Hand siping tires with an Ideal Tire Groover

[Nobody]

I've added an article about hand siping tires with and ideal tire groover. Let me know if you have any questions.

http://www.snowtrek.org/tire-siping/tire-siping.php

[n16ht5]

Id like to try that on my dirt bike..

[Nobody]

You need those 2moto tracks... I'm not sure a motorcycle tire would hold up with siping... Probably be fine if you did pretty shallow sipes.

[n16ht5]

Yeah I want that 2moto... If money grew on trees...

[jam session]

Digging up info on siping as it is almost time for snow wheeling again. Thanks for putting up this article and video, very helpful and convinced me to do my own. I am running 35in MTRKs on a jeep rubicon. Do you ever add sipes at an angle or even in the direction of rotation? I am thinking this would add traction for off camber situations. I got this idea from the pattern on GY Duratracks http://www.goodyear.com/en-US/tires/wra ... 1502700000 that have a great snow reputation. Note that about half the center blocks have sipes that are nearly in the direction of rotation.

[Nobody]

Digging up info on siping as it is almost time for snow wheeling again. Thanks for putting up this article and video, very helpful and convinced me to do my own. I am running 35in MTRKs on a jeep rubicon. Do you ever add sipes at an angle or even in the direction of rotation? I am thinking this would add traction for off camber situations. I got this idea from the pattern on GY Duratracks http://www.goodyear.com/en-US/tires/wra ... 1502700000 that have a great snow reputation. Note that about half the center blocks have sipes that are nearly in the direction of rotation.

I have experimented with the siping angle a little bit. In fact, on one of my front tires, I have the center lugs siped at the same angle as the tread blocks. What I've seemed to notice is the sipes aren't really opening up like they do when cut perpendicular to the direction of travel. To me, this means the angled sipes aren't really being used to their full potential.

On the subject of sidehilling, generally, you don't really drive sideways across the slope. Typically, you'll turn your wheels into the slope, and in short order the rear slides downhill and you end up crab walking. I think this position is both unavoidable, and a more stable and safe position. With that in mind, I think the siping is going to be most effective when perpendicular to the rotation of the tire. I think it's safe to assume whichever way you point the front tires is the direction you wish to go, so you want to maximize those sipes for the direction of travel. In the crab walking position, the rear tires are going to be pointed slightly uphill, which is the direction you want to go, so again you want to maximize those sipes.

In order to get the benefit of siping, you need a lot of it. So sure, maybe if you siped the whole tire with parallel sipes, you might get some decent lateral traction out of it. But at what cost to forward traction, acceleration, and braking? Where do you spend most of your time?

Also consider that transferring power from your engine to the ground can only be done via the rotation of your tires. If you want to maximize that transfer of power, it makes since that the sipes should be perpendicular.

One of the other benefits of siping is that it helps make the tire more flexible. I think this is the purpose of much of the factory siping we find on mud terrain tires.

Please keep in mind, this is just my opinion, and me thinking out loud. I'm no engineer, so it's quite possible to I'm dead wrong I keep an open mind, and welcome differing opinions!

[Nobody]

On the Goodyear Duratrac you linked above, it looks like some decent factory siping! I can't imagine those few parallel sipes are really helping or hurting.

[jam session]

You make some good points, thanks for your feedback. I was thinking the benefit might be for on road where you don't want to get in the crabbing position. In other words to prevent a slide. In most snow conditions this is not an issue but we had that one day last Jan with freezing rain on top of snow which made things really slick and I needed both lockers just to get up my driveway. I think you may be right that the benefit may be very small and traction and braking are more important ....I am an engineer, but in this case experience is more important . I've run several sets of tires siped by Schwab or Discount on road but this is my first jeep with mud tires. Just ordered my ideal knife today, cause I think we'll have enough snow for a run in the next week or two.

[Nobody]

I know just the situation you're talking about. I think the best defense in that situation is low air pressure.... get as much rubber on the ice as possible. The problem with lateral traction is it's great until it's not. Then you're going for a ride! Just the rotation of tire alone really works against any lateral traction anyway.

