Gas city's tires all day. They are not that big they're anchored down cables so they dont usually fly out onto the race track and keep ya out but you can still clip one or run over it if you have to in a pinch (no pun intended) huge tractor tires cost to much when ya hit one and berms dont keep anyone from trying to cut the corner. Tracks are not constant with the dont drive on it rule for them to be considered as an option.

I hate tires. They have cost me a lot of money. Some my fault and some not.I'm wondering if anybody has ever tried a ditch instead of a berm. Not a huge one just about as wide as a rear tire, and about half as deep. Kind of like a drainage ditch.

leaglen

I was thinking maybe something on the order of a reverse curb..I ain't no operator but I would think a grader operator could tilt his blade the other direction and take a deep cut out close to the track and taper off to nothing. Dropping off below the track would upset the car kinda of like running off the shoulder on a 2 lane road, you got to be careful the way you drive back up on the road or track but you can do it and I don't think anybody could figure out how to use it to their advantave and it would get rid of some of them big old puddles of mud found between the turns on many tracks.

You would probably need lime marker lines to give the drivers something to aim at. A big problem with tires is that a driver may decide to diamond a turn> go way deep and wide at entry then cut across the turn in close to the apex and come out low and straight to take advantage of another driver or to find more speed and that way out starting spot on the turn entry makes it hard to judge the placement of that exit tire.

Honest Dad himself

you forgettin' about the water that would be standing in this ditch

What if you had a berm that was like a motor cross woop section? Never have liked tires.

Well Ron, that might keep some out of it, like a moat, just gotta be something better than tires, even little ones are a problem, that berm like they put in at Tulsa works about as good as anything, at least it doesn't jump out at ya, and it don't move, I went to a Nascar race when they were still running in downtown Nashville, boy, has that been a while back, and they had Euclid tires around every light pole there, I don't know which would be worse, the pole or the tire, but they sure worked them over. We used to run a little track in Illinois, that had what looked like they had used gallon milk jugs as forms, and had filled them with cement, then buried all but about 2 in of them in the turns, kinda made a rumble strip with them, worked pretty good, just a real pain in the butt grading the turns. Bob!

Ron

Every Yeng has a Yang I guess. Could you take a 6" gasoline post hole digger and drill 5 or 6 holes down to that sand and gravel under base that every good dirt track has and let it drain off into them things. But then I guess at L'burg they would just hit water.

Honest Dad himself

Kyron, If they overwater enough to fill that ditch without it soaking in, where is that water sitting with a berm built up? We have this problem now and it sits on the racing surface at the apex that never gets rolled in, splashes up on the hard slick surface usually because of traffic and makes for a dangerous couple of laps. If you find the collection point of the trench cut another so it drains to the infield. Not much volume needed to move unless a real mistake or rain which probably made an un-raceable surface anyway. Well I have a couple of converts, now to talk to the grader operator.

Exhibit 1:

Turn two at Bloomington Speedway

They have blow molded plastic everything now. Gas tanks, fuel jugs, they even make blow molded highway barricades. Mini Indy even had blow molded plastic barriers designed for their outside wall. Wonder if someone could make rumble strips out of yellow plastic about 4 feet wide and 10 feet long and 3 feet deep that could be filled with sand and burried in the turns, then the grader operator could work up right to the rumble strips.

Honest Dad himself