If you’re a NASCAR fan, you must’ve come across the visuals of a pit crew member taking a fire torch, burning the tire, and using a knife to scrape off the rubber. It is a fascinating thing to watch indeed.

But this is also something that makes one wonder, “Why are they doing what they’re doing?”

Well, there’s a reason. A very solid reason that has something to do with the phenomenon of ‘tire wear’ or tire degradation, a big big enemy of all racecar drivers and teams in all motorsports.

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Why do NASCAR pit crews heat and scrape the used tires?

To put it simply, the pit crews heat and scrape the tires in order to determine the amount of rubber that’s actually left on the tire. This is because after a tire has been run, be it during the race through a pit stop or after the race, it has all kinds of debris on its surface that it collects since it’s hot.

So the pit crews simply take it off to check how much actual rubber is left.

This was something that one of Joe Gibbs Racing’s pit crew members also explained in a video.

He described how each tire has five holes, and through the help of an instrument called tread depth gauge, they check the depth of each tire through these holes and get a number. This is done before the tire has been run.

Now, after it’s been run, they need to check the depth again, but at this point, the tire has picked up all kinds of debris. So what they do is they burn and scrape the junk, put the gauge in again, get a number and the difference is the actual tire wear.

What happens with the old tires?

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The amount of tires that are discarded, naturally, and unnaturally, after a race is quite overwhelming. This is simply because once a tire has been run, it’s of no use again.

So what does NASCAR do with its old tires?

They recycle them.

Liberty Tire Recycling is the official recycling partner of the sport that helps them not only in the process of recycling an old tire, but also to make sure its put to good use.

“It is a great use of what was a problematic waste,” said Tom Carter, the Vice President of alternative fuels for Liberty Tires. “Over the last three decades we have been able to produce products that consumers desire and that are making a difference.”

In a year, on average, the company recycles around 300,000 tires.

That’s a lot of useless rubber.

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