Just kidding. Screw that piece of crap. I put it on my parent's property to make room and on the way I locked the brakes for about 100 ft and dropped the front end off the road. But it's fine.

Now, I'm straight up ballin' son.

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Black leather, climate control (yick), 6 CD changer, 6-speaker MONSOON system, power everything, heated seats and mirrors, power sunroof.

I love this car... so much...

I got 32 MPG driving 55 on the highway with a 6 cylinder engine!

For the civilised people, that's 7.4 l/100km. Which is 1 litre too much for any car that doesn't weigh 1500kg, really.

jhuuskon: you know it's 6 cylinder engine.
Chris: what type of VW is that? Jetta?

I remember him asking about a jetta in a thread a while back. Nice car! How much did you end up paying?

I know, but it's still unacceptable.

edit: With a car about the same age that weighs the same and the same power and torque output, a figure of 6.5l/100km is easily attainable with skill. Even the facelifted 406 with the outdated ES9 V6 beats the VR6 in power and torque numbers and has an extra 300kg over the Bora at the scale (not to mention being one notch higher in size class), yet it still easily reaches 7.5l/100km without much effort.

My point: Deathwish needs to hone his economical driving skills before he starts bragging with mileage.

Speaking of fuel efficiency, I sold my Uno. I need something with a little bigger engine now that my driving has shifted from the city onto the road. The 1.1 is magnifcient in the city but its fuel consumption rises sharply after speed goes above 80km/h.

The turbo diesel versions of the Jetta are pretty good, and for long distances driving...they get a lot more MPG. They are pretty awesome cars.

Yes, Dullswagen makes pretty nice turbodiesel engines now that they abandoned the pump nozzle idea and switched to common rail like other reasonable engine builders. For an Audi their turbodiesels are an excellent compliment.

I really should go try out some new turbodiesels to see if they've gotten rid of the annyoing turbo lag.

As boy racer cars go (which is probably what you want given previous threads), it's a pretty dull and ugly looking thing, something my granny would drive. Big engine aside.

That's my opinion, of course

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I'm not arguing about that, thinking about my previous reply again I really need to hone my sarcasm skills.

You have much to learn about the US my friend. For a V6, it's almost unheard of. For a car in general in the US, it's barely below highest you'll ever see of 40 MPG (which a POS Honda gets with 100 hp) without going hybrid. Which is just stupid.

32 mpg is 5 mpg above EPA.

Looks like someone hates VWs... I can feel the envy through the screen.

I. Do not. Want another POS ricer boy car. Just so I can go joy riding around the corners and then wonder like a little bitch why the CV joints and tie rod ends keep getting blown out. Children drive Hondas. I'm driving lush. The trunk of this thing is big enough to fit three rows of 12" subwoofers (just for a dimensional example).

This car is sexy as hell from the inside. Black leather, sound system. It makes a Cadillic XLR interior (that I parked next to today) look like it was done in china.

I think the exterior is sexy too.

Nice car, I'd roll it.

You mean it gets 32mpg instead of 36? Yes, the difference is substantial...................

The USA is still a minority when compared to the whole rest of the world.

Congrats. I wouldn't call it a cool car, but hopefully it's as reliable as you'd hoped.

I pride myself at being a car guy. Even though I don't yet have a lot of experience under the hood, I do have a lot of experience checking them out. Cars are never "sexy". Personally, it annoys me when people describe everything as sexy. Calling a Jetta sexy is something I would expect from a girl... And I don't mean girl like Danica Patrick either. I mean Paris Hilton or Britney Spears.

I take umbrage to that sir. My pos Honda is a '92, has 167 thousand miles on it, gets about 200 miles per tank city, can do 90 mph; at least I think it is 90. When I drive by those automated radar thingies my speedometer says 20 but the thing says 30. But my point is the thing still does the job pretty well. As to your car Chris, congrats, should we start a pool to see how long before you kill it?

Some people honestly do get turned on by cars, as bizarre as that sounds. So to them, a car can be sexy.

And I find it quite ironic that the very page you link to for a definition of sexy has this: 3. excitingly appealing; glamorous: a sexy new car.

