What's made you grumpy today?

[AndyRKett]

It's a different place to Mazda that's for sure...could have them tomorrow if your didn't care about brand or speed and weight rating otherwise usually 2 or 3+ days if you wanted the exact ones.

This 2 minutes on the internet Sunday morning, fitted by Monday lunch and an exact swap for the ones on the car.

Could probably have left the slow for a while but I'd already ordered the replacement by the time I'd investigated how bad the other one was. Was fully expecting wild hissing once the screw was out...hence taking it out as knowing the other half she'd have mounted the kerb going past a car in the street and removed it forcefully.

There tends to be common dimensions in each diameter oddly enough usually around what VW group and Ford use (mysterious I know!).

Of course despite my best efforts the puncture alarm went off on the smart motorway today....at the bit where the M6, meets the M56 meets the M62 so all off ramps lead to other motorways for about 5 miles.

But false alarm caused by half a psi difference across the front and the diameter difference (brand new tyre Vs one that's been on the front for 12k) across the axle. Stressful few minutes...but behaved itself once checked and reset.

New tyre now has 500 miles on it...

I quite often have this happen with mine if I’ve just had new tires or have recently pumped them all up and the weather has changed, quite often get it if we go over to france as well probably because I have checked the pressures just before going and pumped the tires up to a higher pressure than normal and the tps gets a bit confused

 

[StevenRB45]

I should have known given it also happened on ours last time we had a new one. But it happened just after we'd had to run through all sorts of bits of a Ford Transit with a tyre that had delaminated leaving bits of steel belts everywhere.

I thought I'd missed them all but the timing 5 minutes later was a bit too coincidental to ignore when you've still got 3 hours to clock.

 

[Pugglt Auld Jock]

We had a few wheel options when speccing this and went for the common/cheapest tyre size after being robbed/inconvenienced by the choices Mazda made for years.

Same with the Scala, pretty much trim dependent. The base model - not sold in UK - uses a 185/65 profile tyre - which I would have been vary happy with. SE trim (mine's an SE Technology) comes on the 205/55R16 next up is the SEL on 205/50R17 (which you can specify optionally on the SE) then there's the 205/45R18 which I think is what the Monte Carlo comes on? I think there may be an even lower profile on a 19inch rim but "rubber band" type tyres are of no interest to me at all. I prefer a tyre with a decent size of sidewall because they can "swallow" road irregularities more easily so giving a better ride and I'm very satisfied with the 205/55 tyres on mine.

A nail/screw or whatever in a tyre is something I just can't resist pulling out.Of course despite my best efforts the puncture alarm went off on the smart motorway today....at the bit where the M6, meets the M56 meets the M62 so all off ramps lead to other motorways for about 5 miles.

Both the Ibiza and Scala have the Tyre pressure monitoring system which uses the ABS sensor signals to compare RPM. I much prefer this system to the type which has individual wheel mounted sensors. I've found it to work very well being neither too sensitive nor does it ignore a substantial loss in pressure. I swapped the Ibiza tyres around front to rear to equalize wear at about 2 years old and it picked up on the difference in rpm on tyres with only about 3mm of wear! and yet, in normal everyday use, I've never had a false alarm.

 

[StevenRB45]

Yeah, we had the option of Cactus wheels and tyres 205/50 R17 (with oddly a lower 89 load rating) which would have had this little adventure costing 50 quid more for the tyre or an extra 200 quid for 4 tyres .

The issue with small cars on big wheels is the Diameter goes up but not the width so you end up with slightly odd tall but skinny tyres. If memory serves the common size as used by VW, Stellantis and VX etc in an 18 is 225/40 R18 (as per Andy's) these are reasonably cheap and available...but drop a width and add some sidewall and reduce the weight rating and all of a sudden things start to get expensive.

Ours has the same system, I set all the tyres and reset it before setting off, it wasn't bothered the whole way down. But the trip back things were hotter and apparently it didn't like it. Only seem to have false readings when you've just moved things around so it's probably got a history of what "normal" is that it's currently relearning.

