I have a kid kart with about 500km on the tires. Should I bother replacing them for this next season. I’m thinking no, but what do I know.
It depends heavily on your kid’s driving and their kart weight. A 150lb kart pulling 1G will never have the tires be the limiting factor.
Look at the data - were they pulling 2G originally and now just 1.5G? Could be the tires, if you can rule the driver out. 90% of the time though, it’s the driver when they are that young.
Run them to the cords. KK is about fun and getting comfortable, not about lap time.
Do you race on a concrete track? We had to scrape the tires with a heat gun because the clag/pickup would make the OD to big.
I wouldn’t worry about changing them. Chain aligned, clean and straight, tire pressures maxed, neutral setup in the front…send it.
I’ve replaced my daughters’ tires most often because I didn’t feel like scraping the clag off, haha. And even then, they were throwaways from a cadet team.
I have found she is more comfortable at the limit at lower tire pressures (less skatey, better bump tolerance), so we don’t run as high as others on the front. The rears are illegal at very high pressure with the SH2 being so soft, so we have to keep an eye on that as well. Either way, KK tire pressures are set against a whole different set of goals than faster classes.
Just don’t use the wear dots as a decision maker. Often they don’t even touch the ground. My son corded a set of tires before I realized it because I kept checking the wear dots thinking they were fine. When I took them off i could literally put my finger through the middle of the tread patch as he had worn it down to nothing.
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