Obviously I didn't read the examples or I would have chosen a different source. My opinion still stands. I still think it's bitch to use it to describe anything except for the opposite sex (or at least things that hint towards it; a Jetta not being one of them)... Not that the world agrees with me... There are probably millions of women this instant with their asses hanging out of half a skirt frivolously telling guys not to objectifying them. I've already given up.

Yeah... Sure... Just remove the 40lbs of heroin hidden in the trunk and you're good to go

Jetta trunk
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Cars in America, when loved, are considered female. It's not odd for females to name their cars female names. So sexy can still apply once you've applied a female personification. For example, anything James Bond drives or touches, is inherently sexy. Austin Martin DB9s are sexy. Think of it as looking at sexy clothes at Victoria's Secret. You're not exactly "aroused" by the clothes, but you know they're sexy.

Bob Keane: It's not to be taken as a personal attack. 99% of kids who drive Hondas don't realize one thing: As good as it is (because they are good cars) it's still a Honda. Which means it's not race car and its not that fast. So dropping a huge spoiler, bazooka muffler, rims, carbon fiber hood on your mom's old car is the same as ... dropping a huge spoiler, bazooka muffler, rims, and carbon fiber hood on your moms car.

It's like dropping a suped up Chevy 350 into Nova or F150. It's been done before. Except... in this case, the guy with the 350 actually has a fast car with a sexy American V8 burble sound to it. If I die never hearing the obligatory "wiiiizzzzzzzz" of a fat pipe on a honda 4-banger again, I'll die happy.

Okay, I had fun with that last part so I'll really sum it up. Hondas are great cars. They earned their position as a car company in America. However, as a piece of fashion, they are over done. (Which makes them inheriently "not cool") They are not better than Aston Martins. They aren't better than BMWs. So for all these people to drive around like they own the place in their cars that are only notable because of a movie they saw ("The Fast and the Furious") is straight up silly. Hence my usage of the word childish.

VR6 Jettas are rare here. That's some sexy points. Black leather on black body reminds you of a stealth bomber. More points. 5-speed and power everything is more points. A rare V6 that uses one head, more points. German made, more points. All it needs is some nice (but not over-the-top) shiney silver rims.

I'm not here telling anyone that this is the greatest car ever made on any level. It's clear to me that it's not on even a single level. That's not the point. The point is that it does everything I want it to very well. The handling is precise but smooth. As is the power delivery. The interior is lush, decently laid out, and very comfortable. For $7700 (after tax) and only 85000 miles on it, I struck gold and I'm very happy with it. I never would have dreamt that I could own such a jack-of-all-trades car. And I'm happy and thankful!

Not a good analogy. The arousal in that case comes from visualising a woman wearing the lingere.

Just because they're occasionally referred to by feminine pronouns doesn't mean they're literally considered female. It's just natural for straight males to refer to things they love as feminine, but taking it seriously is taking it out of context. Personifying a car is worse than personifying a cat. It's ultimately a machine whose primary function should be working^[1] and whose secondary function, if any, should be looking and sounding cool while doing it.

You should be aroused by what you're imaging inside them. Take that away and they're just meaningless fibers.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with a suped-up Honda. What's wrong is imitation cars that are fitted with purely cosmetic mods to look or sound fast when really the internals are stock or otherwise underwhelming.

An import is a relatively inexpensive way to build a relatively fast car. And honestly, rice rockets are nearly as cool as American muscle. They're made for the same thing: speed. American muscle just does it much cooler.

Fashion is a woman's domain. Cars are not a fashion statement. Ever.

Again, I think your Jetta looks like a nice car on a scale of average cars, but it's not nice when compared to dream cars or anything like that. So I don't mean to put down your wheels. I'm happy for you.

I'm guessing you mean fashion as in clothing? You've never seen a men's fashion show before? Plus, as many designers are male as female (and they're not all gay).

If you buy a car to portray a certain look, then you're making a fashion statement. Always.

screw it with the fuel efficiency flame war jhuukson is starting, drive it and love it son!