 

[AndyRKett]

The golf uses the same TPS as jock stated above uses the wheel speed to work out if one tire is down compared to the others, but our mini has the individual wheel sensors which tells you not only which tire is effected but by how much so you can make the decision if it’s just a couple of points or if the tire is flat and you need to stop more urgently, that being said the mini has run flats so can drive quite a way without having to stop anyway.

It’s interesting that as wheels have gotten bigger the tire size has also gone up.

I remember my old Mondeo took 205-55-15 inch wheels which was huge for a car made in the early 90s by the 2000s everyone wanted “massive” 17 inch wheels which to keep the same rolling circumference needed to be something 215-40-17. Which looked like a very thin tire at that time on a very big wheel.

These days a 17inch wheel is almost the Norm and shopping cars that have 17 inch wheels often have a large tire wall.

What I would say about having 18 inch wheels on both our mini and my golf, is that the suspension on both is good enough that you really don’t notice it at all, both cars are quite heavy the spring’s especially on the golf are quite soft, so it is still a very comfy ride even with the big wheels and thin tires

12 years ago our first mini had 17 inch wheels with rubber bands for tires which if you hit a pebble in the road it felt like you’d hit a big pothole. While I loved the car I hated the ride if having to go across country on anything other than A roads or motorways

 

[StevenRB45]

A lot of it comes down to development and budget for components.

We had the DS3 on a 205/40 R17 (something tells me the wheel arch width won't take anything wider....).

The Chassis dates back to the Peugeot 206 which was offered on 14s to 16s. The suspension remains a basic MacPherson front and twist beam rear.

While there's obviously calibration done...in a basic suspension set up there's not a huge amount to mess with compared to say fully independent all round as the Mini and Golf would have.

I would not be surprised if PSA did the suspension development on what they expect to be common tyre size...and then whatever happens when you fit bigger wheels happens. That was certainly the feeling on the DS3 where lowish profile tyres, stiffer sporty springs and further stiffer diesel springing combined into a car where the suspension and tyre combo was stiffer than the shell.

I assume in more expensive cars these things get done properly...but in cheaper ones there appears to be an art in picking the "happiest" set up.

 

[Pugglt Auld Jock]

Oh, there you go, was just looking through the specs and the Monte Carlo apparently uses 215/45ZR18. Wonder what the Z signifies? Anyway, too exotic for me!

 

[vexorg]

I think the Z is the speed rating, 150mph+ from memory

 

[Pugglt Auld Jock]

I think the Z is the speed rating, 150mph+ from memory

Hmm? I think the speed rating is usually after the load numbers - so 185/55R16 89H - the H would indicate a max rated speed of 130 mph. I've never seen it in the middle of the dimension figures.

 

[irc]

Pretty sure ZR is old school marking for 150mph+, but newer tyres would have W or X (or higher) to show the speed rating.
Could be wrong, been a while since I needed 150+mph tyres...

 

[StevenRB45]

Pretty sure ZR is old school marking for 150mph+, but newer tyres would have W or X (or higher) to show the speed rating.
Could be wrong, been a while since I needed 150+mph tyres...

I Agree, when I had the Mazda only tyres available were W rated so up to 168.

It had a top speed of 115mph.

Z is in excess of 149...which makes no sense when W is 168.

 

[AndyRKett]

A Quick Look online suggests it’s Z for plus 150mph and the R for radial it appears where you would normally have the R for radial but the spec for the car is that the tires need to be rated above 150mph and of radial construction,

Then if needs be the manufacturer can specify Y or W speed rating if appropriate, but otherwise the car is unlikely to exceed 150mph so either Y or W will do

 

[Pugglt Auld Jock]

A Quick Look online suggests it’s Z for plus 150mph and the R for radial it appears where you would normally have the R for radial but the spec for the car is that the tires need to be rated above 150mph and of radial construction,

Then if needs be the manufacturer can specify Y or W speed rating if appropriate, but otherwise the car is unlikely to exceed 150mph so either Y or W will do

Wow, thanks for all your interest shown here folks. Maybe I didn't emphasize the reason for my puzzlement enough though. It's not the speed limit indicated by the letter, it's the placing of that letter between the width (215) and bead diameter (R18) which I find so strange?

