Re: bigger wheels

[sebruun@ihlpe.att.com]

Karl Nordstrom writes (first quoting someone else):

>...look at mazda.  they comissioned bridgestone to make special
>light weight tires for the miata.  imagine all that effort just to
>save a few ounces.

I hadn't heard that before.  Mazda puts three different tires on the
Miata.  None are that sticky.  Now the wheels are a different story.
They are quite light at 12 lbs for a 14" x 5.5" wheel.  Compare that
to BBS 14" x 6" wheels at 18 lbs.  They are supposedly lighter than the
Mini-Lights they are modeled after, too.

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I'm not sure what this is doing on the Quattro list, but what the heck:

In fact, Mazda commissioned special lightweight tires from Bridgestone,
Dunlop, and Yokohama, and one third of all Miatas are delivered on each
make of tire.  Unfortunately, all of them are really terrible no matter
how light they may be, so most of us have long since replaced them with
something that actually sticks to the road (Yokohama AVS Intermediates,
in my case).

The wheels were also very carefully designed to be as light as possible
(and they are indeed *very* light).  The original mock-ups of the Miata
were fitted with eight-spoke Panasports, and the factory alloys were to
follow suit.  The designers wanted to achieve a classic MiniLight look.
However, they discovered that by removing one of the spokes, they could
reduce the weight to whatever figure they were targeting, thus the very 
unusual seven-spoke design which resulted.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled Audi programming...

- Steve Bruun