do wider tires affect handling in the rain?

i went from a 10.50 dunlop rover to a 12.50 cooper stt adn the dunlops do way better in the water, no worry of hydroplaining at all. with the coopers i have to be a little careful around puddles. just wondering if it is the tread or the width. thanks

Ummm. one word YES.
Thinner tires knife through better that wider tires that have a tendancy to float. Think of the concept behind Monster Truck tires they are extremly wide to distrubt the weight of the veh. The same is true for your veh. just on a smaller scale.

jrsxj98 said:

Ummm. one word YES.
Thinner tires knife through better that wider tires that have a tendancy to float. Think of the concept behind Monster Truck tires they are extremly wide to distrubt the weight of the veh. The same is true for your veh. just on a smaller scale.

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hmmmm

This would explain why the Forumula 1 guys replace their 355x45's with Q78's when it starts to rain.

Lets use a little common sense here. A thinner tire is has less surface area, hince it will not want to ride on top of the water. As a wider tire would. Now any tire will hydroplane, Im just saying that a wider tire handles different in the rain. If im wrong please show me some viable facts.

In order for a tire to maintain contact with the pavement in rain, it has to displace the water as it rolls. Assuming forward motion, the water gets pushed three ways -- forward, and to both sides. Of course, any water pushed forward is waiting for the tire to catch up, and that's what causes hydrplaning ... if the water can't be displaced as quickly as it builds up, the tire rides on water instead of pavement.

Obviously, with a wider tire there are two problems. First, the water at the center has to go farther before it reaches the edges of the tread. Second, there's more width so there's more water. A good tread design can help offset this by providing channels for the water to run through while the tread lugs (blocks) stay in contact with pavement.

How this translates into your situation is that your new tires are 2" wider than the old ones, so they have to deal with more water. Unless the tread is more effective at water dissipation, they won't be as good as your old tires in the rain.

<EDIT>Just went to the Cooper web site and looked at the STT. Seems to be intended as primarily an off-road tire. It has very little siping, which are the smaller grooves in the tread lugs intended to help squeeze water out from under the contact patch. The Dunlop Radial Rover is more of an all-purpose, all-terrain tire that is intended for highway use as well as off-road. Don't know but it would not surprise me if the STT uses a harder rubber compund for durability in rocks, and that won't help wet traction, either.

I guess you just need to slow down at puddles.</EDIT>

Thank You Eagle!

thanks for the replies i kinda assumed that was the case, but to clarify eagle i had the dunlop radial mud rover. both were mud tires, the rover had a sharper tread, more of a point to it, and the coopers is slightly more round compared to it, thought that might have something to do with it

would ponds per square inch have anythin g to do with it, sice the thinner tire has more per square inch of tire