still very drivable. I believe if the pressures were any more than this the tyre would be over pressured and good lap times would not be possible.
Regards
Azim
Xchallenge Organiser & Race car driver
Submitted on 2007-07-30 23:54:47