v7guy
01-05-2004, 05:44 PM
I've been seeing more and more cars over the last few years that are capable of near, or over 200mph. Factory cars exotics and hell, the C6 I suppose too now.
These cars are routinely running bigger wheels,18s and 19s and while the sidewall isn't as narrow as it could be, it is still quite small, the train of thought I've seen most often when discussing vehicles that are being built for top speed while being able to be driven (not comfrotably I'm sure) is that one would want to run a tire with a little more sidewall than say you would normally put on a 17x9.5 in ored to help cushion the car from being upset in high speed driving.
While this makes perfect sense to me, is it actually more of a band aid for a suspenion that isn't doing what it should be, would a differently valved shock work to alleviate the need to run more sidewall and then could you also gain from the stiffer tire as well? Why has the OEMs been putting on bigger wheels with these cars if it could be potentially very dangerous, as it has often been described to be in the past?
These cars are routinely running bigger wheels,18s and 19s and while the sidewall isn't as narrow as it could be, it is still quite small, the train of thought I've seen most often when discussing vehicles that are being built for top speed while being able to be driven (not comfrotably I'm sure) is that one would want to run a tire with a little more sidewall than say you would normally put on a 17x9.5 in ored to help cushion the car from being upset in high speed driving.
While this makes perfect sense to me, is it actually more of a band aid for a suspenion that isn't doing what it should be, would a differently valved shock work to alleviate the need to run more sidewall and then could you also gain from the stiffer tire as well? Why has the OEMs been putting on bigger wheels with these cars if it could be potentially very dangerous, as it has often been described to be in the past?