Alee891's Radiant Red Build & BS

I have wondered this too. Just did some research and this is what I found.

"Mehcanisms of Tire grip. Friction Mechanical Keying Adhesion As they are madr from deformable rubber, tires dont exactly follow basic friction theory. So to just say that F=mu*r is strictly wrong. Although it basically does floow this during the elastic range. Tires only give grip when they are at the correct temperature. this is the most important thing you can remember about tires . Now on to business. Tires are the most important part of the suspension, either they are designed to fit it, or the suspension is designed around the tire. People who say wider tires make more grip because ;''there is more rubber on the road' are wrong. They are both wrong that it makes mroe grip and that there is more rubber on the road. When you make a tire wider, you alter the contact patch to be wider , but it reduces in length. So depending on sidewall stiffness, a wider tire can actually give less rubber on the road. The main reason for tires being the size they are is actually heat management. Wider, low sidewall tires will cool better than narrow tall tires. If you can;'t get a tire up to temperatie it will give no grip, if you get it too high you will cook the rubber and ruin the set of tires. Back to contact patch, you can safely assume that contact patch stays roughly the same area with wide or narrow tires (as long as the load stsys the same). Narroe will have longer contact patches and wide tires will have shorter. The reason why F1 tires are wide is primarily so that they dont cook (remember they arent just wide, they are fairly high sidewalled), but they ten dto have wider contact patches because they will give better grip going round corners. A wide tire will generate more lateral force per slip angle making cornering better. F1 cars DO NOT have wide tires for linear acceleration. Conversely (Mike im goin to have to disagree with you here) drag racers acutally use the tires not becuase of the width, but the tallness. As we know a wider contact patch gives better cornering performance, a narrow but long contact patch is what you want for linear acceleration. so strangely, drag racers will actually be better with narrow tires. So why do they use wide tires? (remember the most important gip aspect of tires) Temperature! They want as longer contact patch as they can get, but need the width for cooling. (eith 4000+ horsepower you do kind of build temp rather well) But if you look at the contact patch shape between say, an F1 car or drag racer. (both are considered to use wide tires). The F1 patch will be wider and shorter for good cornering, the drag patch will be longer and narrower (relatively) for good linear acceleration. So to sum up: Wider tires are not always better. They dont always give better traction. It depends on the car, the situation, the conditions. Eg. Rally cars use wider tires when on tarmac rallys, and use (surprisingly) very thin tires on ice rallys. F1 cars used to use narrow tires until aero began to be used in the 60's. Drag racers acutally want tall tires, width is there to stop the tire being destroyed. TEMPERATURE!!!!!! rawr. As example I can think of is formula student cars, they used to use 8inch tires but couldnt get them up to temperature. They switched to 6.5inch and got more grip because they can get them up to temp. hoyl beep thats the longest post i've ever done. I should do a tl;dr summary.

Reference https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/wider-tire-giving-better-traction-debate.330790/"

 

So what I took from that was that a longer narrow contact patch is better than a longer wider patch.

 

Except that seem to be geared entirely toward street tires. Not sure if the exact same theory applies to deep snow and off road type tires. The theory sounds good though.

 

Yes it was. I'm still trying to find an article that detailed geared toward off road. I'm thinking that a wider tire will keep you a float better in deep snow but you won't have the best traction due to the shape of the contact patch. Vice versa with skinnys you will sink more but might have enough traction to continue plowing through the snow.

 

http://www.expeditionswest.com/research/white_papers/tire_selection_rev1.html

 

But could you not argue as well that tread pattern and thread depth will assist in deep snow traction?

Don't get me wrong I see the advantages of tall, skinny tires, but I don't have issues with my wider tires in snow either.

 

OK you win simply on the fact that I need a ton of time to read all ot that information. And.... I ain't got time for that right now.

 

And to throw a monkey wrench in this let's talk about varying driver skill sets. Maybe I am just better at driving wide tires.

 

I'm babysitting ski lifts so I have lots of time. Things are almost as reliable as a Toyota...not really

 

Airing down increases the length of the contact patch much much more than the width, so whether your tire is skinny or fat to start with doesn't really matter w/respect to airing down.

 

That's what she said

 

I don't know about all this book worm stuff. It still seems that we need to get out there and get your tires in the snow and test it.

 

FWIW the ST MAXX tires are by far the BEST tire I have ever purchased. Skinny or wide these tires rocked in the snow today. I am amazed.

 

You ever run MTR's though?

 

Yes. Typical mud tire IMO.

 

Just got caught up with this discussion.

Like I said earlier, I've been under the general assumption that tall/skinnies cut through snow better, whereas fatties have a larger footprint in the snow and can float a little easier. @BDN made a good point that cutting into snow doesn't really have a benefit if the end result is being high-centered. Likewise, I've noticed with 317/75r16's I need to really air down (neighborhood of 6-8psi) in order to increase my footprint in the snow. Rock is a different scenario, obviously.

@Gramps also brings up a good point: driver skills. True driving characteristics come out in snowy conditions. I like to think I'm alright at driving in the snow, but usually find myself stuck in a drift, burning the clutch, and having others shovel around me...

Tires aren't the be-all/end-all to snow bashing. Good recovery gear and friends are.

 

Completely agree. Tires do help for sure but theres a lot more to it than just that

 

Heavy right foot and the correct gear to spin tires on demand. Secret to snow bashing success.

 

Front actuator is stuck again...
I blame @cynicalrider for bringing up recently.

 

I always hear how of a pain in the ass these are and I'm so glad when I bought one I got a new one from Toyota. Headache free.