Tyre pressure effect on balance

[ales]

How does tyre pressure affect the handling of the car? (FWD car in this example, if that matters) So if the pressure of the front tyres is increased/decreased in the rear tyres, what will the effect be? And the other way around - the front tyres' pressure lowered/the rears' increased?

And why?

Thanks,
Alex

P.S. I have a sneaky feeling that the first root would take to understter, and the second - to oversteer, but I'm not sure

[Moppie]

Well as long as the pressures remain with in the spec of the tyre, then it will have the same effect as stiffening the suspension.
i.e. harder at frount = understeer.


However the correct tyre pressure should allow the tyre to maintian full contact with the road at all times.
This may mean you are unable to use it to adjust the cars balance.
basicly if you get the suspension set up right then you can run the ideal tyre pressure.
If you dont get the suspension just right, then you can adjust the tyre pressure to compensate at the expense of total grip.

[ales]

Thanks, captain!

I definitely meant pressure changes withing spec. And my car has even 2 sets of pressures listed on the door sill, depending on how many ppl are in the car. So there is some room to play with, considering my car has no adjustment in the suspension.

Alex

[SaabJohan]

In car racing such as F1, most shocks are taken up by the tires and not the cars shocks. The ratio between shocks and tire pressure is used to adjust balance.