No such tyre
General Wheel spin
- Thread starter juliecully
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General Wheel spin
Mine are just the standard 15" tyre which came with the 500 pop. Ive wondered about 16" for suspension improvement (following another thread) so maybe they are better for grip too? I try to do my tyre pressure every couple of weeks and so far not had much deviance. I'm presuming using the commercial machines at garages the pressure will not over inflate the tyres? I know I set it right becuase I always double check the manual each time incase my premature senility gets the better of me!!!
Get your own tyre gauge. Treat it like a precision instrument (ie, don't let it rattle around in the boot). Check with that. You'd be surprised how out of calibration most petrol stations are.
The 16"s with standard suspension doesn't improve ride quality if that's what you mean? Quite the opposite. I swap between 15" and 16" quite regularly on my 500.
Any recommendations on make? How do you inflate your tyres to the right pressure? Foot pump? Sorry if its a silly question but I have no idea!!
Julie, use the petrol station pump to inflate the tyres and then use your gauge afterwards to check and adjust to the correct pressures.
I have my own compressor so I can check/adjust with the tyres cold but if you have to do it with warm tyres just inflate a couple of pounds over and readjust at home after the car has been stationary for a few hours.
SmoothHound
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Funnily enough I just pumped my tyres up to 30 psi on all 4 tyres at the BP station this morning. I checked the pressure using my own pressure check and all 4 were at 28.5 PSI.....bit of a difference!
No such tyre
I meant 2, not 3.
These ones;
http://www.conti-online.com/generat...um_contact/cpc_2/contipremiumcontact2_en.html
I know Good tyre
Good tyre
I took my car out for a 30 minute drive earlier as it had only been on short runs for the last 2 weeks and I got the wheels spinning a few times on the empty industrial estate roads It's fairly easy, but still not as easy as most small cars, especially the older ones!
I've also noticed lately that 3rd seems to be pulling very very well for such a small engine! The engine and exhaust are also sounding a bit 'meatier', possibly due to the colder air. So much so that earlier on I changed down for a bit of engine braking while slowing down from 60mph and the noise was so loud that a group of nearby chavs turned round in anticipation. They must have been gutted to see a 500
It's fairly easy, but still not as easy as most small cars, especially the older ones!I've also noticed lately that 3rd seems to be pulling very very well for such a small engine! The engine and exhaust are also sounding a bit 'meatier', possibly due to the colder air. So much so that earlier on I changed down for a bit of engine braking while slowing down from 60mph and the noise was so loud that a group of nearby chavs turned round in anticipation.
They must have been gutted to see a 500 nicholas
New member
Reading this has made me think that ESP is a worthwhile option after all. You'd probably recoup the £300 over the life of the car just from reduced tyre wear! Also cutting out the wheelspin will improve the car's acceleration.
FFS the accelerator pedal is not an on/off switch!
Modulate with the right ankle.
Cheers
SPD
Modulate with the right ankle.
Cheers
SPD
Simply not true. Ideally to get the best acceleration from a standing start you want 10% wheelspin or something near enough to that. If you're gentle with the throttle when you've got a bit of lock on wheelspin is not something you're ever really going to see. Regardless, if you want to pull out quickly you don't necessarily want the system killing power when you want it.
nicholas
New member
So ESP doesn't include traction control? It certainly did on my old Mercedes A-class.
ESP on the 500 comes with ASR though
To be fair at least on the 500 ASR can be switched off. If I could have got ASR without ESP then I'd have specced it
ESP on the 500 comes with ASR though
yea i always switch ASR off, unless grip is very low
car very slow pulling off otherwise
Agree. Apart from once when it was damp I've never got wheelspin in the 500 without trying to do it on purpose. It's a bit sad that people in general just don't feel things through their bum or through the wheel or with their ears. I'm no Schumacher but I would class myself as a sensitive driver and was able to feel the 20 year old Michelin's on my dads 504 developing a bulge in the tread which would have caused the tyre to delaminate nicely at speed given the time. I'm 99% sure that most people would just have driven through that with it being such a subtle feeling. Definitely a life threatening fault with the tyres.....
Yeah I had a similar experience in the 500c I testdrove.
