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Old 05-01-2008, 12:34 AM   #22 (permalink)
LostCause
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Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: California
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Thunderbird - '96 Ford Thunderbird
90 day: 27.75 mpg (US)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnnyGrey View Post
-A certain amount of energy goes into deforming the rubber when it hits the road. The square footage of rubber that meets the road per rotation is a function of tire width and does not change with contact patch. In other words, a 195mm tire has 5.4% more area that must make and break contact with the road surface than a 185mm tire.
Good points, but I have a question over the first statement.

Generally, a wide tire and a skinny tire have a contact patch of equal area at a given psi, right? If the skinny tire has a square contact patch, the wide tire would have a thin rectangular one.

Wouldn't the area of tire deformity be equal on both? A wider tire has more area than a skinny one, but less of it is in contact with the ground at a particular moment. A wider tire will also cause a smaller area of the sidewall to flex at a time, which intuitively seems more desirable then decreasing tread flexing.

I've only tentatively gone over this in my mind, so sorry if I've made a blatant mistake...

- LostCause
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