Edit, Chris, awsome ride son, now take of pic of you posing with your car like i did

edit 2:

You'd be surprised how good looks can be handy. Fashion is a good thing to know about. And a man's car and how he maintains it is his style and personality.

No more than any other object though.

LennyLen, it's an expensive and cool object, sometimes i like to wear matching colors to my car. It can get you from A to B in style or not, depending on how much you care about appearances.

I prefer repainting my car to match my clothes.

My car cost me less than I was earning a week at the time. It certainly wasn't expensive (my PC cost six times more than my car), and I don't see anything cool about it either. It's been handy, certainly, but not cool. Don't get me wrong, I certainly think there are cool cars. Mine, however, is not one of them.

That's nice, and it shows that your car does reflect your personality and style. But to some of us, a car is no more or no less than any other object.

I work (when I'm able to work) in an industry where appearance counts more than pretty much anything else, so appearance is important to me. However, since I can't have my car behind the bar, I don't really give a damn that it looks like a piece of crap.

I don't hate the cars. Nor am I envious. It makes me angry that the corporation has the technology and skills to make the most awesome cars the planet holds, yet they decidedly make them look and feel dull.

That extra litre, with any substantial commuting, makes quite a bit difference in any european country (gasoline costs over 3 times as much here than in the US). The last time I refuelled, regular 95 octane cost 1.329€/litre, that is 7.13 USD/gal.

The only sexy Volkswagen ever made... Hmm. Such thing doesn't exist as a sexy Volkswagen. The new Seat Ibiza Cupra gets close but not quite as it is built on Volkswagen technology but it looks and feels vastly different (due to much shoddier workmanship).

Are you sure they don't bring them over from Mexico instead?

What do you think the Mini, Fiat Nuova 500 and the Alfa Romeo brand as a whole are?

Even the expensive cars are a fashion statement. Think to it, what else would you do of a 300 horse power car when you can only drive to 130 km/h max on highways ?

They're not a fashion statement but a statement of exuberance in luxury.

Luxury and fashion are compatible only occasionally, for brief periods and selected items.

Thank you, sir!

Definitely. I need to wash it again. Black goes dirty quick!

Okay. So I think we're confusing generalities with specifics.

Your computer, means something to you. You like computers. You can tell the difference between an AMD and an Intel. It represents you in some way or another. So you put money into it and you like doing that. But most people can't tell the difference.

I plan to start a car company... so I definitely like cars. And while I know that no car makes me valuable (just as no nice set of clothing makes me valuable), I do enjoy it and am willing to pay more than someone would for a clunker. Especially for something reliable because I'm moving away.

The same applies to anything. Archery, fishing, and so on. Your checkbook shows where your heart is. Some people love ATVs. Some people love knitting. There's nothing wrong with that as long as it doesn't possess your life to the point of hurting other aspects of it.

Given archery: To everyone else, a bow is a bow. They can't tell your finely crafted compound bow with the 150 lb test with the guided laser range finder. But amoungst people who do know their field, they can tell the difference. My VR6 is just a black car to many. But to those who know cars and know what it is, it's something special (personal preference aside).

At the very least, it's special to me.

You just described every American company except... VW still does it better in fuel economy and interior quality... and ride quality...

German designed then. On that level, there's more American parts in a Jetta or Corolla than a Mustang.

I've been thinking of buying a beater for the hell of it, drive it till it croaks and then scrap it. I found this cheap 1990 Opel Kadett GT for sale nearby that has inspection valid up to december. The Kadett is known particularly for shoddy construction and very, very easily rusting bodywork but it has running gear that can withstand an A-bomb.

Buying, driving and scrapping beaters is cheaper and economically more beneficial than buying a new car and selling it because:
1. Building a car produces carbon emissions equal to 180 000 km's worth of commuting.
2. As the vehicle will be scrapped anyway, resale value is of no concern and therefore maintenance of non-safety components maybe neglected to minimise total cost.
3. The amount of money lost during ownership due to purchase and sale price difference is 100% (scrapping is free but finland has no scrapping reward system) but total loss of money is much less than the depreciation of a newer car. Not to mention the money spent keeping it serviced properly.
4. Cars not worth much money are cheaper to insure.
5. You don't have to worry so much about the car when you know it'll be smelted by the end of the year anyway.
6:. You'll be doing the world a favour by removing an old polluting and unsafe vehicle from the road and scrapping the materials for recycling. Last I heard from a reliable source, 85% of the weight of a car can be recycled.

