centrifugal force (was Tire Slow Leak)

[Larry C Leung]

In it's day, from the factory on the 14 inch Conti Sports, it pulled
about 0.84 G (according to R&T). Really quite exceptional in the
mid-eighties, when C-4 Corvettes (the first REALLY good ones) pulled
around 0.86. To put things in perspective, the '84 Rabbit GTi (not a bad
handling car in it's day!) pulled 0.84 and the A2 GTi pulled 0.85.
Typical 911's of the day pulled 0.85 so, that put the CGT in the upper
end of skidpad ratings in the mid-eighties. Perspective, a stock '82
Rabbit (STILL a good handling car for it's day) pulled about 0.79 G's,
right on par with an '82 Mustang GT 5.0. 

Modern tires and suspensions have improved quite alot, so that the
AVERAGE sedan (i.e. Taurus) handily approaches 0.8 G on such wonderfully
techie tires as the General Tire AmeriWay all season rim protectors that
they come with. Even Honda Civics get a solid 0.82 performance. 

Note, all of these are steady state cornering performance, fun for a
little while on entrance ramps. Not all that exciting on the Autocross
course, where Transition is the name of the game. Of course the skidpad
numbers matter there, but you only need to be in the ballpark when on
those tight P-lot courses. The bigger Divisional/National level courses
need it all, however. 

Disclaimer: Your results may vary, depending upon tire inflation, surface
that you're driving on, driver guts and skill, temperatures, surface
moisture, yadda, yadda, yadda.....

LL - NY

On Fri, 15 Mar 2002 21:26:57 -0500 Huw Powell <human747 at attbi.com>
writes:
>
>> Very few street cars can meet or exceed  a constant 1 G (I know, in
>> Physics class, we say that 1 G is as much as you can get, but that's 
>for
>> non-deformable materials, not rubber on pavement), though some 
>(Corvette
>> Z06 and several Porsches) do from the factory. Meeting or exceeding 
>1 G
>> is possible in somewhat more mundane cars in transition however, 
>though
>> even those cars are few in number.
>
>I heard that like the Audi Coupe GT had like really good skid pad
>numbers?
>
>-- 
>Huw Powell
>
>http://www.humanspeakers.com/audi/
>
>http://www.humanthoughts.org/