Why do your everyday consumer vehicles have tires with tread, but Formula 1 tires are smooth?
In: 23
The tread is for rain, ice, and snow which we need on the road because it could rain. Formula 1 also has treaded tires for rainy conditions. But when it’s dry they use smooth tires because there’s a bigger contact patch which then offers more grip. You could have smooth tires on your car as well but If you use the smooth tires on the rain, they would hydroplane. We keep the treaded tires on our car most for the convenience but also because they will still last for thousands of miles, even in dry conditions. F1 rain tires on a dry track get destroyed quickly and only last for about 10 miles.
https://content.presspage.com/uploads/2363/1920_visualsprintquali-en-2.jpg?10000
Formula 1 cars drive on dry pavement. Your car drives in the rain, snow, hot, cold, and maybe even dirt. Also race cars produce a lot down force and the smooth tire gives the car the most amount of traction.
Everyday tires are designed to last a long time (usually at least 30K km) and deal with a variety of road and weather conditions reasonably well and accommodate an average driver. The treads are designed to get rid of water for the most part so the tires can work in wet conditions. Road tires don’t need to deal with super high speed corners and cars being driven at the limit.
Formula 1 slick tires are designed to last 300km (at most) and run on a well prepared asphalt surface in dry conditions only. These tires need to be warmed up to work properly and don’t work at all in the wet. Slick tires can really be used by good drivers who know how to use them and their grip potential and would be rather dangerous for the average driver.
F1 rain tires have tread. The primary purpose of tread is to give water somewhere to go. If it doesn’t have anywhere to go, it wedges between the tire and the surface. This is called hydroplaning and is pretty close to driving on ice, there’s no grip.
Most consumer tires also have tread patterns that can handle snow better. More and deaper void area means more grip in snow (up to a point). Some tires also have small slits or “sipes” to help on ice.
It’s ELI5!!
When a smooth tire goes over a very thin layer of water, that water acts just like a banana peel under your shoe, and you slip.
When a grooved/treaded tire goes over a layer of water, the raised parts of the tire act like spikes on your shoe that poke through the banana peel, so you don’t slip.
But you can’t run as fast in shoes that have big spikes, so if the road is free of banana peels, no spikes are needed.
Last weekend at the F1 imola Grand Prix it was drizzling a bit for part of qualifying. 5 red flags from cars that spun off and weren’t able to recover. So like 25% of the best drivers in the world will crash into a wall if it’s drizzling, because even the intermediate tires (they have some tread), have nothing compared to normal consumer tires.
Tire treads exist to help clear away rain and snow. Road tires have them to make the cars safer to drive.
F1 and other racing series use smooth or *slick tires* because it increases the amount of rubber and therefore grip to the road. This makes the cars go faster and brake harder.
However their tires don’t last, they have the consistency of hot chewing gum to help with grip which causes them to deteriorate very fast. Good for racing, bad for road cars. When they talk about hard compound tires in F1, these are still far softer rubber than you would find on a roadcar.
F1 cars do have access to tires with treads called Wet or Intermediate tires that are meant for wet weather.
F1 tires are slicks which are made solely for grip where treaded tires “remove” the debris that causes “no grip.”
Because your tires need to work in about 100 different weather and terrain conditions. F1 tires don’t. Tires with no tread offer far more grip on dry, paved surfaces. Just think about it. Cutting tread into tire is *removing* material which **lowers** the contact patch with the ground. This is bad for grip. You have less tire making contact with the road.
But if it even starts to *drizzle* then those tires become basically un-driveable. With no tread on the tire, the tire has no way to push water out from underneath. It basically just floats or ‘skips’ on top of the water and you lose control.
Also, some F1 tires *do* have tread on them. When it starts raining, [they switch to these.](https://thumbs.dreamstime.com/b/pirelli-f-race-tyres-formula-one-oz-wheels-stands-paddock-lightly-grooved-intermediate-wet-tyre-65482648.jpg)
To direct water out from under your tires. Even F1 cars have specific tires for the wet that have tread.
Latest Answers