Posted from Marc Tyler
Paul Gage tires for Revoslot Grp 2. Mini-review.
I decided to order some Paul Gage urethane tires sized to fit the Revo Group 2 cars. The order came from Slot car corner, both the softer (XPG-1780SM) and harder (PGT-1780SM) tires.
These tires do not come with the interior rib of the stock tires, so I wanted to make sure they were mounted on the rims fairly true to begin with. After slightly roughing up the wheels to provide a “tooth” for the glue, I wiped down both the rims, and the insides of the tires with some isopropyl alcohol. No issues with the solvent reacting with the urethane that I noticed. I then started the tires onto the rims, taking care that the open pour side of the tire was facing the inside. I pushed down on the hub to seat the tire squarely on the rim, and gave them a test spin on the truer (without tightening, to avoid nudging the tire). The hard tires were trickier to get on straight, but it only took a little bit of fettling to get rid of the wobble. Tires successfully dry-fit.
On to gluing.
The method I used was to use a tiny bit of the black C/A on a toothpick and running it in
between tire and rim. Usually took 2 reps of this per side. I glued the backs first to get the tires properly registered on the rims. Waited a half hour, turned over the wheels and repeated the process on the front. Note: I have had experience with Shoo Goo not curing properly against urethane, so I avoided it.
On to truing.
Truing urethane tires is a breeze compared to rubber, the process is a matter of minutes, not hours. The material is much less sensitive to heat, and cuts more easily on my Hudy truer than the stock rubber tires. The Paul Gage tires also do not have that seam down the middle of the tire, and were much less out-of-round than the BRM tires. The Paul Gage urethanes are not softened by lighter fluid, so the usual polishing method will not work, I did get them smoother by wet sanding with Tamiya 1500 and 3000 sanding foam sheets. They never did get that “Just sprayed with armor all look, though.
Performance results. Some surprises
I ran both my Alfa and My Escort at 11 volts on my Spottswood track (yellow lane). Each got to run 60 laps with each of the tire choices. Here is what I got:
Observations
This test was me driving (and all that implies) and on my track. The rally track is a different animal, and this may not reflect these tires behavior there, but I would like to lobby for making them legal for the GRP 2 event coming in spring.
I expected the soft tires to do better, but they were the slowest of the lot, and they wear like old Dunlops! The stock rubber tires are the grippiest, but the harder urethanes feel very controllable to me, and they did get the best time.
Thanks for letting be prattle on about this.
-Datto