Get speeding tickets. And occasionally go to licensed race tracks. Besides, it's not all about top speed. It's also about how quickly you can get to the speed limit.

Not at all. My point was that a car does not have to be expensive. It's only expensive if you're willing to spend a lot of money on it.

As I said, just like any other object.

Or are you trying to say theirs no such thing as a cheap car in the USA? Because there's a lot of them over here (granted, we probably have a much higher percentage of cheap Japanese imports than America does).

there's

Of course there are cheap cars, at least relative to the expensive ones.

I know that fact all too well...

If that is true, I really wonder how much my last car cost... My current car is about $10,000 new.

I think that's IFF you want full coverage, i.e. for the insurance company to buy you a new car if you wreck it or it gets stolen, etc.

Back in the '60's and '70's they charged much more for minimum liability if you bought a high horsepower car, that's why Chrysler and GM stated their engines horsepower ratings as significantly lower than actual output. (426 hemi horsepower was stated as 426 horsepower, actual output on dyno was "how far do you want to rev it?")

Mmmmmz, 426^[1]... That's a lovely number, isn't it.

Except the american companies don't even have the skill to make a decent car why do you think they are all going bankrupt?

I've been driving a 1997 Ford Crown Victoria for the last 3 months as a cab, and I love it. It's already got 225K? miles on it, got new ball joints and bushings on the front end a month ago (been T-boned twice since then) and it still can outrun, outhaul, and just outdo any "stick your pinky out when drinking the foreign tea" car any day. There are several little problems, such as the climate control tempurature servomechanism being sluggish, and there seems to be some permanent disfigurement in the windshield directly in front of your eyes, but I love it. Oh, yeah, it's an old cop car. (hope the boss ain't reading) It's been beaten light to light drag racing by a new version Dodge Charger (sounded stock), a Ford Mustang that sounds like a top fueler, and a Honda was so hopped up it couldn't idle at the red light without feathering the throttle. I haven't maxed it out on curvy roads because that requires serious practice without passengers and also not adding too many unpaid miles to the meter, but I wish it had the full monty bucket seats to keep me from sliding around.

American car companies can and do make quality cars. However, the market is a motherfucker and obviously foreign companies are sometimes able to do it cheaper (they can also get away with more; when a Japanese company releases a little car it's normal, but when an American brand does they're mocked for it). Where I live, 60-70% of people drive 1 ton pickup trucks (which really makes me wonder how the Hell the big three are even suffering ). I have no doubt that over the years there have been some poor quality decisions made for the survival of the companies, but I've personally been in PoS Nissans, Volkswagens, Toyotas, etc, too. Fortunately, British and French cars don't make it this far. There are a lot of variables that need to be considered to really understand why the American companies are struggling. Sure there have been some management fuck ups, as there are in any company, but I'd still hate to see them go (well, OK, I'm not really a big fan of Ford, so I wouldn't cry if they went).

My parents have a '94. The computer is junk and cruise control and all of that had to be disabled due to a defect. The car is pretty fun to drive once you get used to it, but I'm always driving around a front-wheel drive Pontiac Grand Prix so I'm never used to it anymore when I do drive it. The wheel is so large that you can turn it with a pinky, which is a major change and generally very uncomfortable until I get used to it (which I rarely get a chance to). That said, I have had some good fun with it, doing corners sideways, etc. Purely accidental, I'm sure. There is noticeable delay in the accelerator (the same was felt from a previously owned '89) which drives me crazy, but once it kicks in it definitely has some get up and go (probably not nearly as much as an ex-cop car though).

I feel that. I absolutely hate that feeling of being pushed out of your seat. I'd love to get bucket seats and 5-point racing harnesses.

