High Performance Tires

The fastest, easiest way to instantly improve the performance of your slot cars!  You can make virtually any car competitive with any other car in its class by simply replacing the slot car's tires and wheels.  For the fastest performance, you want the lowest friction front tires (original rubber tires are fine) and high performance slot car tires with the most traction in the rear.  As with real tires, the softer compounds give better grip than harder tires.  Aftermarket, High Performance Slot Car Tires come in two types of compounds: silicone or urethane.

SILICONE TIRES - Silicone slot car tires and wheels offer exceptional grip on clean track surfaces, leave no residue on your track, and have consistent dimensions and characteristics such as diameter, width and roundness.  Silicone tires fit right on to the majority of aluminum and/or stock wheels without having to worry much about how it fits on the rim.  Unlike Urethane, Silicone high performance slot car tires do not require truing unless you are in an ultra-competitive environment. 

URETHANE TIRES - Slot car tires and wheels made from urethane possess incredible stretching properties. Urethane tires are typically more forgiving than silicone on normal track surfaces that are not "super clean", but can be somewhat less grippy on a clean surface.  For best performance, be sure to sand your tires "true" and "profile" (round off) the inside and outside edges of the tire - this will result in smoother, more consistent cornering/handling.

When choosing high performance slot car tires, you will need to know the *size that you require. You may be able to measure the diameter and width using a ruler, but callipers will make the measurement easier and more accurate. Also note that the ridge of the hub that holds the tires can be different sizes, so not all tires will fit all hubs, even if the outside dimensions are correct.

*Differnt profiles allow for minimum air gap under the car chassis.

Please note:  Rubber tires put down a thin layer of rubber on your track so that as a track is raced, its performance improves.  Silicone tires are known to pick up material from tracks and may clean off this rubber coating. For this reason, it is not recommended to run Silicone and Rubber rear tires together.  Urethanes do not do this, however, allowing you to use them interchangeably with rubber tire shod cars.