Hamann 599GTB!

  • Thread starter Thread starter Danny
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Race-cars use as wide a wheel as they can get away with under the rules, to increase traction and grip. As for height, like TheCracker says... it's all about brakes. :D F1 cars used to have ultra-wide and ultra-low tires. The current tires are only the way they are because of current rules... I'd expect them to be a bit shorter and wider if teams were given free rein in designing their own tires and brakes.

Acceleration and speed is more a matter of gearing... you don't pick bigger wheels for better performance in that realm... you pick larger wheels to clear bigger brakes and to give you a wider and longer contact patch.

It also depends on the car's suspension design and tuning. With bigger mags, you sometimes have too much weight and too little damping from the shocks to control it (this is one of the reasons why early editions of current BMWs drove like crap on run-flats... too heavy!)... yes, you'll have tons of grip, but botch-all for steering feel and the wheels will be driving the car instead of the other way around.

It's always much more fun driving a well set-up suspension with crappy tires than a car with ultra-grippy tires and big wheels but no suspension upgrades.

Of course (to stir this back on topic), if Hamann offers those wheels with a suspension upgrade, it'd be okay... but obviously, they don't... Hamann is one of those companies that think "tuning" = "body-kits".

They're very pretty body kits, though... but I'm a performance type of guy, myself. If I had a 599, the first thing it'd be getting is an exhaust system... :lol:
 
In standard cars and even race cars, you can have what ever gearing you want. If your engine isn't powerfull enough to overcome the drag of the wider tires, you won't win topspeed , maybe even lose a little bit of topspeed. F.e.: top F1 teams have f1 cars with more hp and a higher topspeed (ofcourse there are other issues but I'm not discussing them) than f1 teams with cars with lesser hp..
 
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