 

[StevenRB45]

It's Friday afternoon Jock anything but work

Although in my defense I'm off...

 

[irc]

Wow, thanks for all your interest shown here folks. Maybe I didn't emphasize the reason for my puzzlement enough though. It's not the speed limit indicated by the letter, it's the placing of that letter between the width (215) and bead diameter (R18) which I find so strange?

Hi Jock
I think that's the "old school" part of it - for quite a while 150mph+ was the highest rating available, and ZR was specifically "a Radial Construction tyre adapted for speeds in excess of 150mph" (not sure of the exact wording).
Then came hatchbacks with 300hp, hypercars that could do 220mph etc. and someone decided that some new bands were needed so that people didn't put Golf GTi tyres on a Pagani Zonda, so they continued them on in the format of the lower bands ([width]/[aspect] [size] [speed] [loadrating]) and "ZR" in the middle was superseded. Except it's still used in some places.
At least that's what I remember the explanation was, but I wasn't particularly interested at the time, so I may have some knowledge gaps... and old age is catching up fast.

 

[Pugglt Auld Jock]

I need to keep a sense of proportion on this, but, I'm getting increasingly annoyed by Mrs J's apparent inability to put the tops back on containers properly. Doesn't matter what it is, Milk cartons, The Marmite jar, top of the Lea and Perins bottle, etc, etc. All cross threaded. She even manages to put the top on the marmalade jar squint! Actually I can live with it - I've no option have I? and she's been doing it for all our married life. At least she doesn't do what her old aunt used to do which was to "semi tighten" stuff so you thought it was tightened up but, if you tried to lift the container by it's top then the top would come off ensuring a lovely mess! I certainly won't be challenging her over this, friends have divorced for less!

 

[The Panda Nut]

I need to keep a sense of proportion on this, but, I'm getting increasingly annoyed by Mrs J's apparent inability to put the tops back on containers properly. Doesn't matter what it is, Milk cartons, The Marmite jar, top of the Lea and Perins bottle, etc, etc. All cross threaded. She even manages to put the top on the marmalade jar squint! Actually I can live with it - I've no option have I? and she's been doing it for all our married life. At least she doesn't do what her old aunt used to do which was to "semi tighten" stuff so you thought it was tightened up but, if you tried to lift the container by it's top then the top would come off ensuring a lovely mess! I certainly won't be challenging her over this, friends have divorced for less!

I dare you to tell her off!

Go on do dare ,double dare you.

 

[Pugglt Auld Jock]

I dare you to tell her off!

Not likely, I'm far to frightened of her!

 

[portland_bill]

I need to keep a sense of proportion on this, but, I'm getting increasingly annoyed by Mrs J's apparent inability to put the tops back on containers properly. Doesn't matter what it is, Milk cartons, The Marmite jar, top of the Lea and Perins bottle, etc, etc. All cross threaded. She even manages to put the top on the marmalade jar squint! Actually I can live with it - I've no option have I? and she's been doing it for all our married life. At least she doesn't do what her old aunt used to do which was to "semi tighten" stuff so you thought it was tightened up but, if you tried to lift the container by it's top then the top would come off ensuring a lovely mess! I certainly won't be challenging her over this, friends have divorced for less!

I've got one like that too. Never a lid on properly. She can't get lids off anything now, so everything done by me or a carer, so at least all lids on properly. She never has shut a drawer in her life, always pushed just 'to', never actually shut. I just push every drawer as I pass, as I've done for over 30 years, it becomes a habit. Did have a period when I'd slam them to make a point, but nothing changed.

 

[The Panda Nut]

I've got one like that too. Never a lid on properly. She can't get lids off anything now, so everything done by me or a carer, so at least all lids on properly. She never has shut a drawer in her life, always pushed just 'to', never actually shut. I just push every drawer as I pass, as I've done for over 30 years, it becomes a habit. Did have a period when I'd slam them to make a point, but nothing changed.

I know my place. SHE, who must not be disobeyed knows what Im saying as WELL as thinking

Yes dear......