That's probably a "backwards compatible" thing from the old days before power steering. The old fogeys that normally buy big cars like Crown Vics hate the 10 inch steering wheels with hard foam so thick you can get a handful of grip.

Also, the owner of this cab asked a junkyard how much it would cost for a "normal" engine computer to tame the power down, but they wanted $250 US, so she declined. I didn't mention the possibility that lots of stock Crown Vic owners would be very glad to swap at no charge . OTOH, I drove a stock Crown Vic a year ago, it was able to beat a Mustang whose owner had more lead in his foot than sense. The passenger probably teased him in front of all their buddies all the next day about how his hot Mustang couldn't beat a taxicab.

I wish I had an old(late 70s, early 80s) diesel rabbit with a 5-speed.. that would be nice, because I'm cheap.

I love my integra, she pulls strong, perfect running condition!!

The logic is that you can go by with minimal traffic insurance for a really cheap car because it's not worth insuring it any further than the law requires.

Fixed. It's only for Opel for GM and Ford's european division and Mazda for Ford why they are still afloat.

However, buying any car is buying a time bomb. The only difference between new and old is how far back you want it the spring to be wound up. If you can afford to be towed, and can afford to be randomly out of a car--buy an old one. It'll save you tons of money. However, people away at college can't really afford that luxury. Especially those who want to road trip long distances.

Moreover, a $150 clutch is a $150 clutch (plus $300 labour). Regardless of it being an $8000 car or an $800 car. The first is a no brainer. The second is a consideration for a "new" beater car.

Ford is afloat because of the F150. GM is too huge to survive with only one good vehicle. Chrysler can't make a good truck ( horrible transmission failure rates).

Oh yes, i entirely forgot of the hillbillymobile. You are right in that, it probably is a major contributing factor for Ford's survival (should ford's european operations be separated from the us operations, the euro half would make actual profit while the F150 alone would perhaps float ford enough to avoid chapter 11).

Congrats Chris! Enjoy your sweet ride I own a cheap little hyundai but I found it and I bought it, so I love it! I am surprisingly very attached to my car.

Hey, that's a cool noise. Sounds like my weedwhacker, except the weedwhacker prolly has more power.

Strange.. the 727 automatic is usually noted as a very strong an reliable transmission. Of course, they might use something altogether different by now.. It was introduced in what, the 60s? Though our 84 dodge ram and my dad's 95 dodge ram have it.

But if you want to see transmission failure, look at a GM with a 700R4 overdrive transmission. All we did was overhaul them. I guess they like to make overdrive trannies fairly flimsy, though my dad's 95 has an overdrive extension on the back that seems to have held up over 200,000 miles before needing an overhaul.

[edit]

One other question, why is it that newer diesels all get worse mileage than they did before? An old rabbit would get 45-57 mpg given what I've read, but a new diesel jetta or whatever is lucky to hit anything in that range, even the prius can't match it. And our 6.2 diesels with 4 speed overdrive trannies would get 18-21 mpg, for a full size 3/4 ton vehicle.. I hear that the newer ones can't really reach that either.

My friends new diesel Jetta pulls 55-60 MPG.

A/C pulls more.
Emissions equipment pulls more (soot filters, mufflers, etc)
Heavier cars (brakes destroy energy. period.)
Larger cars (drag force due to air is the cross sectional area times coefficient of drag)
Higher speed limits
Poor driving habits

As for Dodge, there's plenty of stories on YouTube and online about people driving Dodge trucks whose transmission died in less than 20,000 miles, was rebuilt, and died again. At which point, Chrysler would refuse warranty or something similar. I'm sure there's a class action lawsuit somewhere. There's a reason Nissan took the third place best truck seller from Dodge (with the "Titan") : Quality.

Energy cannot be created or destroyed. What brakes do is convert useful kinetic energy into completely useless heat.

If you consider slowing down and/or stopping useless. The heat itself isn't much use, but it's the byproduct of a useful transfer of energy, so I'd say it serves a purpose...

Yes, it's contributing to global warming, so no more braking!!!

