mickey thompson DR

[Dave Vince]

Drag Radials

Was at the US Street Nationals in Bradenton Fl. last weekend, and all the fast guys were running Mickey Thompsons in the Radial class. One car ran 7.50s, in the 1/4, amazing. Many cars doing wild wheelies on these tires. I have a 95Z with the stock junk rear, a support cover, and 3.23 gears. I have run the MT radials without any crunched rear so far. I ran 84 mph in the 1/8th so it is making some power, stock was 79mph. I have the stock converter so it is a dog off the line, 2.18 60', even with the MT tires. Had a match race set up for Saturday in Lakeland, Fla. However the sky opened up and dumped enough water to drown a fish here, 12" of rain in some spots. So I imagine the track is under water. Put the cover brace on the rear it should help. From my many years of drag racing it is usually the case or retaining straps that break before the gears. If the gears do break it usually is caused by case deflection. I have broken gears in a Mark Williams 9" aftermarket case, but that car had a 632 on Nitrous. Good luck, let us know what happens.

[Joe 1320]

I'm curous abou the new MT Sportsman. They have that water shedding agressive tread and come in some monsterous sizes. Matching front runners too.

[fastTa]

I'm curous abou the new MT Sportsman. They have that water shedding agressive tread and come in some monsterous sizes. Matching front runners too.

The Sportsman's have been around for a long time but the Sportsman S/R is fairly new I guess. It really is just a variation of the regular Sportsman's with the "flame" type tread pattern. The compound is not very sticky. A buddy of mine up the street has the S/R's on his '41 Willys. They are the 31 x 18.50's. He's only getting about 460 to the tire and he easily blazes them up in 1st and 2nd gear.

The Sportsman Pro's and the I series are the stickier Sportsmans.

[BANSHEE001]

drag radials

Well if you plan to run the mickey's on the street thier ok enless it rains. Going from 1 to 2nd with a 3000 stall with normal driving sent me sideways. the tires were almost new. The mickey's were the best on the track for me. Nitto- great in the rain ok on the track. BFGs short life on the street the tread wore down real fast . They were also ok in track and street. My rear 373gears were taken out not by the tire I ran but by the way I took off. On launch my tires spun about 300 feet down the track. It wasn't a full loss of traction. Just enough that when it caught full traction the rear flexed seperating the ring and pinion. Causing the pinion to take out ten teeth in the ring gear. In my opinion the 7.5 is the weak link to the car. Back in the old muscle car days real gm muscle cars came with real rear ends like 12 bolts. Then feul cost and cutting cost gave us a family cars rear end. That's only my opinion. Others may be happy with it.