[petevb]

I've never had to try and do this, but I tried to think of everything I could (theoretical list) though many of these are not practical...

Tires get heat from friction. To get the tire up to higher temperature you need to either increase the friction or reduce the area that friction acts upon.

1. Make tires narrower (reducing tire to weight).
2. Increase toe in/ out (increases friction)
3. Reduce tire pressures (increases sidewall flex, increasing friction).
4. Softer compound tires- (allows you to corner harder, increasing friction)
5. Drive harder (overdrive the tires increasing friction)
6. Increase the number/ width of groves in the tire (creates tread block squirm, increasing friction and also reduces contact area, increasing friction to area).

7. Increase vehicle weight- obvious, but dumb
8. Increase/ decrease camber- riding on an edge will heat that edge more, but again usually dumb.

Seems like most of them... As a practical matter:

#1, Skinnier tires, seems like a last resort- it will work to get temps up, but might not help you find more speed.
#2, Toe in our out, sounds good to me up to a point, though of course you'll be a little slower down the straight and have a bit more tire wear.
#3, Reducing tire pressures, might be practical small amounts, but more than a few PSI would probably start to work against you in lap times.
#4, Compound would be the way if the correct one is available. Practically it's often not.
#5, Drive harder- you're probably doing this already.
#6 Cutting groves- I bet it would work, but Hoosier tells you not to do it (probably worried about delamination)

The other two would seem to get more heat into your tires at the expense of slower laptimes... Oh, tire warmers, but that's only for the first couple laps... Any other ideas, or experience with these? Like I said this is all theoretical, not practical...

-Pete