/ staggering, etc, I feel that there is a core few here that are basically putting the frighteners on new Mk3 owners un-necessarily?Certainly, when I originally hinted at 17 wheels all-round with same-width tyres, I was told in no uncertain terms that:
I WOULD END UP IN A DITCH!!Now following this I started looking into this statement, and more importantly, how this opinion may have originated .
After all, we are simply disagreeing about essentially an extra couple of square centimeters of rear tyre contact with the road ?
Given that there are almost limitless combinations of tyre size, compounds, road conditions, vehicle speed, etc, it seems the statement is somewhat misleading .
What has probably happened is that someone has had an
incident, lost it on a corner and ended up in the ditch
Now when this is mentioned people have jumped to conclusions and assumed that it MUST be down to the tyres .
.? Then the Chinese whisper syndrome kicks in
Someone else loses it on a corner:
The same thing happened to someone I know, and it was the tyre stagger, etc
So it is incomprehensible that PERHAPS they were driving a little too fast, did not show the required respect for a mid-engined car, had a binding brake caliper, hit a patch of wet leaves
/ oil, etc,etc
?!Now I appreciate that the stagger will obviously have SOME effect on handling, but there are a LOT of other more significant variables:
Binding brakes, tyre profile, tyre tread depth, tyre wear across the tread, suspension wear, etc .
And this is just on a standard car !
If you then consider that any mods will also affect the handling: engine conversions, uprating suspension, adding ARBs, aero enhancements, different size alloys, uprated brakes
Having driven MR2s for a decade now, I DO agree with one thing: you need to learn to drive a mid-engined car .
I can understand people warning newcomers about the POSSIBLE danger of mixed tyres, stagger, alloy size, etc.
Take a typical example:
A guy has always fancied an MR2 Roadster
(who wouldnt!?). Currently drives a Golf.Looks on Autotrader, finds a nice MR at the right price, buys it, drives it home.
Now its very likely the alloys are blistered, so he looks online for a nice new set of rims: 17 package deal from Halfords for
£399
nice!Buys them, sorted .
.!Monday morning, takes car for a blat on some
B roads..loses it
crashes
writes off car
!SO what caused the crash?
The tyres? Possible, but doubtful
More than likely, it was because he was trying to drive it like his Golf, and HAD NOT GOT THE HANG OF THE CARS HANDLING!
Sorry Ive talked this through with several very good engineers and its a fact:
LACK OF TYRE STAGGER WILL NOT CAUSE YOU TO END UP IN A DITCH!
Driving like a t**t, speeding in a car you are not familiar with on unfamiliar roads WILL, on the other hand.
.!Basically the sensible approach is this: buy the wheels
/ tyres you WANT to buy.Then take it easy, until you know the handling learn the car.
.!By all means experiment with different tyres
/ wheel sizes: after all even Toyota got it wrong initially, changing the rear tyre width at the last minute
This was to make the handling less radical, thereby watering it down, making the car have a more universal appeal.Maybe they were worried that people driving MR cars for the first time would be
caught out by an unforgiving rear end, and this would generate bad press
?This is not to say that it makes it dangerous, though, surely.
.?This IS a can of worms: volumes have been written on car handling .
.But the fact remains that there are simply too many variables all contributing to the overall picture, and it is simply misleading to scare newcomers to the Mk3 .
I dont remember any similar dramas when I first got my Mk1: people run all sorts of different wheels
/ tyre sizes / profiles on them without any youll end up in a ditch statements
.?Now I wonder why that is.
.? 
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