There has to be more to this. The 13,000 mile 2012 GT-500 handled like crap. Even Road and Track said that. The 2020 Track Pak Mustang handed like a slot car. Mine is in the middle. All were around the same power. Brakes were mushy on the GT-500, I think very nice on mine and very grabby on the 2020.
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Well I know my 2014 by the local truck stop scales is 3460 lbs without me but 1/4 tank of gas. To get it down to that, I have run flat tires and nothing in the trunk. The 2012 GT500 is posted at 3950 lbs and the 2020 people say 3850 lbs. All seem to accelerate about the same IE between 12:20 to 12:90. None are mid 11 second cars.What is the weight of all 3 of em ?? Also weight distribution front to back. AFAIK, the GT-500 went to an aluminum block in 2011.
3950 lbs is a bunch.... 490 lbs more than your 2014. Toss in 150-200 lbs for the driver, and now the GT-500 sits at 4100 - 4150 lbs. That would be enough to screw up the handling.Well I know my 2014 by the local truck stop scales is 3460 lbs without me but 1/4 tank of gas. To get it down to that, I have run flat tires and nothing in the trunk. The 2012 GT500 is posted at 3950 lbs and the 2020 people say 3850 lbs. All seem to accelerate about the same IE between 12:20 to 12:90. None are mid 11 second cars.
PS4S tires are remarkable, and FWIW tire grip is not as sensitive to tire width as you may think. I have it on good authority that tire grip is roughly proportional to width^0.15. Meaning that (all else constant) a 245-wide tire can be expected to develop within about 5% of the grip of a 305. Wider tires are more durable, however, as all that cornering energy gets distributed over more rubber.
Norm
Handling and max lateral grip are related, but not necessarily in a linear sense (nothing about tires is truly linear). 285s on appropriately wide wheels will remain closer to linear behavior longer, but max-lat lies beyond that. You probably don't even start to sense slip angles until you're up in your tires' transitional behavior range.Meanwhile Terry Fair claims cars that are heavier, require wider tires. "Put a 225mm on a Mazda Miata, and you require a 360mm on a mustang". Tire width was proportional to weight. Wider tires have similar contact patch, but in the transverse plane. Flip side is the weight is the same on each corner, it's just the way the weight is distributed, plus the lateral loads are in the transverse plane. From my very limited experience, 285's handle better vs 255's.
This is true. What you need would be a carpet plot of either mu vs normal load or cornering force vs normal load. Something like this. Self-aligning torque has to do with "feel".So I guess 255 on a 3500 lbs car is different then a 255 on a 4000 lbs car. Not sure what a mm per lbs would be. That 4000 lbs GT-500 had 255 fronts and so does my 3500 lbs Coyote thus the difference?
What I didn't like about CarMax is they really do not inspect there cars much except for tires. Then new tires on a low millage car is always suspect. I bet the brake fluid has never been changed. The 2013/14s are much more desirable. Another 100hp and much bigger brakes. The salesman really did not understand why I would not think about a 10 year old car for $47,550 that smelled like it was smoked in. Although it is true, I just wanted a test drive. I have one more test drive to do in a 2021. It must be a track pack car with a track pak apps cluster. Is the 330CU in the GT-500 a 3 valve? I also thought I heard a tick at idle.