chaosdrifter06 Posted June 30, 2007 Share Posted June 30, 2007 I'm thinking of a staggered setup (17s in front, 18s in back). This is the biggest I can go before my ride height goes up and make it look like one of those stupid hyphy oldsmobiles and buicks that are 2 feet above the ground. Any benefits from it? Wonder if I could get some feedback on the idea... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest iheartmyz Posted June 30, 2007 Share Posted June 30, 2007 bigger rims + weight = longer reps + expensive tires. basically it all comes down to personal preference and if u got the $... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chaosdrifter06 Posted June 30, 2007 Author Share Posted June 30, 2007 bigger rims + weight = longer reps + expensive tires. basically it all comes down to personal preference and if u got the $... What do you mean by longer reps? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnc Posted July 1, 2007 Share Posted July 1, 2007 A staggered tire setup is basically an understeering setup. That's fine for a street car. Keep your tire overall diameter at 25" or less. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest iheartmyz Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 longer repititions?.. mph may be a little off. I've read an article somewhere and size of tires/wheels effect your speed by a couple miles faster or slower then actual speed. i'll try and find out the source and get back to you. if it doesnt bother u then youre golden its just fyi Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
silversix Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 A staggered tire setup is basically an understeering setup. That's fine for a street car. Keep your tire overall diameter at 25" or less. Will the z understeer less with a staggered r180 set up? I am wondering if less weight in the rear will help the rear step out sooner, or will the weight bias being toward the front with the r180 just emphasize the understeer more? I have 245/275 40 series tires on 17x8.5, 17x9.5 rims. I have yet to run the car with this set up and have not yet installed a r200. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bartman Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 This may just be my misunderstanding, but I thought staggered setup is a wider rim in the rear than the front, not different diameter rims. Maybe your planning on having the 18's wider as well? What specific rim and tire sizes are you looking at? Why do you want 18's on the back? Do you want a raked sort of look on your car? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnc Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 Will the z understeer less with a staggered r180 set up? The issue isn't weight, its grip. A narrower tire generally has less lateral grip then a wider tire, assuming the same tread compound. The 350Z is a perfect example. 225s up front and 245s in the rear give the car a steady state understeer. Switching to equal sizes front and rear significantly reduces steady state understeer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnc Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 longer repititions?.. Again, what do you mean by longer repetitions? You posted the term twice. What do you mean by repatitions as the product of your calculation above? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 This may just be my misunderstanding, but I thought staggered setup is a wider rim in the rear than the front, not different diameter rims. Maybe your planning on having the 18's wider as well? What specific rim and tire sizes are you looking at? Why do you want 18's on the back? Do you want a raked sort of look on your car? Tire stagger in racing terms is the diameter of the tire. In fact you'll find that some teams will measure all of their tires and find one that is taller and stick it on the outside front in circle track racing, or even sometimes in road racing if all the important turns are lefts or rights. http://www.circletrack.com/techarticles/managing_front_rear_stagger/ In layman's terms I've heard of the skinnier wheels in front and wider in back also referred to as stagger. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
auxilary Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 i think he meant revolutions? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bartman Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 Tire stagger in racing terms is the diameter of the tire. In fact you'll find that some teams will measure all of their tires and find one that is taller and stick it on the outside front in circle track racing, or even sometimes in road racing if all the important turns are lefts or rights. http://www.circletrack.com/techarticles/managing_front_rear_stagger/ In layman's terms I've heard of the skinnier wheels in front and wider in back also referred to as stagger. Yes, but aren't we discussing 'wheel stagger'? Regardless, I'm still wondering what specific wheel and tire sizes 'chaosdrifter06' is looking at. johnc, Understanding that a stagger setup can create understeer in an otherwise neutral setup, couldn't it be used to minimize oversteer in high horsepower applications? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 Yes, but aren't we discussing 'wheel stagger'? Regardless, I'm still wondering what specific wheel and tire sizes 'chaosdrifter06' is looking at. Maybe so. When I hear "stagger" I think of tire stagger, which I think is what John was doing too. johnc,Understanding that a stagger setup can create understeer in an otherwise neutral setup, couldn't it be used to minimize oversteer in high horsepower applications? While this wasn't addressed to me, the answer is definitely yes. It's hard to convince some people to run a larger tire in front than rear, but there is no real reason not to and sometimes like in a stock class where you can't change wheel sizes you can run a slightly fatter tire up front to change the balance. In the local autox I used to attend there used to be a lot of VW's and Fiestas in E Prepared running 8" slicks up front and 6" slicks in back. