How do YOU like your tires ?

[Greg Myers]

Plastic? Resin? Vinyl? Rubber?

[highway]

Round!!!

I'm sorry, I just couldn't resist!

Seriously though, I like both the rubber tires in some of the Japanese kits and vinyl tires in the American manufactures' as well, I've never really had problems with either style.

[GOTH KUSTOMS]

Plenty of smoke'n, and slightly burnt, top fuel style please, yea I voted, ....

Edited November 6, 2010 by unforgiven

[ScaleSpeedShop]

I prefer Modelhaus resin tires to kit tires any day.

Ron@ScaleSpeedShop

[diymirage]

as long as they are mickey thompson sportsmans i dont mind

[sjordan2]

I build generally at 1/16. While rubber is far more realistic, it has a tendency to sag and to peel away from the rims at that scale, and can deteriorate. As an alternative, plastic and resin are too hard and not realistic to me. So I would vote for vinyl as a good compromise.

[Modelmartin]

I want accurate, well sized, well detailed tires. I do not care what material they are made of as long as they end up black. White for really old cars is good, too. I do not have a need to be able to squeeze model car tires!

[Chillyb1]

Whatever Tamiya uses in its kits, that's what I like.

[Dingo]

Round, smokin' and screaming for mercy other than that Greg I couldn't care less mate.

Dingo

[Danno]

Another vote for "Round!"

[MILD]

Round, smokin' and screaming for mercy other than that Greg I couldn't care less mate.

Dingo

Must be an Australian thing because I couldn't agree more!

[Junkman]

I like old-fashioned skinny high-profile el-cheapos without whitewall.

[Robert81]

Round!!!

To be honest, that is they way they should be, (off the car).

Ever notice, how the tires on a vehicle have a slight bulge at the bottom where it's in contact with the ground? And that some aircraft kits have an option of "weighted" tires?

On occasion I sand the bottom of the tires flat, but they don't get that bulge.

I don't care what my tires are made out of, just that they fit the build.

Edited November 13, 2010 by Robert81

[Terry Sumner]

I wish all the tires came in plastic. Even resin is ok. I realize some think they don't look relistic but I gotta say that vinyl tires look like toy tires to me. The whole object of modeling is to make your model parts look like the real thing and that is extremely hard to do with vinyl. If you stop and think about it, the paint is what everyone sees. No one sees the bodywork you do...it's only the top layers of paint that everyone is actually seeing. With the proper paint techniques, one can make a plastic or resin tire look a helluva lot closer to the real thing than you can do with vinyl or rubber. Subtle color variations from the tread to the sidewall can be applied unlike on vinylor rubber. This is why the airplanes all have plastic tires. The level of detail in a well painted aircraft tire far outweighs our vinyl tires. Plus you can mold in a slight bulge in the sidewall and a flat spot to show some weight on the tire. And you can mold in much better wrinkles if wrinkle walled slicks are your preference.

Some guys have said they vote for round tires. Well that's okay for most of the tire, but model cars look just wrong with 4 perfectly round tires all sitting on the surface at one tiny point in the tangent line. There needs to be a flat spot to make it more realistic. You can sand that flat spot in on the vinyl tire but many modelers fail to do this small item.

Another thing that bothers me in vinyl or rubber tires is what one other fellow mentioned...tires not precisely staying with the rim of the wheel. It always bugs me when I see gaps between the tire sidewall and the edge of the rim. Plastic tires can be molded to fit precisely to the wheel and they won't peel away.

All ya gotta do is paint them right and they will look a lot better than vinyl tires.

That's my 5 cents! (inflation taken into account)