Honda Car Forum

On Thu, 22 Apr 2004 23:03:03 GMT, dizzy <dizzy@nospam.invalid> wrote:

>On Thu, 22 Apr 2004 16:12:11 -0400, George Macdonald
><fammacd=!SPAM^nothanks@tellurian.com> wrote:
>
>>Unfortunately the OE tires fitted by manufacturers are not in that
>>category. If there was not this obsession with tire wear on the part of
>>the consumer, that might be able to be changed more easily. Many of the OE
>>tires are simply dangerous - prime example: Michelin XGTV4s fitted to
>>Integras... probably the worst tire in the wet I've ever encountered and
>>yet it is/was labelled M+S.
>
>That's what was on my Prelude Si, and they were terrible in Winter
>conditions. The Prelude was my first car with ABS, and for years I
>thought that ABS was a terrible joke (and indeed, the implementation
>of ABS on that car wasn't the greatest), but when I started using
>Nokian's in the Winter, it was "wow, this really works!"

The Dunlop SP5000s I put on my '99 Integra are better in the wet, even
greasy wet, than the XGT-V4s were in the dry - very impressed so far... now
that I can actually drive around a jughandle on-ramp in the wet. I'm told
that 30K for the Dunlops might be optimistic but we'll see - I took the
Michelins off with a good 10K left on them because I couldn't stand in any
longer.

Rgds, George Macdonald

"Just because they're paranoid doesn't mean you're not psychotic" - Who, me??

On Thu, 22 Apr 2004 22:58:39 GMT, dizzy <dizzy@nospam.invalid> wrote:

>On Wed, 21 Apr 2004 16:14:16 -0400, George Macdonald
><fammacd=!SPAM^nothanks@tellurian.com> wrote:
>
>>>Of course. And it doesn't lend itself to the loss of vehicle control
>>>that snap oversteer can. It's eminently manageable.
>>
>>Unless the speed really is excessive, i.e. the driver completely misjudged
>>the corner, it's true that backing off on a properly engineered chassis
>>with FF usually saves you from a catastrophe on a bend where it usually
>>doesn't on a FR and may even make things worse.
>
>ABS, not traction control, helps to safely deal with excessive speed.

Well now, for the cornering situation, Stability Control is coming down
into the moderate priced cars.<shrug>

>>OTOH the benefit of
>>traction control is *not* limited to cornering, e.g. when the front wheels
>>unload slightly on low speed acceleration with a FF.
>>
>>In very slippery conditions -- wet snow, ice etc. -- the worst part of the
>>battle is getting and keeping sufficient momentum without putting too much
>>torque to the wheel and causing loss of traction. IOW once you lose
>>traction it's hard to reacquire it - a FF car can benefit from traction
>>control by that dynamically reduced torque.
>
>Sorry, but I just don't see the benefit there. It's just all too
>easy to regulate the wheel spin with the gas peddle, and wheel spin
>isn't punished by a sudden loss of control, as it can be in a
>rear-driver. Traction control can actually be a hinderance in
>situations where some wheel spin will indeed accelerate the vehicle
>more quickly.
>
>I'll turn it off in my BMW in situations where I need a quick burst
>off acceleration, such as crossing a busy highway, and don't want to
>worry about my acceleration being squashed at a dangerous moment, just
>because I spun a little bit on a patch of sand. Honestly, if the car
>wasn't rear-drive, I wouldn't even want traction control - even if it
>was free.

I think it varies quite a bit from car to car. Our '93 Camry was terrible
on initial acceleration in the wet. Of course it had a lot of longitudinal
rock on both acceleration and deceleration, something which Honda seems to
control much better. On take off from a traffic light in the wet, the
wheels would spin and I was always wary about the guy behind either driving
into the back off me or thinking I hadn't realized the light had gone
green.

Rgds, George Macdonald

"Just because they're paranoid doesn't mean you're not psychotic" - Who, me??