Ride Softness And Tires ?

All other factors remaining equal, a tire with a larger sidewall will be softer riding than a low profile tire, so I would actually go for the 16" wheels over the 17" in your case. Also the low profile tires often come with a "sport" suspension option which I suspect you may not want.

nate

"perception"

Practical concerns may be:

1. Are road tests a reliable guide, i.e. does her doctor judge that patients' impressions after road tests are reliable long-term indicators?
2. Do tyres (size and profile) or suspension (type and tuning) govern the softness of the ride?

We went from Buick LeSabre to Avalon just last model year. Avalon, to me, is smoother and even a bit larger than our old 98 LeSabre.

Honda, for me, tends to have a harder rougher suspension. We did a test drive before we bought the Avalon, and that Honda rattled my teeth going over railroad tracks, etc.

The answer is a test drive or a rental, so that you really get to know each car.

All those things make a little difference, but by far the biggest factor is the car's weight. If ride quality is your objective, you need a big heavy sedan like a Ford Crown Vic (NOT the police/taxi version), Mercury Grand Marquis, or Lincoln Town Car. Don't worry, they get better fuel mileage than you think.

My old car used 205/65R15 tires at 32psi. The ride was firm but cushy ( no jarring). Current car uses 245/45R18 at

35psi. Rides like a truck. Of course the suspension design has a lot to do with it all too I'd stick with the higher profile tires.

You need to keep in mind that ride quality is related to the total package more than just a soft riding suspension. A good comfortable seat can make the deal very quickly. My Crown Vic hurts my left shoulder after a couple of hours. The F150 is great for hours on end. I know one lady of rather petite build and lifelong back problems who had been in the Buicks most of her adult life because of the soft ride. It came time to buy another vehicle and she made a trip of a few hours with my daughter in her Hyundai Santa Fe. It obviously rides much stiffer than the Buick but, the seat fits her better and giver more support in her case. She bought the Santa Fe and has been happy with it for about a year now. I am not necessarily a fan of imports and probably would never buy a Hyundai for my use . The point is that you need to shop a little before buying. The best fit for your wife may not be one you would expect. As far as tire sizes, I think you will find the lower profile tires are more the problem than the rim size. The taller tires have more tire space to absorb shock. The bigger rims give better brake cooling and sometimes a bit less unsprung weight for better handling.

Lugnut

Hyundai has come a long way. Their Azera was likened, in some magazine and newspaper articles, to near Lexus quality at a fraction of the price. We drove it, and it was beautifully finished, a very nice car. The one we drove had an almost undetectable trace of the "Ford jitters" - that tiny background vibration that caused Ford to earn the reputation of having square wheels for so many years. But other than that, it was well mannered and almost as smooth as a Lexus or Avalon. Their warranty was very impressive.

Tire pressure can make a big difference -- The Ford Explorer TP was lower than the essentially same-framed Ranger truck because Ford wanted a softer ride on the SUV. Problem was, the Explorer TP was too low and likely led to the Firestone-rollover problems.

Pete

That is the way that US manufacturers seem to approach the problem - make the car heavier. That is one reason why US cars are a joke in many parts of the world.

Even a light car can ride smoothly if the suspension is engineered for it. You need long travel, variable rate springs and dampers which are properly *matched* to the spring rate.

How does Citroen's legendary hydraulic suspension compare with conventional spring and damper suspension? I remember my dad having a couple of Citroens in the early 1980s which had a lovely smooth ride - in particular the car didn't seem to roll if one side of the road had a hump/depression and the other side didn't, probably because if one wheel dropped into a pothole, the oil that flowed into that wheel's suspension unit caused all the other wheels to drop slightly, so the car moved up and down but remained more or less level without pitching and rolling.

How do you figure that?

Americans like cars that drive that way. I don't know why... it drives me up the wall personally.

Yes, but it is a different feeling ride than that of a heavy car with a long wheelbase. Much more pleasant to my mind, but I'm not the typical American car buyer. The old Continentals, you could drive over the curb and not even notice it, it was so soft....

