KDB's Tires Sabotage ?

It could be a bad batch of tires also
Goodyear's Greg Stucker had this to say with about 20 laps left in the race:
"They were pretty much identical [issues]. We see nothing else like that up and down pit road. We have guys with twice as many laps on tires. ... It's not obvious to us that there was any sort of cut or anything else. It didn't look like a tire rub. It didn't have that appearance. It just looked like the tire was getting overworked. We just need to understand what could contribute to that."
 
StandOnIt said:
Busch's crew chief Adam Stevens: "I can tell it wasn't setup and it wasn't air pressure, the two things I'm in control of. Beyond that, I don't know.
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This is exactly what a Championship Crew Chief should say.
 
StandOnIt said:
I wonder what regular air instead of nitrogen would do to a right rear tire
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The problem with regular air is that it always contains a certain amount of moisture, and as the air pressure builds, it builds faster and tends to be more inconsistent tire to tire and set to set depending on the moisture content. I can't see a reason why a team would ever do this on purpose, and it's VERY unlikely to happen by accident. My guess would be ultra low air pressure, possibly combined with some quirk in the chassis setup that worked that tire extra hard, regardless of what Stevens said. I wouldn't expect him to tell the truth any more than any other crew chief would. It's just the nature of the business. Most likely after the second failure, they upped the air pressure and the problem cured itself. I wouldn't be terribly shocked if this is what happened to Johnson in the Clash too.
 
call me crazy but I believe Stevens. It it was a simple matter of pressure he would have fixed that after the first fail. Could be he didn't, but I think he is too good to ignore the first one blowing out if he had low pressure in the tire. Goodyear said they didn't see a tire rub, said the tire was "overworked" That is awful vague. Oh well it might not happen again, but it isn't a normal occurrence at Daytona
 
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StandOnIt said:
call me crazy but I believe Stevens. It it was a simple matter of pressure he would have fixed that after the first fail. Could be he didn't, but I think he is too good to ignore the first one blowing out if he had low pressure in the tire. Goodyear said they didn't see a tire rub, said the tire was "overworked" That is awful vague. Oh well it might not happen again, but it isn't a normal occurrence at Daytona
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Are you suggesting that Goodyear was to blame, and Kyle got screwed? <Entire Forum shuts down awaiting answer>
 
StandOnIt said:
could have been a dumb mistake, there have been teams putting the right sides on the left, it happened last year I believe, dumb mistakes do happen.
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My guess is aggressive left rear shock, probably very little rebound and overworked the tire. No ride heights this year gave them options they havent had in years and I'm sure Stevens was being creative. Thats his job.
 
Spotter22 said:
My guess is aggressive left rear shock, probably very little rebound and overworked the tire. No ride heights this year gave them options they havent had in years and I'm sure Stevens was being creative. Thats his job.
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yeah could be but there is this from Stevens: It's a head scratcher

We didn't change left sides in the clash or in the duel with the same setup and the same air pressure [as the 500]. And now we can't go 20 laps, but yet we didn't change anything after that and ran the rest of the race. So I don't have a darn clue what's going on. We had teammates that were multiple pounds lower on air [pressure] than us, and it was not even a concern at all. ... There were no rubs on the tire. None."
 
StandOnIt said:
yeah could be but there is this from Stevens: It's a head scratcher

We didn't change left sides in the clash or in the duel with the same setup and the same air pressure [as the 500]. And now we can't go 20 laps, but yet we didn't change anything after that and ran the rest of the race. So I don't have a darn clue what's going on. We had teammates that were multiple pounds lower on air [pressure] than us, and it was not even a concern at all. ... There were no rubs on the tire. None."
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He might not be telling the truth. Those guys are pretty good poker players.
 
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I do hope they find something out. I'm no Kyle fan, but nobody deserves a shot at the 500 taken away like that
 
StandOnIt said:
I guess, but he didn't think it would happen again if he did that. I just don't think he would do that.
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I guess what I'm saying is "maybe" he did make changes after the clash and duel ,went more aggressive tying down the left rear. I just find it odd the tire was not cut or punctured so usually you are looking at a heat issue. But he could be telling the truth. :idunno:
 
Spotter22 said:
I guess what I'm saying is "maybe" he did make changes after the clash and duel ,went more aggressive tying down the left rear. I just find it odd the tire was not cut or punctured so usually you are looking at a heat issue. But he could be telling the truth. :idunno:
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speaking of heat, I would think with the back end down those tires weren't getting the air they did with the old style, and they took some of the fans away, that could possibly be one of the factors
 
Here is the first one pretty good up close shot @ 45 sec. Left rear D.W. might have called it? It has the second one at the end of the clip but it doesn't show anything but the wreck
 
StandOnIt said:
Here is the first one pretty good up close shot @ 45 sec. Left rear D.W. might have called it? It has the second one at the end of the clip but it doesn't show anything but the wreck
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Just so hard to tell but that tire was a mess all the way across the face to the side wall. You could tell while they had a tight shot on it.
 
StandOnIt said:
call me crazy but I believe Stevens. It it was a simple matter of pressure he would have fixed that after the first fail.
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Remember that when the first incident happened, all the crew knew was that the tire went down.. They had no idea why it went down, it could have been a puncture or a fender rub or somebody's splitter. You don't put an "outside the box" setup on the car for the race unless you feel pretty good about it working, so the setup on the car is probably NOT the first thing you are going to look at. The car comes into the pits and you have only a few seconds to make any last second air pressure adjustments on the tires before they have to go over the wall. You don't get to stop the race and analyze all the evidence, you make judgement calls on the fly based on what you think and what you think you know. How many times has a crew chief made a "big swing" chassis adjustment to cure an ill handling car, only to find out AFTER the pit stop that a tire was going flat or it was blistering or the tread was coming off? Stevens may not have had ANY inkling of a car problem until the second tire went down, and even then, he's guessing, he doen't KNOW.
 
