Toyota GR86, 86, FR-S and Subaru BRZ Forum & Owners Community - FT86CLUB - View Single Post - PSA- Don't race on streets. Could Stance have created this crash?

Yardjass · 11-14-2016, 01:35 PM

There's a difference between stance causing a crash and stance not helping matters. You have two main factors to consider with stance:

1. Stretched tires: This one is pretty straight forward. Stretching a skinny tire onto a wheel means you will have less contact patch touching the ground simply because the tread isn't as wide. Additionally, tires aren't designed for this kind of stupid shit and when not mounted per the manufacturer's instructions, they are more likely to blow out. This is stupid at factory camber specs, albeit significantly less stupid than with excessive camber also thrown into the mix. Which brings me to my next point.

2. Camber: Camber is a good thing and a necessary thing, and increased negative camber can even bring you performance benefits if it isn't taken too far. However, "Stance" levels of extreme camber mean significantly reduced contact patch. When combined with excessive tire stretch, it also means you could be riding on the edge of the tread and possibly even on the upper part of the sidewall.

So, where does this get us? Well, tire companies spend large sums of money to design and test tires that are safe at speeds far higher than we are legally allowed to go. These guys are looking out for us, and this is the reason that tire blowouts, especially in the absence of some sort of object causing the puncture, are very uncommon occurrences. However, at no point during their design work do they consider that complete idiots are going to be stretch mounting tires outside the factory spec, riding on the edge of the tread or sidewalls, etc. Forget the simple fact that your braking distance skyrockets and your ability to perform an emergency avoidance maneuver is significantly affected when you're using a small fraction of your tire's tread. When you stance a car, you're not even using the f***ing tire in a way that it was designed to be used.

I've had a lot of idiots tell me that they've been driving a stanced car safely for years and nothing bad has happened so therefore, it is okay. The fact is when you design a tire that is tough enough for 200 mph or more, a side effect of that will be that idiots will probably be able to get away with using them improperly and only going 65. Also, we don't tend to use anywhere near the maximum performance capabilities of our tires in day to day driving so the detrimental effects of "stance" may go unnoticed.

It is also very difficult to prove that stance was the cause of an accident, especially without a video. I think it is realistic that a court could rule an accident caused by a tire blowout was caused by stance, even though those are possible without stance, but a good lawyer still might be able to get the person off. Maybe if you hit someone and the accident scene and ABS log showed that you couldn't stop in time somewhere that the known stopping distance of a stock car could have, they'd be able to get you on something. For the most part though, it is very hard to prove.

I think we should focus on the fact that science tells us stance is idiotic and that regardless of legality, anyone who still chooses to partake in it, deserves to have their stupid ass purged from the gene pool when something goes wrong. This doesn't mean you can necessarily go around assigning blame every time a stanced car gets in an accident.

11-14-2016, 01:35 PM	#32
Yardjass Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2016 Drives: '14 Monogram, '95 Miata, '90 300ZX Location: VA Posts: 378 Thanks: 499 Thanked 253 Times in 144 Posts Mentioned: 1 Post(s) Tagged: 0 Thread(s)	There's a difference between stance causing a crash and stance not helping matters. You have two main factors to consider with stance: 1. Stretched tires: This one is pretty straight forward. Stretching a skinny tire onto a wheel means you will have less contact patch touching the ground simply because the tread isn't as wide. Additionally, tires aren't designed for this kind of stupid shit and when not mounted per the manufacturer's instructions, they are more likely to blow out. This is stupid at factory camber specs, albeit significantly less stupid than with excessive camber also thrown into the mix. Which brings me to my next point. 2. Camber: Camber is a good thing and a necessary thing, and increased negative camber can even bring you performance benefits if it isn't taken too far. However, "Stance" levels of extreme camber mean significantly reduced contact patch. When combined with excessive tire stretch, it also means you could be riding on the edge of the tread and possibly even on the upper part of the sidewall. So, where does this get us? Well, tire companies spend large sums of money to design and test tires that are safe at speeds far higher than we are legally allowed to go. These guys are looking out for us, and this is the reason that tire blowouts, especially in the absence of some sort of object causing the puncture, are very uncommon occurrences. However, at no point during their design work do they consider that complete idiots are going to be stretch mounting tires outside the factory spec, riding on the edge of the tread or sidewalls, etc. Forget the simple fact that your braking distance skyrockets and your ability to perform an emergency avoidance maneuver is significantly affected when you're using a small fraction of your tire's tread. When you stance a car, you're not even using the f***ing tire in a way that it was designed to be used. I've had a lot of idiots tell me that they've been driving a stanced car safely for years and nothing bad has happened so therefore, it is okay. The fact is when you design a tire that is tough enough for 200 mph or more, a side effect of that will be that idiots will probably be able to get away with using them improperly and only going 65. Also, we don't tend to use anywhere near the maximum performance capabilities of our tires in day to day driving so the detrimental effects of "stance" may go unnoticed. It is also very difficult to prove that stance was the cause of an accident, especially without a video. I think it is realistic that a court could rule an accident caused by a tire blowout was caused by stance, even though those are possible without stance, but a good lawyer still might be able to get the person off. Maybe if you hit someone and the accident scene and ABS log showed that you couldn't stop in time somewhere that the known stopping distance of a stock car could have, they'd be able to get you on something. For the most part though, it is very hard to prove. I think we should focus on the fact that science tells us stance is idiotic and that regardless of legality, anyone who still chooses to partake in it, deserves to have their stupid ass purged from the gene pool when something goes wrong. This doesn't mean you can necessarily go around assigning blame every time a stanced car gets in an accident.