I read online a comparison between the new diesel Jetta and a shitty Prius, the jetta did even worse than the Prius' 44 or so MPG.. But I suppose the people reviewing it could've been morons(or perhaps weren't actually comparing the diesel like they said). Now I won't only have to consider a 30 year old vehicle(and thank god, old rabbits in good condition without rust are hard to find).

As for everything else, I have no idea what you're rambling about. Newer cars aren't generally larger or heavier. And likely have better aerodynamics.

As for newer chrysler transmissions, I suppose I'm not surprised if any of their new 4, 5, or 6 speed automatics suck. Pretty much any big vehicle we've had with a 4 speed automatic needed an overhaul almost constantly, and they were GMs. The only exception is my dad's 95 truck which has a 727 in it with an overdrive extension on the back.

Though admittedly my sister's Durango she just got has a transmission leak, I have no idea how many miles are on it, it's not exactly new.

... and I saw a blue Prius. Do you actually have these cars around? Did you know that the vehicle is so light, that if you stick your hand out of the window on a higway the vehicle will tuuuuuuurn?

1. Prius battery pack is a wearing part and needs to be replaced a few times during the car's lifetime. In this process the old battery pack becomes toxic waste, and the new battery pack costs a lot of money. When servicing is taken into account, the Prius becomes actually less ecological and economical than a modern diesel.

2. Diesel fuel is significantly cheaper than gasoline outside north america.

3. Car journalists as a rule suck at driving economically. 4l/100km is not even difficult task for any diesel car from the last decade.

Unfortunately you're wrong. Most long lasting model lines have in fact, grown up a size class during their life span.

Examine the weights of the Volkswagen Golf (that's Rabbit for the north american market):
1979: 790kg 1983: 850kg 1991: 960kg 1997: 1170 2003: 1150kg.

Worth noting that from the 1997 model onwards the Golf's ongoing growth in size caused it to shift class from supermini to small family car.

Or how about the competing model range from Peugeot: 1983 205: 750kg, 1993 206: 1025kg, 2007 207: 1250kg.

We can even compare Peugeot's large family car range: 1955 403: 1050kg, 1961 404: 1050kg, 1983 405: 1050kg, 1996 406: 1300kg, 2004 407: 1500kg.

How about the Toyota Corolla then, it's a nice long-lasting model: 1966: 700kg, 1970: 730kg, 1974: 865g, 1979: 840, 1983: 890kg, 1987: 930kg, 1991: 990kg, 1995: 1100kg, 2000: 1050kg, 2003: 1030kg, 2007: 1220kg.

You can see this same development in pretty much any model that has lasted from the early 80's to the present day.

AFAIK, it's been known as both in North America. I think the Rabbit name was limited in use.

And also ugly as hell.

Well, that's because they're GMs. You just need trannies that don't suck.

Don't forget that by the time you start to break even on the added cost of buying a hybrid is when the battery pack needs replacement.

Hybrids aren't very useful or a good idea IMO. They're just for those rich folk with more bank than brain who want to feel like they're helping the environment without actually doing anything. I say we start driving CNG powered cars - that will buy us time w/o oil worries to start building nuke plants and making hydrogen.

Most definitely. I had a friend who had a Golf. And it said Golf on the car, not Rabbit.

Hybrid cars are a complete marketing lie. Battery technology hasn't arrived. And nobody has bothered to consider how much it costs to replace two drive trains, let alone one.

Diesels are great. Stupid people don't like them.

Gasoline engines are great, but coupled to horrific cars.

Now this is interesting. I found out that the well-to-wheel efficiency (the efficiency of producing power from its original source all the way to your car) is actually horrible for electricity. In the USA, the average petroleum production efficiency is somewhere around 83%, whereas electricity is 30%. ^[1]

So the 190 (gas equivalent) MPG of the Tesla Roadster, is actually reduced to 57 MPG. So everything that the Tesla gives us, is negated by our power infrastructure! And while you can go 0-60 in some 4 seconds, you're still barely getting more efficiency than a hybrid car. Great car. Horrible infrastructure.

Don't be so quick to call my information rambling. I've been studying cars for years. Not only have cars gotten heavier (which requires more kinetic energy converted to heat every time you brake), they've also gotten larger cross-sectional areas (looking at a car straight on, the width and height taken up).

