Okay....so in the next step of my education with these little wonders called slot cars.......

I just received my first shipment of silicone tires to upgrade a few cars in my stable. They're made by AJ's. I'm a little disappointed and surprised that they aren't trimmed as neatly as they could be. There is extra material that remains around one outer edge that wasn't removed after the manufacturing process.

I've tried searching for prior posts that address this issue, but with no luck. What is the best way to remove the extra material? I was thinking some patience, a keen eye, steady hand and a sharp hobby knife on a cutting board. But just in case there are better ideas out there........

It would be easier and cleaner for you to just fire up your car with a battery or on your track, lift the rear end and lightly run the moving tires over a sanding stick.

Chuck an old wheel/axle into a dremel, then press the tire on as squarely as possible, spin it up and trim with an Exacto knife. We do it all the time. One note with AJ's, sometimes when you break the surface (skin), they become prone to tearing. I have a pair of G/Tyco width AJ's that i cut down for AFX rims, been finishing top 3 with them pretty regularly for almost a year and they are just now starting to feel "old".

(edit): Whether sanding or cutting, you will notice that AJ's tend to have lots of air bubbles in the mix, in fact some AJ's look downright horrible after sanding. It's when there is any bubbles at the edge that you will soon see a split.

"been finishing top 3 with them pretty regularly for almost a year"

You don't have to brag!:)

Try a set of "DRAG Trac" silicone covered sponge,factory look,future traction!!!
DRAGjet
859-356-1566

Sigh......okay, here's the latest.

I start out on Saturday giving the track a good cleaning. I started with a swiffer cloth. Then I wiped it down with a towel moistened with Fantastick, followed by a clean, dry cloth. Then I trim up the old AJs. I ran a few laps with the OEM rubber installed to see how much of a difference these make. Then I ran some laps with the AJs. At first, the car seemed to grip better. But that didn't last long. After about a dozen laps, it seemed no better than the rubber. After about another dozen, the car is just plain sloppy. The car ultimately handled far worse than when it still had the original OEM rubber.

After what seemed like the umpteenth de-slot, I look at the tires and the amount of crud these things picked up was beyond belief. The dirt make them slick to the touch, unlike when I first started.

So, I start over.....cleaned the tires with Fantastick. Cleaned the track again. Not much coming up off the track. Ran a few more laps with everything dried off and within a half dozen laps, I was totally disgusted.

These things appear to be good for nothing more than finding all the dirt that a towel and cleaner can't even get to.

For what it matters, the car is a brand new Life Like M chassis. I realize that because of the location of the magnets it doesn't have the greatest reputation for sticking to the track. I'm just a bit surprised, and even more disappointed, with how little upgrading the tires helped it.

With silicone tires it often helps to scuff the shine off the tires to make them less of a dust magnet. You'll give up a bit of grip but the grip you have will last longer. I scuff silicone tires with a dry scotch brite pad, those ubiquitous green scrubbies that you'll find in most kitchens. You can scuff the tires when they are mounted on the car by holding the rear end up off the track and apply just enough pressure with the pad to 1) not bog the car, and 2) take some of the shine off the tires. I also clean silicone tires (and my track) with isopropyl alcohol, nothing else, and nothing with water in it.

Give it a try on one set and see how it works out.

One of the local leagues here runs the AJs Black Cat tires and in the 10 seasons or so that I've competed I don't think I've had two tires that were the same. Difference in manufacturing tolerances are one thing but these are pretty sad sometimes.

Some of the compounds vary from stiff to mushy, and the flash on the edges of the tires can be enormous. Add to that the occasional delamination of the outer layer of 'tread' (like a blistered tire on a 1:1 racer) and you really don't know what you're in for.

It's fine for their spec Indy car league, I guess, and when we ran them in our sports car league we just kept the ones that 'felt better' after running them. We have now switched to the Wizzard PVT-01 slip ons and I ran one set all year and was very consistent.

I agree with martybauer that running the flashing off the inside edge on a nail file would be quick & easy, however, and at least get rid of that headache. :p

Agreed. Gotta scuff!

I got a little dumdum thing I made from Fleabay flotsam.

It's an old MM feeder that isnt warped like a lasagna noodle. On one end I've got two strips of sticky back 220 sandpaper running parallel on the outside of the rails. Easy enough to change as required. I use this end for a finish true on tires I've cut or ground.

The other end has the green "scotchy" as mentioned above for general scuffing/cleaning.

Power from a old copper colored tranny is controlled by an old T-jet "wheel troller" so ya can use two hands to position the car level and straight in the bleach box. It also lessens the chance of over reving/distorting and lumping the softer compound silicone tires. Two hands also helps avoid bogging the car as AFX Too mentioned. Always use a light touch.

I now might have to mount a little wick or sponge that can be moistened with IPA to my bleach box. Great tip!

Great info, guys!
Bill, how about a pic of your nifty tyre-fryer? :thumbsup:

If ya promise not to laugh. :p

This rig works great. Pull a car out of the case, oil it up, and skim the tires across the scrubbee pad. Only takes a second.