We usually get a pretty good snow run in the 2nd to 3rd week of November. Won't be long now. I need to get the top back on my bronco and fix my brake line and button up a few things. The snow might be early this year!

[jam session]

I'm sure airing down would have helped but I was on my way to the freeway to go to work so didn't want to bother if I didn't have to. I have new beadlocks this year so can't wait to try some really low pressures in the snow.

I think we're on the same schedule. My son is coming up Sunday to help me put the hardtop back on the jeep. Then some routine maintenance and the siping and I'm ready for winter. Gonna try to get an early snowshoe run on Tonga ridge if the conditions and timing work out. Would like to have at least 2 ft of snow but it looks like that could happen in the next week if the forecast is correct.

[Nobody]

[jam session]

Interesting video. Would have made a better point if he had used a force gage instead of a rubber band. However it's a moot point to me, I frequently ski at Steven's pass and have run siped tires on road in snow for many years after a friend convinced me to try them. It definitely helps. I have been investigating factory patterns for siping cause one of the advantages of doing your own is that you can customize. I'm finding quite a few tires with siping at angles such as

Blizzak-dedicated snow tire


Super Swamper SSR all sipes are angled


Super Swamper Trxus...note the only angle sipes are on the outer lugs


General Altimax Artic another dedicated snow tire


Goodyear MTRK which is what I am planning to sipe. I am thinking of siping parallel to tread blocks on the outer lugs and perp to direction of travel in the center somewhat like the General above. Any comments or suggestions?

[Nobody]

I really think having the sipes at any sort of angle will have have very little benefit. They would only be "fully enguaged" while cornering or sidehilling. I think it's safe to say you spend most of your time going straight, accelerating, and braking. That might be a different story if you were trying to optimize your lateral traction while cornering.

Without having the tire and siping tool in hand, it's difficult to know how many passes each tread block can take. I'd try to avoid having very small blocks of rubber.

I hacked together the image below real quick...sorry I'm no photoshop expert. Anyway, I think I'd probably roll with the blue. That's what you get if you had the siping done on a machine. Although you by doing it by hand, you'll have much better control over the sipe placement. I think you'd be in good shape if you only siped blocks 1,2,4. You can always experiment with 3 or 4 lugs of tread block 3 on one tire. Just space them out around the tire and see how they look after putting some miles on them. Whatever you do, I think it will be a big improvement.

[jam session]

Awesome! How did you create that image? Green is pretty close to what I had in mind. Thanks so much for your feedback!

[Nobody]

I used the line tool. That's about the extent of my artistic ability.

[jam session]

My ideal tire groover was just delivered today. Will start siping next week!

[Nobody]

Excellent! I look forward to hearing some feedback.

[jam session]

Just finished today. Siped 5 including a 5 tire rotation. That was a lot of work, not hard but time consuming. I really liked being able to put the sipes where I wanted them and avoided the edge of the outer lugs and generally kept the sipes inside the lugs. I did the green pattern on lugs 1,2 and 4 and the blue pattern on 3. Can't wait for snow now to try them out. Did drive a bit on the road tonight and didn't notice any significant difference, though the sipes haven't opened up much yet. I went through 4 of the cutting blades. At some point one of the blades bends and keeps rebending after you straighten it. Is that normal or a technique problem?

oh, and I did find a nail in one of the lugs on my left front. It was bent so didn't hurt anything and I just pulled it out and kept siping. Guess that Kevlar works!

[Nobody]

I siped probaby a dozen tires on one blade. Was it just a problem with the blades bending? It will take awhile for the sipes to open up, but they are working now. Did you experience much tire spin on wet pavement before? Got a pic?

[jam session]

Yeah, the problem was just the blade bending, but once bent I couldn't keep it straight and just put in a new blade. I don't think you could see much in a pic right now but will take some after the sipes open up a bit. On edit, no did not have tire spin on pavement before, but with 35s, stock 4.10 gears and the JK 3.8 that's not saying much