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Re: tubed type rearend switch from 68 to 73 , probs ?

To: MG List <mgs@autox.team.net>
Subject: Re: tubed type rearend switch from 68 to 73 , probs ?
From: Barney Gaylord <barneymg@ntsource.com>
Date: Mon, 10 Jun 2002 19:12:44 -0500
At 09:40 AM 6/10/02 -0700, Max Heim wrote:
>on 6/7/02 10:54 PM, Dan Furbish at BarnOwl@world.std.com wrote:
> > and when cornering I can feel the flex or the not total control, 
> there's a wishy washy feel to wire wheels when cornering hard.
>
>I extremely doubt you can feel the wire wheels flex... if you can they are 
>in dangerously poor condition. ....

Oh?

Well I can add a few cents worth here.  My MGA has bolt on wheels.  The 
first time I bought race tires (about 1994) I mounted them on the stock 
stamped and welded steel wheels.  The race tires are of course lots less 
mushy feeling that the street tires, but I was encountering some 
substantial amount of front end shudder on hard tight turns.  For the time 
being I was attributing this to possibly weak shock absorbers, but that was 
ultimately not the case.  I was also getting stress cracks in the steel wheels.

One year later I bought the forged aluminum wheels, and what a 
difference!!!  After that the nose of the car would just swish around the 
corners in the same places on the same pavement with no noticeable bump or 
shudder, and everything was much more controlable.  The only difference is 
that the aluminum wheels are very stiff, and the original steel wheels flex 
like a warped phonograph record.  (We all remember those don't we?)  When 
the steel wheel is substantially stressed and flexed in a hard turn, and it 
hits even the smallest bump in the pavement, the tire will lose some grip 
with the pavement, and the wheel will snap quickly back towards the 
original flat condition.  It then plants itself firmly back on the pavement 
to take up the side load again, and subsequent ripples in the pavement make 
it repeat the little dance.  The aluminum wheels are so much stiffer by 
comparison that they resist the flexing and eliminate the shudder all together.

Now you can speculate all you want as to whether 60 spoke of 72 spoke wire 
wheels may be stiffer than the stamped steel wheels, but in my prior 
experience the 48 spoke wire wheels are definitly more flexible than the 
stamped steel wheels.  Those spokes stretch and retract a lot like tension 
springs, and the wheels can be in perfect condition when it happens.  For 
my money they would have to be 72 spoke wheels, or I wouldn't even try to 
use the race tires on them.  Even then I'd be a little skeptical, because I 
haven't had the opportunity to try it.  But by best guess is that almost 
any aluminum wheel will be stiffer than any wire wheel, and probably would 
make a noticeable difference in handling, especially on a slightly rough 
surface.

$.03,

Barney Gaylord
1958 MGA with an attitude (and a bunch of broken steel wheels)
http://www.ntsource.com/~barneymg

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