Simple question, but just curious what others are doing.

ET Streets, anyone running rim screws and no tubes. I had run no screws and no tubes, but had to plug a tire so ran a tube and put screws in it. I will screw both rims now. The question is to run tubes or tubeless. The plan is tubeless. With the new BB I want to run screws regardless. Car should run in the 10's.

I run tubeless, I tried the tubeless/screw deal, all that did was cause my tires to lose air in the garage and between rounds. Tubes make me nervous. I've had slicks,drag radials move as much as 6" on the rim,over a period of time, but never in 4 yrs or so have I had a bead break. I currently run the Hoosier radial slicks 30x9x15 tubeless,no screws and they moved an inch or so at first but are staying in place now,I even cut a tire early this year, took it to a local tire place and had it vulcanized and mounted it back up tubeless and wore it out, I'm not running 10's yet, but there's plenty of power back there to move 2 tons into the low 11's to date ;)

Thanks Bob,
That was another question. The one rim is already screwed, so I take it that will/can cause it to loose air? A few pounds a week is ok. A pound or two in an evening is not. If that is true I'll have to run tubes. I'm not exactly sure where on the bead sealing happens and if the screws contribute to that.

I run tubes and screws (inside of wheel only) on my ET Streets. Big tire Camaro that runs 9s. I don't run my Streets at the track all that often though. I may be overly conservative but the tires are tubeless and I'm not messing with it. I'm curious why you wouldn't just run them?

I only tried it once, they leaked and I never screwed a set of tires again, you don't have much choice on where to put the screws on draglites, I've talked to guys that run tubeless with screws and they don't leak, but as much air checking as you see in the staging lanes, there has to be several with leaks. I trailer my car to the track, set the air pressure on the trailer before I back it off and don't touch my tires again the rest of the night. Last time out, after time runs I had 3 1.57 60ft times in a row. I'm a set it and forget it guy at the track, I don't like tinkering on race day, too many halter/tank tops and short shorts to concentrate on :D

I run my ET Drags tubeless with no screws. No issues.


JIM

Doug,
I must be old fashioned. Tubeless actually makes me nervous on a drag car. The entire 15 years I ran my Camaro I used tubes and screws and never had a problem. 3300 documented low 11, high 10 second passes. Rarely had to do anything with air pressure once at the track. Its been a few years since I sold the car, and I know technology has changed, but if I went back tommorrow, I would feel a lot better with tubes.
Just my opinion,

Tubeless vs. screws and tubes is another one of those great debates for which you can find many people on either side of the aisle.

I run tubes and 8 screws per side (16 per wheel) on my El Camino, I run tubeless on my Corvette.

Running tubeless is pretty good in most cases, a little less rotating mass etc.

I think that the car weight vs, tire pressure should have a lot of influence on which way to run.

Here is the deal: I know of a couple of totalled out drag cars that ran fairly low pressure without tubes or screws. The big "oopsie" was when these cars got out of shape on the top end of the track. With a tubless slick if you get sideways enough at speed with little pressure in the slicks the bead can move and "burp" air out. Generally speaking, getting a bit sideways at speed and then losing tire pressue is a pretty tough act to recover from.

If you are running say ~ 14 psi or more than it probably isn't an issue, but at ~ 12 psi or lower I believe in screws.

Thomas