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dat240zg Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 Jon: This caught my attention due to the fact that I just purchased what I guess is being referred to as a staggered setup. I'm now running 225/45/17 in the front and 245/45/17 in the rear. The reason was to get a little more meat for traction. In your experience, will that little of a stagger make that much of a difference (as far as understeer goes) for an occasionally autocrossed car? According to the tire salesman, the difference was an inch and a quarter in width. Thanks for your insight. Bryan Dat240zg Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnc Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 johnc,Understanding that a stagger setup can create understeer in an otherwise neutral setup, couldn't it be used to minimize oversteer in high horsepower applications? Yes but.... Most people "think" they have an oversteer problem due to horsepower when they really don't. The real problem is understeer and the driver's right foot. Here's what happens: 1. At the threshold just below where the rear tires break traction due to engine torque, the car will generally be pushing pretty bad due to weigh transfer to the rear. 2. To compensate the driver has put in a lot of steering to get the car to turn. 3. The driver then thinks - "More power will reduce the understeer by breaking the rear tires lose." 4. Drive adds power. 5. Rear tires break traction. 6. Weight transfers forward increasing front grip, reducing rear grip, and the understeer goes away. 7. Because of the extra steering the driver has put in to compensate, the front of the car darts in the direction of the steering due to the new found front grip. 8. Rear tires are now sliding in the opposite direction as the fronts. 9. Driver's hands are not fast enough to catch the spin. 10. Driver gets scared and lifts off the throttle. 11. More weight transfers forward, increasing front grip and reducing rear grip while the chassis is rotating. This increases the the rate of rotation. 12. Car goes past 90 degrees and driver is now countersteering the wrong way. 13. Spin... This happened in your car at the autocross practice and last Saturday when I was an instructor at WSIR riding in a student's Mustang GT in turn 3. A staggered width tire setup can be used to balance available power with lateral grip. But, its generally only used with cars that have a rear weight bias. My old 240Z with 320 horsepower and a 48/52 weight bias ran a balanced tire setup and was very neutral. You can't compare what works in a Porsche 911 with what works on a 240Z chassis. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bartman Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 1. At the threshold just below where the rear tires break traction due to engine torque, the car will generally be pushing pretty bad due to weigh transfer to the rear. 2. To compensate the driver has put in a lot of steering to get the car to turn. 3. The driver then thinks - "More power will reduce the understeer by breaking the rear tires lose." 4. Drive adds power. 5. Rear tires break traction. 6. Weight transfers forward increasing front grip, reducing rear grip, and the understeer goes away. 7. Because of the extra steering the driver has put in to compensate, the front of the car darts in the direction of the steering due to the new found front grip. 8. Rear tires are now sliding in the opposite direction as the fronts. 9. Driver's hands are not fast enough to catch the spin. 10. Driver gets scared and lifts off the throttle. 11. More weight transfers forward, increasing front grip and reducing rear grip while the chassis is rotating. This increases the the rate of rotation. 12. Car goes past 90 degrees and driver is now countersteering the wrong way. 13. Spin... This happened in your car at the autocross practice ... Thanks for the explanation...and it makes a lot of sense. When I went to another autocross practice I didn't spin out, but I came close due to a situation similar to what you described. I had another experienced autocrosser riding with me, and when we discussed my performance after a run he mentioned that even though my car was already pushing, I still gave it more gas. I think that I'm incorrectly "wanting to reduce understeer by breaking the rear tires loose". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted July 3, 2007 Share Posted July 3, 2007 This caught my attention due to the fact that I just purchased what I guess is being referred to as a staggered setup. I'm now running 225/45/17 in the front and 245/45/17 in the rear. The reason was to get a little more meat for traction. In your experience, will that little of a stagger make that much of a difference (as far as understeer goes) for an occasionally autocrossed car? According to the tire salesman, the difference was an inch and a quarter in width. I have driven a Z with 185s in the front and 205s in the rear, but that car was a hodgepodge of different parts and more than anything else what I remember from driving it was the ultra loud dual exhaust. So I really don't have much experience with a staggered setup, but with my years of experience trying to get my car to turn I can say that I have never thought of it as a good option for my own car. I never got rid of the understeer in my car when I was autoxing and until I do I won't go with a wider rear tire than front tire. I think that eventually I will get to that point so that's not to say that I think it's never a good idea. I figure probably after a V8 conversion I'll need more meat in the back. As it is when I started work on the car there was one turn on one racetrack that required some tact with the gas pedal. On every other turn on every other track I could apex and floor it. By the way according to math that is .8" wider, not 1.25" wider. I know that the tires vary by manufacturer, but 1.25 really doesn't make sense mathematically, it's 20mm wider. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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