If you have ever watched so much as a minute of off-road racing, odds are you have seen BFGoodrich off-road tires in action. Since winning class eight (full-size, rear-drive pickup) at the 1977 Baja 500 on the first all-terrain tire using radial construction, the brand has racked up 80 overall wins on the Mexican peninsula, including 25 overall victories out of the past 28 runnings of the grueling Baja 1000. Needless to say, the brand dominates SCORE’s premier races.
Just as it did nearly 40 years ago, BFG vetted its newest all-terrain tire, the All-Terrain T/A KO2, with a 2013 entry in the 1000. Rather than competing in the premier Trophy Truck class, the tire featured in Baja’s spec buggy class, Baja Challenge, or BC for short. Because it is a spec class, all BC buggies ran on the new tire, so it was guaranteed victory if even a single buggy finished.
Winning wasn’t the point so much as proving that BFG’s newest off-the-shelf tire could take 1000-miles of racing abuse (the 2013 event was actually only about 900 miles). This new tire needs to fill large shoes. The old T/A KO (T/A for Trans Am, an homage to BFG’s TA racing heritage, and KO for key off-road) is popular and proven capable. BFG says the most frequent complaint about the previous tire was durability, so beefing up the KO2′s stamina was a requirement for this fourth-generation All-Terrain. Working truck tires have to endure driving on debris-riddled job sites; chunks of broken concrete and jagged rebar are not friends to sidewalls. According to BFG, 84 percent of all-terrain tire failures are sidewall-related.
BFG claims the KO2 has a 20 percent tougher sidewall and to get there, it developed an entirely new sidewall toughness test (see above). The test basically employs a chunk of steel that digs into the sidewall as a loaded tire is rolled over it. The test is repeated as the steel is indexed up and in, digging deeper into the sidewall until there is a failure.
After lots of testing and plenty of failures, BFG settled on what it calls Coreguard for the KO2. It’s a three-legged stool employing tougher, cut-resistant sidewall rubber borrowed from the Baja T/A KR racer, thicker and extended shoulder rubber, and an advanced deflection design that reduces the chances of snagging hazards in the sidewall.
We sampled the KO2 on some BC buggies and Ford SVT Raptors with Wide Open Excursions, an outfit that rents BC buggies and guides you around Baja’s extreme terrain. We’ve been on a Wide Open tour before. It is a seriously good time, independent of your interest in desert racing.
We’re accustomed to testing tires on tarmac, but not used to Baja’s constantly changing conditions of dirt and rock. Thus, we lack the experience to say whether or not the KO2 has more or less grip than other offerings, but the KO2 imparts the kind of confidence required to run quickly through blind corners with cliffs on the outside.
We didn’t have access to another tire to make our own comparisons, so to get some perspective we polled pro off-roaders Ryan Arciero and Rob MacCachren. These pros say when they’re testing rubber, the biggest impression a new tire can make is in how it bites in a corner. The new “side biter lugs” probably improve this characteristic because they are significantly more pronounced than the lugs on the KO, and the extended shoulder rubber should help. Either way, they say, off-road testing is a far more subjective matter than the more objective approach that we’re familiar with on pavement.
There is data, though, and if BFG’s proves accurate, these tires are a serious upgrade from the KO. BFG claims the KO2 has two times the tread life in gravel and can last 15 percent longer in road use. It also claims 10 and 19 percent better traction in mud and snow, respectively, thanks to tread-block sipes that provide additional gripping edges without sacrificing tread squirm.
Called locking 3-D sipes, these aren’t straight perpendicular cuts in the tread block toward the tire’s center like conventional sipes. Instead, 3-D sipes are wavy cuts that lock a tread block under load. Michelin (BFG’s parent company) uses the same technology in other offerings, including the all-season Defender and X-Ice winter tire.
The All-Terrain’s tread pattern changed very little because the interlocking block is a good and efficient design for on- and off-road conditions. Also, the design is nearly as iconic as the chain-link tread of an L.L. Bean boot.
It was important for BFG to improve in all regards, but the gain on snow is particularly notable. The old KO and the Goodyear Wrangler All-Terrain Adventure were the only two all-terrain truck tires that carried the “snowflake in a mountain” pictogram, which indicates the tire exceeds industry snow-traction requirements. KO loved being able to run one tire all year long. Not all KO sizes had the winter badge, but all KO2s will. We’re going to test the winter traction of the KO2 as soon as possible. If this coming winter is anything like last year’s around here, we’ll have more than enough snow.
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The KO2 goes on sale at the beginning of November in select sizes. Prices vary with size, though the KO2 is about the same cost as a KO. BFG is rolling out the KO2 in three waves throughout the following year and it will eventually completely knock-out the KO.
from Car and Driver Blog http://ift.tt/1sbur5f
via Agya
