Now that I've been able to get things sorted with the new house and area, I've been trying to re-commit to having at least 1 fun drive in the SLC each week. Lately, I've started to get paranoid about rolling around on the 4 year old Michelin Super Sports that I've had on the car since I completed the build. Like many builders, I sprang for the "best" tires I could at the time of ordering. Add on a few months for the kit to be assembled, a year of sitting in a garage to collect dust, and another year of construction time and I'd already burnt 2.5 years of shelf life away before even rolling the tires under motorized power.
With these Ultra High Performance tires the rubber can be particularly sensitive to how they're treated. I learned a particularly nasty lesson with Michelin's latest UHP, their 4S tires on my Audi. I had to drive to Colorado for work and it meant passing through Utah during a cold spell - temps got down to about 30F overnight. Not realizing how sensitive these tires are to cold temps, I got into my car the next morning and started on my way. At the first nature break I took a walk around the car and to my horror saw several large splits in the sidewall - that's when I learned about cold cracking, and the susceptibility of these tires to that phenomenon. In addition to being sensitive to the cold, they're also sensitive to dry cracking as well.
OK, back to the SLC - the tires on my car have been around for over 4 years now and, while the car never misbehaves and has never once squirmed while driving, I just couldn't shake the thought that these tires were starting to get aged out - everyone remember Paul Walker? Anyway, I decided to bite the bullet and put a fresh set of shoes on the SLC. I wanted to avoid the Michelin 4S tires this time around due to my experience with the Audi - but wouldn't you know it, I've elected to use such an oddball sizing that the only manufacturer that makes high performance tires in my sizes are - yep - Michelin, and it's their Pilot Sport 4S line. Yay.
I'll know not to drive the SLC in sub-freezing temps in the future
They see me rollin' ...
I don't recall where I first heard about this tool, it may have been in another build thread or somewhere else on GT40s - but I recently picked up a set of wheel hangers from
Reverse Logic and I'm totally jazzed with this tool. Everyone who's got an SLC should have a set of these if you put off suspension work because you hate the thought of having to remove your wheels. Full transparency - I'm not getting any kickbacks for pimping this tool, I just think they're so damn awesome.
These are female threaded studs that you install onto your wheel studs. You can then simply slide your wheels off and let the hangers take the weight.
I got the 200mm length set; our rear tires are so damn wide, the longer the better! Here's a pic with the wheel pulled away from the hub - so effortless! Obviously you need to take over before the tires have fully cleared, but this gets you most of the way there.
And here's why I'm totally loving this tool - note how close my tires are as I pull them away from the hub; recall that I've re-shaped the lower edge of my bodywork to gain clearance here AND I'm running undersized tires. There's not much margin between whacking bodywork, contacting the rotor, or taking our your nicely powder coated brake calipers. This tool makes it MUCH easier to maneuver the wheel coming off and going back on.
And here's what they look like once the wheel's been removed - the studs are just wee little lads in comparison. Note that I'm currently running the stock studs, those who've upgraded and gone with extended studs may not have the same difficulties I've had playing Operation with my wheels.
More words, more pics, same radio station!
79. Sacre bleu mes pneu sont caca
