Schumacher recently updated their well-proven Astro turf tire lineup with the release of the Mezzo tires. They have described the tire as consistent and gave a lot of emphasis on the low wear due to a change not only on the tread pattern but also on the carcass of the tire. Additionally, they have not highlighted an increase of performance but more or less said that the performance of the tire would be similar to that of the Mini Dart.
As I usually race in astro turf offroad tracks with my 1/10 buggies, I could not resist trying them out and write a review about them. I must tell you beforehand that in Greece we select the MiniSpike2 as the primary choice of rear tires in both 2wd and 4wd classes which I have quite a lot of experience with it. It has proven to be the fastest and most consistent tire so far.
As you can see the height of the Mezzo’s pin is a bit taller than that of the MiniSpike2 and the density of the pins is way more than the MiniSpike2’s.
The difference in sidewall structure is pretty obvious. The sidewall of the Mezzo has actually no pins and is almost perpendicular to the tire contact patch area whereas that of the MiniSpike2’s has pins and are placed in a weird angle along the tires ‘s convex shape.
In conclusion, the overall profile of the tires have some differences too. As you can see the MiniSpike2 profile is curved providing good amount of side bite in the corners as the tire can get deformed. In contrast, the profile of the Mezzo tire is really similar to that of a Touring car tire(apart from the pins of course). Almost flat, low profile and with high density of pins in the middle of the tires has me thinking that it is going to provide more grip on accelerating and braking due to the bigger contact patch area with the pavement whereas in the corners it is not going to provide tons of side bite as the tire cannot get easily deformed because of its shape.(but that does not mean it will have slower corner speed…or does it?) Don’t get me wrong, those are all assumptions and the only way of finding out is by testing.
The day I tested the Mezzo tires was sunny, with medium humidity and around 15-18oC air temperature. For the record, every run was 5 minutes!
I did in total 6 runs. Take note that the first 2 runs were ran on a slippery track due to the humidity early in the morning. In the 3rd run where the track was completely dry I managed to break the track record by 8 tenths and also be in average 3 tenths slower than my best lap which was very positive. The performance was surprisingly the same in the next runs with times slightly falling off but nothing to be worried about.
Overall, as you can see from the pics the wear is not high and lower than that of the Mini Spike 2. What impresses me the most is that the tire does not only have low wear but is quite fast too. The car is easy to drive and was not prone on traction rolling even if I traction rolled twice as I was trying to reach the limits of the tires. Note that I did not use any tire sauce or tire cleaner and that I tested it extensively on my 2wd and not on my 4wd buggy.
Verdict: The tires look really promising and it is going to be interesting to see if in astro turf races, the EOS organization will select the Mezzo as control tire. It is consistent and fast even if there are signs of wear. What I will be looking forward to is how the tires will feel in the super hot Greek sun of +30oC in the summer.
See you at the track!
Dimitris Ioannidis RC Racing 