RideLust

They’re round, made of rubber and are one of the most important and overlooked parts of your automobile. I’m speaking of course about your cars tires and I must say there’s a helluva’ lot more to them than meets the eye. Since tires are a consumable item people tend to spend more time choosing what they’re going to wear in the morning, than on a piece of equipment that could end up saving their lives. Thankfully though, you have us. The motoring press, the journalists and the die-hard car enthusiasts who try and do our best to educate you on what’s good, bad and downright junk.

This past week I had the opportunity to head down to New Orleans and test out Michelin’s newest all-season tire, the Michelin Pilot Sport A/S 3. However before I share my thoughts with you I want everyone to be aware of something. First off, I’m not getting paid to write this review. Second, I go through A LOT of tires, both high-performance and all-season. And third, I was extremely curious to see if this was going to be some kind of bullshit media event or an all out real life test in real world conditions.

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If you live where winter means snow, now is about the time of year you should be thinking about a switch from summer tires or all season radials to dedicated winter tires. The video below does a good job of illustrating why, but it has one fatal flaw: it compares “summer only” tires, which shouldn’t ever be driven on snow and ice, to dedicated winter tires, which optimize grip on snow and ice, and in low temperatures. Read More…

Apparently back in the 1960′s and early 1970′s women who drove didn’t have the mental capacity to read street signs, dodge potholes or drive in the rain. Thankfully though men everywhere were able to purchase Goodyear Polyglass tires for their cars in order to ensure the safety of their wives. Believe it or not but this was an actual Goodyear commercial from back in the day, and honk my hooter if it’s not the most sexist thing I’ve ever seen. Maybe Goodyear thought that women back then didn’t care about cars, safety or tires. Or maybe, just maybe this was truly the way the company viewed female drivers. Either way though this is one for the record books and one that I’m sure raised a few eyebrows when it was released way back when.

Source: Youtube.com
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The Goodyear Blimp. Image: Sao Paulo 1

I’ll be the first to admit that tire pressure monitoring systems are a very good thing. Most drivers rarely, if ever, check tire pressure, and TPMS systems can at least give you a heads up if you’re about to have a flat tire or blowout. In the grand scheme of things, checking your tire pressure involves about as much time and energy as getting dressed in the morning. Somehow, we all manage to avoid walking around naked, yet we’re utterly incapable of remembering to check the air in our tires from time to time. Read More…

More than any other part on your automobile, your vehicles tires provide you with safety, braking, foul weather performance and confidence, yet they are almost always the most neglected part on a vehicle. For some reason people don’t think about tires. They neglect tire pressures, wear and age, items that all contribute to keeping you safe and sound. Branick Industries provides nitrogen tire inflation systems to companies all over the world. This safety video shows us the effects of how an over inflated tire, on any vehicle can not only cause harm to an individual, but in some cases, death. By utilizing a slow motion Phantom camera, the team at Branick is now able to show us just how dangerous an improperly mounted and inflated tire can be. They’ve also gone as far as to show us that by utilizing a tire inflation cage, the risks of injury can be greatly reduced.
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I always find it amusing that one of the most important pieces of equipment on an automobile is also one of the most neglected. I speak of course about your tires, and it amazes me how little attention people actually pay to them. Understand that your cars tires are the only connection that you, as a driver have to the road. They give you feedback on road conditions, ride quality and are instrumental when it comes to a cars handling and breaking performance. Yet for some reason the majority of people will go for the cheapest tire available just to save a buck, however they’ll spend thousands of dollars on things like stereo systems and rims. It’s a bit frightening actually. I recently swapped out the tires on my 2006 Dodge Magnum SRT8 and was so impressed with their wet weather performance that I just felt the need to write about it.
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This movie officially goes under the classification of “WTF”… Believe it or not but “Rubber” is the story of Robert, the discarded tire that inexplicably comes to life and goes on a homicidal rampage through the desert. For some reason Robert woke up very pissed off and in doing so realized that he possessed the power to literally make peoples heads explode. Sounds intriguing right? Anyway, in his travels he ends up meeting this chick who he kinda’ digs and in the process kills everything in his path to get close to her. At least I think that’s what it’s about, but it may not be, so don’t get all pissy if I’m wrong. Regardless, I’m totally in shock that someone actually made this concept into a full length feature film, but more to the point, I must absolutely go see it when it comes out. Make sure to click through to view the trailer – peace.
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I remember back in high school that if you had a car and wanted to make it look faster you’d simply slap on some white lettered tires and wallah – instant horsepower! White lettered tires back then were the equivalent of what big wings on imports are today. Sure they look good (well sometimes), but at the end of the day they end up doing less then nothing in terms of performance. I have to admit though that they do look good on certain vehicles. Muscle cars for example, with stock rally or steel wheels look great with the white lettered writing facing outward. Take this beauty of a Plymouth Road Runner for example… we’ve got stock 15-inch rally wheels and a great looking set of BF Goodrich Radial T/A’s. The entire combination just screams VINTAGE while enhancing the entire look of the car.
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NASA probably isn’t sending anyone to hoon around on the moon anytime soon, but that didn’t stop the space agency from developing a new set of tires for the moon buggy. Each tire is made from wire mesh and has 800 springs to absorb impact. They do not go flat, even over the gnarliest moon rocks. They also weigh less than the last generation of moon tires, which is a big deal when you’re shooting stuff into space. The tires will likely end up on rover-type robots, but one can always hope an enterprising privateer will build another moon buggy for our enjoyment.

Source: Gizmodo

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Now that winter is upon us, and most of the US is dealing with cold, snow or some mixture of both, here are two videos that prove the merits of winter tires over their all-season or summer-only counterparts. If you live where the white stuff falls on a regular basis, you really do need to invest in a good set of winter tires, as these videos dramatically demonstrate. If the winter tires help you avoid a single accident, you’ve recovered the cost of buying them.

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