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Formerjackman said:
You don't put an "outside the box" setup on the car for the race unless you feel pretty good about it working, so the setup on the car is probably NOT the first thing you are going to look at.
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With the new rules, isn't everything outside of the box?
 
Spotter22 said:
My guess is aggressive left rear shock, probably very little rebound and overworked the tire. No ride heights this year gave them options they havent had in years and I'm sure Stevens was being creative. Thats his job.
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What would reducing the rebound on the left rear do? Take the push out of it?
 
Formerjackman said:
Remember that when the first incident happened, all the crew knew was that the tire went down.. They had no idea why it went down, it could have been a puncture or a fender rub or somebody's splitter. You don't put an "outside the box" setup on the car for the race unless you feel pretty good about it working, so the setup on the car is probably NOT the first thing you are going to look at. The car comes into the pits and you have only a few seconds to make any last second air pressure adjustments on the tires before they have to go over the wall. You don't get to stop the race and analyze all the evidence, you make judgement calls on the fly based on what you think and what you think you know. How many times has a crew chief made a "big swing" chassis adjustment to cure an ill handling car, only to find out AFTER the pit stop that a tire was going flat or it was blistering or the tread was coming off? Stevens may not have had ANY inkling of a car problem until the second tire went down, and even then, he's guessing, he doen't KNOW.
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and they have the track bar also. It's a good theory, the tire might not have given Busch any trouble until it went, he's usually pretty good at saving a tire when he heats one up. Going by what Stevens was saying about double stinting the left sides, quite a few did that and didn't have problems, but on the other hand a bunch got 4 at the same time.
 
Revman said:
What would reducing the rebound on the left rear do? Take the push out of it?
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Basically after the shock compresses rebound allows it to return to its normal height but if you dampen it the shock wont rebound which helps keep the spoiler down out of the air and loads the left rear ( along with spring selection). As far as what it does to handling it depends if you you went stiffer or softer.
 
Spotter22 said:
Basically after the shock compresses rebound allows it to return to its normal height but if you dampen it the shock wont rebound which helps keep the spoiler down out of the air and loads the left rear ( along with spring selection). As far as what it does to handling it depends if you you went stiffer or softer.
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Thank you.
 
Spotter22 said:
Basically after the shock compresses rebound allows it to return to its normal height but if you dampen it the shock wont rebound which helps keep the spoiler down out of the air and loads the left rear ( along with spring selection). As far as what it does to handling it depends if you you went stiffer or softer.
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Like Rev said, thanks to all you guys for this good discussion.

I would think excessive rebound damping would cause un-loading of the tire over bumps, and lead to more sliding of the tire in the corners. It is the classic trade-off between suspension compliance (which aids mechanical grip) and keeping a low ride height (which brings aero benefits). In other words, running high rebound damping creates a quasi-rigid left rear suspension, which would tend to skid on bumps in the corners, I would think. And that lateral slippage would tax the tire quite a bit. Am I wrong on this?
 
What got my attention as strange was that Kyle's tire problems were on the left rear. Correct me if I am wrong, but it is usually the right front or the right rear tire that blows when a tire is "overworked". D.W. filled in part of the mystery when he said the same thing happened to Johnson's car in the duals. It is something for me to keep track of at any rate. See if it happens at the buck n a halfs, or is isolated to plate tracks or specifically only happens at Daytona. It could be new to the tail draggers. I'm probably putting everybody to sleep, but I did learn new things with this discussion and something new to keep track of this season. That's the deal for me, some see cars going around and around, some of us like the nuts and bolts of it.
 
It could be a bad set of tires. But, the same driver, multiple tires, multiple races?

"Overworked" is quite simple. Aggressive setup. Running the tires too hard.

Kyle Busch tends to run his cars loose and out of control. If that rear tire is sliding around, it will wear down faster.
 
AndyMarquisLive said:
It could be a bad set of tires. But, the same driver, multiple tires, multiple races?

"Overworked" is quite simple. Aggressive setup. Running the tires too hard.

Kyle Busch tends to run his cars loose and out of control. If that rear tire is sliding around, it will wear down faster.
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no it isn't simple IMO, that is like a title of a book. "Overworked". That explanation probably works for the majority of racing fans..Like saying short tracks are better without explaining why they are. Most didn't notice it was on the left rears instead of the right side where they usually blow out.
 
StandOnIt said:
no it isn't simple IMO, that is like a title of a book. "Overworked". That explanation probably works for the majority of racing fans..Like saying short tracks are better without explaining why they are. Most didn't notice it was on the left rears instead of the right side where they usually blow out.
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"Overworked" is a word that speaks for itself. Again, it could be a number of things, or a combination of things.

Blown tires happen. There have been other instances where a driver has blown multiple tires in a race. It's almost always a setup issue. Most drivers will never admit fault, nor will a crew chief.

This is the second straight year this has happened to Kyle Busch at Daytona when it hasn't happened to any other driver. That tells me the issue is with the 18 team, not Goodyear.

And, yes, it could take a week or more for Goodyear to examine everything and figure out what went wrong. They will quite literally be conducting forensics.
 
When it is just one car it probably isn't the tires. If it isn't the car setup then the driver might have something to do with it. It could be from rubbing another car.
 
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