1996 Sebring drag was .36, and the 2006 Sebring is .34. Firstly, for ten years of development, that improvement is something to be expected from children. I could explain the theory behind "tuft testing" and literal children would have gained more than .02 reduction in drag.

Now I don't have the cross sectional area for my 1996 Sebring unfortunately online, the 2006 is 2.33 m^2, HOWEVER, it should be obvious from the following numbers:

1996
Width 69.7 in
Height 53.3 in

2006
Width 71.2 in
Height 59 in

That the cross sectional area is going to be larger on the second. So in ten years, they gained no ground aerodynamically, and managed to make the car look ugly as sin. I took a picture with my Sebring juxtaposed against a new one... but I can't find it yet.

More on aerodynamics, the advancement in that field with regard to cars has been almost null. Compare any car to any plane, or any fuel-efficiency competition vehicle, and cars are orders of a magnitude worse. A 1955 Cessna 172M has a Coefficent of Drag of only 0.027. Note the zero on that one.

The increase in weight over time might have a lot to do with safety standards. For example, the Volkswagen Golf Mk.1 was a death trap, and I'm guessing the new Golfs are not.

It's an acquired taste..!

The Mustang started out as a relatively light (for the time) compact car, which ballooned over the next few years into the fairly large Mustang Mach I. Then the OPEC crisis prompted the uselessly small Mustang II, which has eventually evolved again into a fairly heavy car. I was using a floor jack on one a few years ago to change a motor mount, and was surprised how much effort it took to pump the handle as opposed to, say, a Volvo or Chevy Lumina.

Just one quick addition to clarify this before it expands:

It has none to do with safety. Newer cars are safer by design--by correct placement of structural loads. Gas-charged airbags weigh nothing. ABS electronics weigh nothing. Moreover, aluminum block engines cut the weigh of engines by hundreds of pounds over their cast iron counterparts. Plastic manifolds do the same, over aluminum ones. My Jetta has plastic water pump blades (although I do NOT approve of that for durability reasons.)

So drive trains are getting lighter, but cars are getting heavier.

One of my biggest pet peaves is large rims. The larger the rim, the heavier the rim, the more the unsprung weight of the suspension system. This results in worse feeling and handling of your cars suspension (unsprung inertia has to be moved before the suspension system even begins to follow the road). If big rims were good, why do NO professional race cars use them? Once again, the car companies have settled with form over function (as if 18" rims really looked good to begin with).

The original reason for large rims was smaller tire sidewalls, to reduce flex and the resultant "peeling" of tread from the tire contact patch with the road. The use of alloys (early use of magnesium lead the the moniker of "mag" wheels) reduces unsprung weight. I wouldn't have most of the aftermarket "gosh, look at me" wheels for sale now though, I've seen the results of a BMW that had fancy wheels actually break while negotiating a gentle curve at 130 mph (210 kph). The resultant ball of twisted sheet metal was pretty much unrecognizable.

I used to watch all of the automotive TV shows that they used to have (predominantly on TNT -> Spike TV) on weekends. And IIRC, they each said that larger rims result in better handling. I assume because of stiffer tires. The downside being ride quality, I assume because there's less give in the tires. I've never had a car with large rims so I can't say.

I think large rims look better than standard-sized rims, but they need to suit the car too. Some cars look great with smaller rims. For example, cop cars look good with their traditional rims and would look wrong with large rims. I also think most trucks look silly with large rims. And really, if you want a vehicle with good handling, a large pickup truck is the wrong place to start, so there's little to no performance benefits to it as well. So trucks usually look silly with large rims. Some cars though, predominantly sports cars and tuners, can look awesome with large rims.

Form follows function, not vice-versa. If a new "weird looking" gadget significantly outperforms the previous gadgets, it'll quickly become thought of as "cool" and "good looking". Kind of like that "meh" girl who turns out to know how to make a sammich, suck the chrome off a bumper hitch, doesn't mind you being on the computer 5 hours a day, etc. After you've lived with her a few weeks, (and she doesn't turn out to have a hidden underside) she looks pretty good.

