We have limit of 1.6mm during summer and 3mm during winter, but I don't see point using tires less than 4mm of thread.

I think I might stop driving altogether, what with all these suicidal pedestrians and schools spewing reckless giddy children onto the highway. I've got one 340 with double its original horsepower, and I'm building a 360 with treble, I think I'd better scrap both in case this happens:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_urLWPrONI

I was going to turn up the boost on my cavalier, perhaps I'd better not in case I kill someone. I was going to pop down the unit to work on some cars but thinking about it, the burns cream in the first aid kit might be out of date so I'd better stay at home and cower under the stairs.

Ian Mac, let's see some photos of your tyres eh? Still on its original set of michelins I'll bet.

I backed into a wall outside the Brierdene.
Dont make fun of accidents.

Im only now almost getting back to 100% fit.

^^^ Watch where you're walking then

haha this topic rules, loving the opinions flying around

filthyjohn wrote:
Ian Mac, let's see some photos of your tyres eh? Still on its original set of michelins I'll bet.

Even I don't take originality that far - tyres have a safe life of ten years maximum, irrespective of mileage. Having said that my unused spare still has the original Dunlop which I'm hoping to keep that way. The rest of the tyres are nearly new budgets which seem to work perfectly well. As I use the car mainly for shows and commuting to the railway station I couldn't justify the outlay for premium brand tyres.

You'll appreciate I'm not criticising modifications and tuning enhancements as long as these are well executed but rather the mentality of driving like an idiot on the public highway whilst under the delusion that this somehow makes one a better driver...

I absolutely agree that health and safety has gone mad and I'll happily debate it all day long but that isn't the subject in hand.

1.6mm and 10 years

the tyres had about 4mm and were only 5 years old. completely road-legal but still bad

I think that here older than 5 years old tyre is considered useless, but here we have this winterstuff too.

Look this moron acting like a total jerk on public streets:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ybsghnkk72o

Actually once I did overtake police car with those tires, tail sliding and all, they did followed me quite a while after that, but I guess that I was lucky, especially that nobody did not jumped at front of me as there would not been any way to stop the car, steep downhills were really horrible, often resulting attempts of telekinetics which of course failed miserably.

More than 6mm of thread fom my memory, over 10 years old and all studs broken.



Now having bad tyres on tarmac is one thing, but on ice, that is just something words can't describe. Actually I can't quite imagine how I could break a grip even on wet tarmac without trying really really hard, still 360 would bog down after tire heats a bit, there just is no power, but I have understood that tarmac in other countries is much smoother than what it is in here, our tarmac is really really rough, someplaces it is so that one can't really walk on it barefoot as it is like walking on spikes or something.

On race track I have had grip issues when raining hard, but that tarmac is different somehow and I was flooring it on corners too.



LOL, put new toy hanging from roof support beam for cats, mother cat came just in and is circling the toy, sometimes hitting it with paw and then taking distance and doing it all again from circling bit, quite amusing

jtbo wrote: Look this moron acting like a total jerk on public streets:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ybsghnkk72o

lol, looks like they're pretty much the same as summer tyres. I can drive quite well with summer tyres in the snow because I usually pre-plan things. Although last month I'm approaching some parked vehicles on my side of the road, when I'm 20 feet away a car pulls out from the right side and I now have to brake before I hit the parked cars.

Lightly touching the brake just locked up my fronts straight away, I start to panic slightly and realise there's no room to manoeuvre, I either hit the parked van or the oncoming car and I've got about 5 seconds to think about it. Luckily the woman coming towards me speeds up and at the moment of her passing the rear bumper of the parked van I make a very tight squeeze between both cars. Very close indeed! Wouldn't have liked to pay for a new van.

Speedy88 wrote:
lol, looks like they're pretty much the same as summer tyres. I can drive quite well with summer tyres in the snow because I usually pre-plan things. Although last month I'm approaching some parked vehicles on my side of the road, when I'm 20 feet away a car pulls out from the right side and I now have to brake before I hit the parked cars.

Lightly touching the brake just locked up my fronts straight away, I start to panic slightly and realise there's no room to manoeuvre, I either hit the parked van or the oncoming car and I've got about 5 seconds to think about it. Luckily the woman coming towards me speeds up and at the moment of her passing the rear bumper of the parked van I make a very tight squeeze between both cars. Very close indeed! Wouldn't have liked to pay for a new van.

Worse than summer tyres my friend, you see once it did happen that during night roads were frozen, there were perfectly smooth ice layer on roads, something like inch thick, one of those odd things that happen sometimes, so road was smooth as glass and slippery as ice, then I had my summer tyres on and I did decide to change tyres at place which was other side of town, with summer tyres there were not much of problem, sure slippery, but managed to go just fine, even over railroad bridge http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source= ... 41,,0,5.39

I changed tyres and drove back, but damn I had really big trouble getting up that railroad bridge, when I got up then I was sliding downhill towards red traffic lights, luckily there were no other cars at front of me and light did change, but there would not been any way to stop as speed only increased when trying to brake, summer tyres did grip a lot better

Those tires were so bad that I had to be really careful when lifting off throttle while doing 80kph on 5th gear, but they were legal winter tyres, all studs were gone equally from every tyre, you don't need to have them but there can't be more than 25% difference, also there was plenty of thread as you can see from photo

I still drove over 100kph on ice with those tires, pretty stupid, but then I was younger and still imagined that I would be invincible, indestructible and generally a winner in life, now I'm just mostly feelin I'm too old

There's a red 240 in that streetview pic. Live action shot of you?