--scott

I always ran Firestone tires at the proper pressure (+/- 32 psi) and had

6 separated tread tires in the back of my garage a bit ago when I did a clean up.

They just plain make shit tires. I will never buy another, used or otherwise.

Mike

86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00 'New' frame in the works for '08. Some Canadian Bush Trip and Build Photos:

Firestones were definitely part of the problem. Ford engineering was very suspect as well.

I have googled this problem and there seems to be no clear cut answer, BUT the handling of the Ford, particularly after a delamination and blowout, seemed to cause people to jerk the steering wheel in order to try to regain control. The often seemed to result in rollover. It was mentioned that as the Ford suspensions aged, looseness was expected to make a bad situation worse.

I kinda figure from the photos I saw, the tread didn't come all the way off so it wrapped around suspension parts stopping the one tire dead. This can cause even the most experienced driver trouble, let alone the average person. If it is a rear that locked up, the arse end would try passing the front right quick which puts you sideways. When a front locks you lose steering and it would pull like mad I would think. I only have experience with locking up rear wheels, on purpose when ice racing for cornering and 'trick' controlled 360's.

Mike

Some years ago when I was looking for a car with the smoothest possible ride, I asked in a Mercedes owners' web forum how a particular model's ride quality compared to the biggest American cars. I got no response until someone explained that I had probably offended them by asking for that comparison. That told me two things: (1) Their cars, whatever their other qualities, didn't measure up in that category (since verified by a ride in one); and (2) these particular Mercedes owners were insufferable snobs.

I'm happy for you, that you don't have a chronic pain problem. For those who do, trust me, there's just no substitute for weight along with a cushy suspension, for a smooth ride. You can do a lot with engineering and technology, but in the end you have an expensive, complicated (read: unreliable when it gets old) system that really doesn't come close to the smoothness of a big heavy sedan.

Aside from the suspension, seats are critical. For some years I had pretty bad back pain that could be quickly alleviated by a short ride in my '88 Celebrity. Being cinched into that seat just soothed what ailed me. The car had what I'll call a "medium soft" suspension.

--Vic

This is a fundamental characteristic of a spring-mass-damper system. You can't get a smooth ride (e.g. sharp bumps are smoothed out) and good handling (proper stiffness) at the same time without having a very heavy sprung weight in the system. If you try to get a smooth ride, comparable to a traditional American sedan, from a small car you end up with a wallowing pig when you expect it to handle as well. (of course, many traditional American cars were also undersprung and underdamped as well, making *them* wallowing pigs, albeit wallowing pigs with a cloud-soft freeway ride.) Engineering can do a lot, but it can't completely overcome physics.

Of course, this extra mass comes with other tradeoffs, such as nimbleness, fuel economy, and acceleration...

Personally, I find myself very comfortable in a small car with a "sporty" suspension - but WITH PROPER SEATS. My old daily driver prior to getting a job with a company car was a Porsche 944, and prior to that a long series of watercooled VW's (three GTIs and a Scirocco) all had excellent seats. For me a supportive seat and lumbar support makes all the difference. I remember riding in a late 80's Pontiac rental car - I think it might have been a GrandMa, I mean Grand Am, and after about an hour and a half in the car I literally needed to be pulled out of it, my back hurt so badly. Same with a '71 Avanti II I drove for a friend - the supercharged 350 under the hood and 4-speed didn't make up for the pain caused by those awful, awful seats. (however, I would have been more than happy to swap the stock seats for, say, a pair of Porsche front seats had it been offered to me for a price I could have afforded...)

I guess to offer real, useful advice it would be helpful to know if the OP's wife's problems are most exacerbated by impacts, or by seating position. As I said before, I've been very happy with the seats in a typical VW or Porsche. I am going to be less help picking out a car with the "plushest" ride possible, as personally I couldn't give a rodent's rosy red rectum about such things :)

nate

Typically a larger rim increases unsprung rate, but the tradeoff is accepted due to the better grip from the usually wider, low-profile tires and also often appearance reasons. (some cars just look better with low profile tires.)

nate