But after that comes the less than functional versions that try to differentiate themselves by looking different, regardless of functionality.

Ride softness (all things equal with suspension and car weight) depends on the aspect ratio of the tire. A higher aspect yields a better softness (more travel within the air/rubber than going through the suspension) but yields more tread distortion (and subsequently less road handling adhesion).

Bigger tires radially in racing are for increasing the heat dissipation and reducing the heat generated in tire sidewalls. Less sidewall deflection given a certain weight means less internal heat generated from the flexing, and larger tires allow the flexing region longer time to cool before flexing again.

Bigger tires sideways don't increase the coefficient of friction (so no more road handling benefit), they only increase the possible area on the ground for that coefficient to occur in as well as spread out the force trying to rip the rubber off.

I've heard that with less flex, manufacturers can use harder, better gripping rubber without it suffering from cracking due to sidewall flex. However, I have no source for that.

So the benefits of a larger rim size are: Cooling and to a lesser extent, higher probability of reaching the maximum coefficient of friction.

The drawbacks, however, are weight and aerodynamics. A wider tire increases your cross sectional area, and creates a larger wake both behind it and from the grooves; which increases your coefficient of drag. The weight is especially important because the quality of your ride can be expressed in the ratio of sprung weight to unsprung weight. The lower the number (the more weight not held up by the suspension), the more the entire body will move given the same amount of suspension travel. In other words, a car with super-light suspension can theoretically move it's tires over bumps without any real force entering the car it suspends. You can drive over any bumps without even feeling it. The more you weigh down your wheels, the more force you're putting into your car before the wheel can react.

Another factor is rotational inertia. You engine has to spin up itself, the drive train, and your wheels. The heavier that is, the slower your car accelerates for the same power output and body weight. The inertia of a uniform rotating disc about its axis is I=MR^2. Where M is mass and R is radius. So increasing either of those makes your car slower still. But it's worse for a wheel! A wheel has much more of its mass further from its center than a uniform disc, so the formula changes to something even higher.

Are we talking about width or diameter?

Softer tires tend to grip better, hence "gumball" drag slicks. For rigid bodies, friction doesn't depend on area so much as pressure and composition of materials. At least, I read that in a book, which urged me to measure friction of pulling a brick across a wooden table in various positions with a spring scale.

But tires aren't rigid, so more pressure causes roughness of the road to dig into the tread a little bit, like gear teeth. Also, "dead" rubber (that would make a ball that wouldn't bounce) will absorb energy as the rough points slide along the tread.

Reducing unsprung weight is mostly so the weight of the car isn't overwhelmed by the bouncing of the tires mass as you hit bumps. Think of attaching a little plastic model to some regular car tires and roll it across a speed bump. The whole thing will fly up in the air quite easily. Old Cadillacs had a reputation for a smoother ride than the equivalent body style Chevys, because a couple hundred pounds of extra plushness held the car steadier while the tires jumped up and down over potholes and bumps.

Since the car is steadier, the springs and shocks can do a much better job of holding the tire to the ground at a relatively steady pressure, which results in better traction.

bamccaig:

I said quite a mouthful and I was still proof-reading my post (hit post too early!) so to clarify:

"Radially" is referring to larger diameter tires. This is from a higher aspect ratio, or larger rim size.

"Sideways" is referring to the width of the tires. A wider rim uses a wider tire.

However, using that same perspective: Less pressure would result in more molding of the rubber around surfaces, increasing grip. That's why they deflate tires off road. But inflated tire pressure isn't the same thing as a car's weight being put through the tire. So I'm not sure what you're going for here.

That's the ratio I mentioned. Which has a direct correlation to ride quality. If you watch a wheel of a car, they'll move 6 inches up and down constantly just traveling a flat stretch of highway. This is force transmitted straight into the car. This is also why Subaru switched to aluminum A-arms for its WRXes (and maybe others). It reduced the unsprung weight, and bettered the ride quality. If you throw heavy rims and tires given everything-else-is-equal, you will reduce the quality of the ride. Hence, for most cases, heavier rims is a bad idea.