The sand paper on the truing side lasts a good while. Even with regular usage I only change the paper a coupla times a year.

Not sure how I'm gonna add the IPA sponge to my "tire center" yet. But I gotta have it! :thumbsup:

Some really good thoughts. Thanks, guys.

I'm not generally one to suggest you throw money at the problem, but I am certainly one to often suggest the following: get some SuperTires (http://www.supertires.com/). They're very inexpensive, last forever and grip better than anything short of a sili-foam tire that costs 10 times as much. We've been racing on them for years...they actually get better and better the more worn they get. I'd give (and do) you a new set before letting go of an "old" used pair.

I'll want to give Supertires a try but if I order black and they send pink I'm gonna hurt somebody.

Per website: "Please note, if a color is temporarily out of stock, another color (at our discretion) will be substituted in your order"

I had something like that happen to me when I ordered a hopped up LL-T chassis from a race shop on the left coast. He advertised it on the bay as coming with 2 extra sets of tires. When I received my shipment, the extra tires were missing. I wrote him and he made good, sort of. The tires were pink.

At a later date, I ordered a few more chassis and same thing happened, except this time I never wrote back to get the additional tires. I figured he was only going to send me pink again for complaining.

Even my wife, who's known to have a controller in her hand on occassion, has said that she wouldn't ever be caught running a car with pink tires.

I have a couple pairs of pink silicone tires and they work pretty well. And since they do, that's enough for me.

How sweet.

I've not seen anyone touch upon this aspect of this discussion so here goes. I bought 4 sets of AJ's from the A category, as they call them, this is supposed to fit the old magna/non-magnatraction cars. They fit but more often than not the cars are literally dragging on the track. Inner diameter is .250 and outer diameter is .415. From what I can discern I believe I need a tire that has a larger OD somewhere in the neighborhood of .425-.435 or somewhere along those lines.

If someone has any thoughts on this I'd love to hear it. Are my chassis' kinda whacked out or something?

Another thing as well I need to replace alot of my tires but I'm not about spend a ton of money for all of my cars. I don't have that kind of capital to spend on tires. Does someone know of a place that sells a whole mess of these at a decent rate? I'm hoping for silicone here.

Thoughts?

I believe you ordered the wrong size. For AFX cars you want to get the o.d. of .474. That is I believe the standard size. Dave.

We've found after much testing that .435 - .440 mounted is pretty sweet. :dude:

Thanks for your quick replies gents.

From what I could discern I knew I had to be really close but I wasn't sure the exact number. From the way I think about it if the car is being basically drug along on the track then the tire size has to be really close. I'm sure that .474 works like a champ but for racing purposes you want that chassis so close that it's almost touching but, obviously, not quite if you can manage it.

Now the next question is: where do you get such tires?

Tom Heister's site is a good source for tires and parts. Dave.

Here's some tires I see on e-bay:

http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=360007720261

I never tried them, but they look good, and at a decent price.

I haven't had any luck with the Jel Claws. Maybe I just haven't found the right setup, but they go away in 2 laps or less for me. :confused:

I've been playing around with the Jel Claws too. I've not found any performance advantage over the slip-on sils I've been using so far, at least on t-jets and AFX magnatactions. Still playin' around with them though

REH Distributors ( Cincinnati) are the "new" AJs, definitely "NOT" the AJs of old of Indianapolis that we all knew and loved. I found that they do not make nearly the quality of product that the old original AJs / TwinnK did. Business as usual. $$$$$

Chuck an old wheel/axle into a dremel, then press the tire on as squarely as possible, spin it up and trim with an Exacto knife. We do it all the time. One note with AJ's, sometimes when you break the surface (skin), they become prone to tearing. I have a pair of G/Tyco width AJ's that i cut down for AFX rims, been finishing top 3 with them pretty regularly for almost a year and they are just now starting to feel "old".

(edit): Whether sanding or cutting, you will notice that AJ's tend to have lots of air bubbles in the mix, in fact some AJ's look downright horrible after sanding. It's when there is any bubbles at the edge that you will soon see a split.

Here is what I do to make a true Tire

Before even placing the slip-on you must first have a true axle and rim.

I made a tool to checking the axle, first get the axle size and drill a hole just about .003 larger in a block of steel or wood. Make sure that it is about the same length as an axle. Then, let the axle fall through the hole, you might need to adjust the size of the hole. If the axle completely fall through then you have a straight axle. A bent axle will stop short.

Take a true axle, using a dremel place each hud on the end. Using an emery board ( dull side) LIGHTLY place the end on the hub at speed. If the hud is un-true the emery board will bounce up and down. ALSO!! listen to the hummm of the Dremel - a true hub will make a higher pitch. After you have found a true wheel, do the same step on the rim, the flange will cause the rim to be out of balanced. Of the hundreds of hubs I have checked - maybe 10% are true - however you will see the difference on the track!!!!! This will be time well spent.

Next see above.

Thanks

Voxxer