Dougal Cawley
Active Member
The early porsche that gets crashed by a (potentially hung over) middle aged, midlife crisiss, chap would not have crashed if they hadn't changed the wheels and tyres for wider modern low profile tyres with the wrong kind of carcass structure. It probably wouldn't happen if they had stuck to the original CN36 or XWX. That certainly was the case with my mate anyway.
I used to pop to the pub with a mate of mine who lived on the same street as me, also a petrol head, into his aircooled. Normally we would just have a couple of light ales on the way home from work., then go home for us teas etc. However this particular evening, he had another freind with him and a bottle of over proof rum, so I parked my car up and popped into his house on the way home. What could possibly go wrong. I didn't quite make it home until i was late for my tea. In fact i didn't get home untill the only way up the stairs was on my hands and knees. That was the end of it as far as i was aware.
the next night i popped into the pub for a couple of light ales on the way home from work. my mate was in there, but not in his 911. he had given it a bit of throttle on a corner, the back end had suddenly let go completely; and he rattled it through a garden wall knocking off 3 out of the 4 corners of the car making it a bit messy. When he got back to his yard he found his front number plate was also missing. so he very wisely gave it a few hours before returning to the scene.
Now there is no doubt that the car let go so suddenly because it had silly modern tyres on it. If you go back to the early 911 that ran on 165VR15 Cinturato or XAS it didn't have the reputation of letting go all of a sudden, in fact it didn't have that reputation in 1968 when they fitted 185/70VR15 Cinturato CN36. When it started to earn that reputation was when more modern lower profile tyres were inventesd and people started fitting out rageous wide tyres that was where the trouble started.
Is it fair to completely blame the tyres? maybe.
Could the fact, my old punk rocker mate was still in a bit of a tangle from the night before, have contributed to him not catching it before it went throught the wall? well that dynamite 90 proof rum leaves your body very quickly, specially when you drink it as fast as we did, and it was so strong i was crawling and rolling around on my stairs at about 10 pm, so it wasn't a late nighter; All this considered, it would be unreasonable to completely absolve the rum of all blame.
However, there is no doubt, he would have stood a much better chance of catching it, before it went through the wall, regardless of how arseholed he was, if it had had 185/70VR15 CN36 on it instead of 225/50R16 modern tyres on the back. thinner tyre break away more gentley and predictably, you can catch it, and when you do catch it it doesn't rip the steering wheel out of your hands and throw you in a ditch (wall/ hedge/etc) like modern wide tyres do.
Todays cars are built to never even nearly loose traction at all, because their suspension is so clever in can keep all of a wide tyres foot print in contact with the road under very extreme cornering forces. Your car doesn't do that. (nor did my mates 911.) You can turn your car into a racing car. You can add a load on adverse camber so as the car leans your tyre stays flat. To make it into a racing car you can do loads of other mods aimed at:
a/ making it keep all that foot print on the road when cornering.
b/ making the car an all round less pleasant road car.
Modern road cars fitting massive tall and wide wheels with wide low profile is silly it is only fashion. no road car benefits from having a wheel bigger than 16" it is purely fashion. road cars having a tyre wider than a 225 section is unnesesary un beneficial and only there for fashion reasons. modern road cars would be nicer to drive on thinner tyres with taller side walls. Car manufacturers sacrefice ride and handling because taller wheels with wide tyres sell cars because they look cool. not because they are nice to drive on.
my 1976 Silver shadow has a nicer ride than a modern Rolls Royce with its silly low profile tyres.
here is a progressive car. Thats me in the silver one, up the inside 45 seconds in. Have it!
however i'm not suggesting you drive your car like that. what you want is more subtle.
On 15" wheel i would fit the 185/70VR15 CN36 or XWX. probably CN36 unless you are in a really hot climate where the XWX might just get the edge. I think as standard these cars fitted 175R14 or 195/70R14. you dont have to go bigger all the time.
Anyone going to Oulton Park this weekend?
