Rear end sliding out?
- Thread starter tres
- Start date
Soldato
- Joined
- 20 Jun 2004
- Posts
- 5,957
- Location
- Essex
What are you complaining about?! I paid good money to get my GT86 for this purpose! 
In all seriousness, does sound a bit odd from a Focus.
In all seriousness, does sound a bit odd from a Focus.
Pioneer - The front tyres have more grip in the wet than the mix-match rears so the back end slides about. I had the same with my Mondeo when I 1st bought it so I changed all 4 budget tyres for Goodyears and the car felt a thousand times better afterwards.
Man of Honour
- Joined
- 13 Nov 2009
- Posts
- 11,662
- Location
- Northampton
This is a bit of a misconception, wider tyres don't necessarily offer greater grip as their are a lot of factors involved such as contact patch etc.
Depending on the weight of the vehicle you can actually reduce grip with wider tyres, then there are things like slip angle.
Soldato
- Joined
- 10 Jun 2010
- Posts
- 5,158
- Location
- Scotland
Your description of the mr2 and fwd correction looks the same but reworded to me.
Genuine
Well....it kind of is if lift off has caused it as you want to try and shift the weight again...only in the mr2 I simply never had the skill to do anything other than end up having a big moment once the pendulum had swung.
If too many beans had caused the Toyota to go then putting the foot down wouldn't help at all, you'd want to try and maintain steady throttle whilst ******** yourself and correcting. Can't get into that same scenario in a focus as all you'd be doing is understeering
If too many beans had caused the Toyota to go then putting the foot down wouldn't help at all, you'd want to try and maintain steady throttle whilst ******** yourself and correcting. Can't get into that same scenario in a focus as all you'd be doing is understeering
Last edited:
Soldato
- Joined
- 11 Aug 2012
- Posts
- 4,548
- Location
- S.E Wales
Same as the Op happened to me back in September in my 1.2 Clio, Went round the roundabout at my regular pace (about 15ish mph) all of a sudden the rear just went without warning, bit of opposite lock and gas got me back, but a certain hole was left quite tight for an hour of two.
Turns out one of the rear tyres were virtually flat, so totally my own fault with that one, but after pumping them back up, I held back quite a lot for a few weeks, really knocked the confidence out of me.
Just a reminder really, Doesn't matter what car you've got, the unexpected can always happen.
Turns out one of the rear tyres were virtually flat, so totally my own fault with that one, but after pumping them back up, I held back quite a lot for a few weeks, really knocked the confidence out of me.
Just a reminder really, Doesn't matter what car you've got, the unexpected can always happen.
As Andy says - Over-inflated tyres on a greasy road are probably going to have been the biggest factor. With the pressures set to the manufacturer recommendation you should see a big improvement.
Decent tyres will perform much better than the ones you have on the car. In an ideal world you'd replace them, but if money is tight - see how they perform with the correct pressures. They might be acceptable to you for now - but when they wear out it's defintiely worth spending the extra to get something decent on the car.
As above, over inflated tyres will not get up to temperature, at the correct pressure they will flex, warm up and should grip the road better. I saw a Vecra yesterday that had spun on a roundabout and was facing the wrong way into the barrier. Presumed he had run out of talent hooning it round the roundabout, lifted off and the back came round.
Correct, they all sound like cheap trash and it's in your best interests to replace them soon. Well done for actually caring, unlike most of the motoring population of Britain.
What it boils down to, is your tyres are the only thing keeping yourself on the road. You can skimp on parts here and there, you can skimp on oil, but the only thing you shouldn't skimp on is what tyres you have. They pay for themselves over their lifetime.
Absolutely this, wider tyres give a wider and shorter contact patch which can be better in the dry but just means more water to clear in the wet, so is actually worse than narrow tyres.
[TW]Fox;25604390 said:
It's quite possible to have the back end step out on a slippery roundabout (i.e. diesel spill) without provocation. I had this happen a few years back whilst driving my father and step mother in her Astra, it was completely unexpected but perfectly controllable as I was driving very sedately.
Soldato
- Joined
- 10 Jun 2010
- Posts
- 5,158
- Location
- Scotland
Surely in order for the back end to slip out in a FWD car you have to be going at a decent pace and then turn in sharply to unsettle the car. People are mentioning he lifted off, causing a transfer of weight. If I'm on a roundabout doing between 20-30mph in 3rd gear and lift off I'm most certainly not going to spin out as the transfer of weight wouldn't be enough, there's not enough speed or motion to cause it... U less it's ridiculously wet/slippy and you're on Russian tyres.
If his entry speed is too quick all the time as people have been saying and confirmed by the OP, then wouldn't he just get plenty under steer in a FWD focus?
I think there's more to it than crap tyres and the OP 'thinking' he might be too fast on approach. No one drives too quickly and doesn't know what they're doing. I'd be checking for mechanical issues. Wheel bearings are very common to go on focuses and mondeos of that era. I've replaced two within a year on mine.
If his entry speed is too quick all the time as people have been saying and confirmed by the OP, then wouldn't he just get plenty under steer in a FWD focus?
I think there's more to it than crap tyres and the OP 'thinking' he might be too fast on approach. No one drives too quickly and doesn't know what they're doing. I'd be checking for mechanical issues. Wheel bearings are very common to go on focuses and mondeos of that era. I've replaced two within a year on mine.
Its perfectly feasible he was going a bit too quickly, but not excessively fast, coupled with shocking tyres which are over inflated.
Something like a wheel bearing will do zero to actually impact grip and there will be no real adjustment at the back end of a focus for alignment to be out so much that it'd step out without warning ( unless it had been smacked)
Something like a wheel bearing will do zero to actually impact grip and there will be no real adjustment at the back end of a focus for alignment to be out so much that it'd step out without warning ( unless it had been smacked)
Last edited: