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Tim,
That accident had several roots and one of which was rear tires which were in worse shape then the front ones. Let me explain:
- I left that puddle at a slight pitch angle
- right when I got myself onto the asphalt, there happened stabilization which produced some transversal force (google for drifting video episodes - e.g. TopGear - to see that very often stabilization doesn't occur in soft manner, it's often sort of whipping)
- my rear left wheel happened to be on a road marking, which was pretty slippery since it was wet and made of plastic (N.B.: one wheel only, not the whole axle!)
- even though I had some rally background and did know that it's fwd car and I need the positive torque from the front wheel in that case, the jerks (reflexes) are quite strong and I stepped away from the accelerator pedal
So here we have a car in a slight drift with negative force applied to the front wheels (engine braking). I left the stupidity factor out of equation since we are not always perfect and it's very easy to dig into other errors - this doesn't prevent you from making your own ones.
So a car on a wet asphalt at 60 mph with a slight negative force applied at the front wheels (so far it was only engine braking; I did not hit the brake pedal until I finally went rotating), net force aimed slightly off-side and bad rear tires. The result? I was lucky and trained enough to keep on fighting for next 5 (five) pitches before it finally went rotating (fwiw: with most drivers it happens on the second or the third pitch) and gave some time to the others behind me, who braked off a bit after they saw that circus happening. What happened afterwards isn't that interesting here.
Did I make a mistake then? Yep, plenty: wrong tires (for that road and weather conditions), wrong tires/axle distribution, wrong speed with those conditions applied, wrong throttling technique on a FWD car in a case of drift accident. But I believe that if I paid some attention to the tires (I just recently got that car and haven't checked the tires thoroughly) and swapped the front ones with the rear, then I could be forgiven that throttling mistake. But there's no conjunctive mood in history.
(btw, I always drive with both hands on the steering wheel and I didn't do that mistake which you are hinting about when talking about straightening s/wheel; moreover, fwiw: one should not just grasp its steering and keep it steady straight one driving thru a puddle - there can be different depths and thus different resistances on the left and right sides and you should be ready and parry accordingly)
So here's the bottom line:
Is it hard to catch a puddle on a road? Or catch some ice in a turn or freeway exit? Or anything similar? Nope.
Do you always drive... ok, let's be honest. Do you always drive smart? Well, we all know the answer.
Do you really master at all the drivers techniques? Oh, really, you do?
So we have to agree that it isn't that hard to stress your vehicle stability. And should this happen, then you'll be missing good tires on the rear axle very much.
Good luck and drive smart,
Zig
posted by 188.134.44...
, Tue, 13 Mar 2012 19:02:57
, Wed, 14 Mar 2012 08:52:31
, Wed, 14 Mar 2012 09:07:55, Wed, 14 Mar 2012 11:04:21
, Tue, 13 Mar 2012 23:21:30, Wed, 14 Mar 2012 07:56:11, Wed, 14 Mar 2012 10:15:15, Thu, 15 Mar 2012 13:13:04, Sun, 18 Mar 2012 21:23:57, Mon, 19 Mar 2012 07:45:20, Wed, 14 Mar 2012 11:06:00, Wed, 14 Mar 2012 17:40:36, Wed, 14 Mar 2012 17:24:24
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