Has any manufacture ever made an intermediate style rain tire? Something for just a damp track or very light drizzle? Almost seems like you could take a standard rear size tire and a tire cutter and make something. Just something I’ve thought of.
We’ve always just used worn rain tires for inters.
I think I’ve seen them before but I think the ones I saw were just a novelty and didn’t actually see competition.
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Yeah, probably not necessary but I think would be cool to experiment with a 7.10 rear with some grooves cut it.
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There are some out there, I rember Dunlop having them at one point too. Cut slicks is a mother fun option as mentioned.
Not exactly intermediate, but certain brands are definitely better in drying conditions while others need full wet to not cook. The Vega’s are one of the best full wet tires on the market at the moment (that i know of), but if it starts drying they’re toast. MG and Bridgestone seem to be middle of the road. The Le Cont is not the stickiest rain tire, but you can run them pretty dry with no significant consequence.
That’s some good info. The club o run with has an open rain tire policy.
Continental had some back in the day. We tried them on the road race side. If I remember correctly the diameter of the tire was so drastically different from either our wets or drys that we had to make huge changes to the gearing.
This topic reminds me of a time a buddy was racing.
He was racing KZ on MG whites, and had used them in one of the early heats that had turned dry mid way through and had half stuffed them.
The final then turned wet, so out come the half stuffed wets. Half the field went out on slicks the other on new wets.
Midway through the 20 odd lap final the half stuffed tyres had made him drift back through the field with the guys on wets at the front. The track then dried out and the rest of the usable tread wore out of his tyres completely, making them sort of slicks. He made it all the way back to the podium through all the guys who were on newer wet tyres, being chased by the guys who went out on slicks.
It was a hugely entertaining race.
So I guess the moral of the story is in changing conditions can make any wet tyre do interesting things.
LeCont Purples are pretty comparable to an intermediate wet tire when put against something like MG Whites.