Factors that effect car braking part 1

We have a long downhill run ahead of us, this might be an opportune moment to cover some factors that affect braking. Lets kick off with (1) Under-inflated tyres, this not only effects your braking but also has a knock-on effect to your steering and fuel economy. Your tyres are your only point of contact with the road and they are low on pressure, step back for a moment and watch the front driver side wheel as we corner this next left bend in the road (it’s alright, I’ll steer the car) See the natural weight distribution of the car shifting to this wheel as we take the corner? the outside edge of the wheel is now taking the full burden of weight which is made worse by the low pressure. Wow, the steering feels really heavy because of it. Imagine the difference between heading a fully inflated football and one that is under-inflated. Got it? In fact lets run with this analogy and imagine all our wheels have been replaced with under-inflated footballs (or basketballs if you prefer) Because of the uneven weight distribution currently on our footballs the tread is now wearing faster on the outside of ball/tyre (remember we covered the legal tread depth back when we did the basic vehicle checks? Remember what it was? Sweet...mm) well there is also a legal requirement to maintain this minimum tread depth across the central three quarters of the tyre.

Now that we have identified heavy steering and uneven tread wear as two side-effects of low tyre pressure how does poor fuel economy enter the equation? Simple, lets go back to our football match analogy, the players look tired don't they? that's because they have been so busy running around after a ball that travels a shorter distance when kicked because it is low on pressure. As a result they are burning up their energy quicker and same goes for your car, it’s being made to work harder so it is naturally taking more fuel to compensate. More factors affecting braking next time, but in the meantime why not visit www.facebook.com/TheoryTestNovel and discover the undiscovered country of the Demon Road directly... http://twitter.com/theorytestnovel