Comment 28699

By Brandon (registered) | Posted February 13, 2009 at 21:25:26

Great article and I mostly agree wholeheartedly, but I have difficulty imagining that tires will last 10 years and be in good condition unless you hardly drive at all.

I also wonder what high performance summer tires will do to your braking numbers on dry pavement?

As far as accelerating to avoid a slipping situation, it's not as cut and dry as you might think. Assuming FWD, if you go into a corner too fast, you'll understeer (vehicle doesn't turn as much as the steering input demands). If you lift sharply, the vehicle will oversteer (vehicle turns more than the steering input demands) due to more traction at the front and less at the rear (weight shifts). If you then accelerate sharply, you can pull yourself out of the skid.

Now, the intelligent driver doesn't deliberately put him/herself in this situation when there are uncontrolled variables, but it can be a lot of fun and good practice when visibility is excellent and there is no one around to be endangered. It's also good to practice it so that should the situation arise unexpectedly you instinctively know how to deal with it.

Sadly, most drivers have no idea what understeer and oversteer mean, never mind how to deal with them when they occur.

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