Hoosier vs Dunlop Vintage Tire

[csingletary01]

this is my first season of vintage racing so I am not real familiar with the performance of the threaded vintage style tires we are required to race on. CVAR will start requiring rhe tires at our TWS Sept event. Has anyone done any back to back comparision between the Hoosiers and Dunlops? Any opinions as to the performance differences? There never seems to be any shortage of opinions here, Thanks to all ahead of time

[brian]

I haven't done any testing myself but the real impact will be felt in the wallet. The Dunlops are obscenely expensive. Sizes are an issue as well.

[csingletary01]

The Dunlops are about $30 per tire more, they both are 60% more than any of the current slicks. There are only 2 sizes that are Vintage legal from what I understand as most vintage groups and Monoposto require a 24" or taller rear tire.

[ajax]

Chuck,
I think I'm safe to say that with in CVAR group, I'm the only one who has been consistently running the newer Hoosier and has had prior experience with Dunlop. However I have never done a side by side tire test, or even a good trouble free test day, so all statements are from seat of the pants only! First of all as a driver just starting out on treaded tires, and with no preconceived opinion, you will do fine on either set. From my experience the Hoosiers have proven very durable (even for my driving style) so given their cost advantage these two points make them very attractive. However on the negative side, they did not prove to give me that unfair advantage we all are looking for! The Hoosier have a stiffer side wall, and seem to on turn in take a hair longer to set which if you are used to the Dunlop, takes some getting used to! Also this same side wall issue seems to show up with more sliding around on the first hot lap when tires are cold, then with those drivers on the Dunlop tire experience. Once they come in, they seem as fast, but any time or positions lost are getting tougher and tougher to make up with the group running CVAR these days! To off set both of these issues, I have been lowering tire pressures more and more with continued positive affect on both turn in and first lap stick. The only draw back has been the steering load increase I can feel, which makes me wonder if this does not also show up as a general increase in rolling resistance that would affect lap times? Either way, they are aheck of a lot better then trying to race on slicks with their session to session performance drop off. I have run the Hoosiers hard using talls and shorts with no effort to flip around on wheels, Iexpect I will get 2 full seasons on them. With care and flipping the tires around to even wear, I could get a full season on the Dunlops.

[BobShedd]

I will mostly agree with Ajax on the differences. I am running Hoosiers, am on my 3rd season ( 12 or 13 events ) and they seem to have lots of tread left. I'm not sure I like the Hoosiers in the cold ( early spring or fall ) but they sure were working today at Grattan ( low 80 for temp ).
The other comment is if you call Jim @ SR the price diff is more like $50.00 per tire ( about $ 200.00 diff per set ).
For us on a tight budget they seem the way to go.
Bob