RE: Tire experts needed

["Linus D. Toy" <linust@interramp.com>]

At 07:05 AM 4/23/96 -0400, Glen Powell wrote:

>>conventional wisdom (does it apply to a quattro?) has been to install the
>>better (new) tires in the rear, on the theory that you can't steer that end
>>if the tires fail.  
>
>Huh? IMFO, conventional wisdom is to put the best tahrs on the front -
> they do most of the braking and also the steering and with FWD all of the
> drive force - a *lot* more work to do from the circle-of-traction
> perspective - the rears are pretty much just along fer the ride. I believe
> this is even more important with cars that exhibit inherent understeer -
> like the Qs - and applies only for street operation - track use may have
> very different suspension/alignment setups and overall objectives.

not to dispute your logic (i agree with most of what you say, but not sure
about the conclusion esp your comment wrt understeer) but i think the
"conventional wisdom" i was talking about is pretty ingrained in quite a few
tire vendors.  and yes, let's limit this to street apps.

i would put the new tires on the rear on a RWD car.  with FWD though, i too
wanted the newer tires up front, since they do more of the work.  since the
vendor wouldn't do it, i simply went home and put them where i wanted.  

for our q-cars (sorry--was the original post for a q-car or a fwd?), i'm not
so sure.  one option is to replace all four (that was me when i was younger
and foolish with my $--ok, i own an audi, i guess i'm still foolish with my
$ but... :)  that still leaves two more options--the front or the rear (and
no wise-cracks about i forgot both on the right or left or opposite corners)
i haven't seen any other posts on this--anyone else btdt care to comment?
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* linus toy           email:  linust@interramp.com                   *
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