Speedy88 wrote:There's a red 240 in that streetview pic. Live action shot of you?

No, my 240 is light blue and I haven't been living there for years anymore, but there used to be quite many 240 Volvos as daily cars, but I guess today situation is different as petrol prices have really killed any possibilities to keep petrol 240 as a daily + the rot issues.

Good thing to remember is that there's a huge difference between "spirited driving" and driving like a moron at public streets.. I would consider my self as a "spirited driver". I'll overtake if there are slower cars ahead of me, I frequently use the + side of the boost gauge and yes I speed sometimes at highways but I don't do this at crowded city streets...

At winter I like to keep my car on the edge of the traction just to keep the feeling on to the road and how slippery the surface is. There's a differnece between the controlled use of "throttle steering" and complete lost of traction and drifting around corners sideways like a maniac.. If the car starts to understeer I use the throttle to correct to the slight oversteer during winters. (And at some lesser crowded country roads a bit more oversteer ) Breaking the traction doesn't always mean that the car is out of control.

Proper car control is something what many drivers should learn. Nowadays with these ESP and ABS the basic car control without electrical devices is something which seems to be a lost trait. I know very well the limits of my car and the point where I would run out of hands so to speak.

There's a saying in Finland that many people have legs of Ari Vatanen but hands of their own and that is sadly a true thing for many.

And what comes to tires that's the most ridicilous place to spare money. I bought a fresh set of studded Continentals for this winter as the studded Goodyear UG500's I bought at 2006 started to show "a bit" of fade and I did quite a lot of driving between two cities at the beginning of the winter.

filthyjohn wrote:I think I might stop driving altogether.

Good idea,John.

You really weren't very good TBH

Fuse wrote:Good thing to remember is that there's a huge difference between "spirited driving" and driving like a moron at public streets.. I would consider my self as a "spirited driver". I'll overtake if there are slower cars ahead of me, I frequently use the + side of the boost gauge and yes I speed sometimes at highways but I don't do this at crowded city streets...

At winter I like to keep my car on the edge of the traction just to keep the feeling on to the road and how slippery the surface is. There's a differnece between the controlled use of "throttle steering" and complete lost of traction and drifting around corners sideways like a maniac.. If the car starts to understeer I use the throttle to correct to the slight oversteer during winters. (And at some lesser crowded country roads a bit more oversteer ) Breaking the traction doesn't always mean that the car is out of control.

Proper car control is something what many drivers should learn. Nowadays with these ESP and ABS the basic car control without electrical devices is something which seems to be a lost trait. I know very well the limits of my car and the point where I would run out of hands so to speak.

There's a saying in Finland that many people have legs of Ari Vatanen but hands of their own and that is sadly a true thing for many.

And what comes to tires that's the most ridicilous place to spare money. I bought a fresh set of studded Continentals for this winter as the studded Goodyear UG500's I bought at 2006 started to show "a bit" of fade and I did quite a lot of driving between two cities at the beginning of the winter.

0,2bar at steady 80kph, I hit 1bar mark every time I drive, peak is at the moment 1.3bars, that I don't really need to hit at winter as there is no grip, quite often after 0.6bar I'm starting to get wheelspin on 3rd, but I would say that I drive like a granny with one leg on grave, just those intersections where I turn are at bottom of hill, so that is why I'm hitting boost so much, also those tires from 240 are having quite high rolling resistance so I'm constantly on boost at highway now and it does kill my fuel economy.

French crap is still not fast, but it does move better than originally, there is just only so much you can do without new cooler and turbo, but those slower ones that try to prevent you from overtaking are now laughable fools.

Corners are fun, sometimes there is car behind me as I don't drive much over the limit, meet a corner and suddenly there can be more than 200 meters distance, I don't slow for corners, there is no need and slowing down or cutting corner kills the fun (rather low) g-forces.

Often I do use left foot braking too and if there is slower car I just go past it.

So maybe one could say my driving is bit spirited too, however I don't really be bothered if I go under speed limit at city, situation makes limits, imo. Also I like to foresee situations and try to minimize my usage of diesel as I'm cheap, so I don't do fast acceleration just to slow down soon, I hardly ever use brakes, but I like to accelerate rather quickly, not all out and not top revs, but I use maximum torque to pick up speed swiftly, so that I get better economy, again I'm cheap.

I find it annoying when people take 3km to get their vehicle to 75kph from 65kph they were doing, then they use brakes for even slightest curve on road, when they could get lot better economy by driving and not just travelling.