From my own experience during monsoon rain storms here in Florida, the stock
13" steelies did an "okay" job keeping the car planted on the road. After I
lowered the suspension on Eibach Pro Kit springs and put the 205/50 R-15
Koenig rims on, the car had a horrible time driving through any slicks of
water at high speed- felt like a crazy crabwalk.
Back in 2001 when I was out in Orlando (the week of the 9/11 - as some of you recalled, I was actually stuck out in Orlando because of it), the sudden and random(?) down pours dumped a ton of water on the streets.
Our rental car (a Pontiac Grand Prix) didn't experience any hydroplaning but we did see one car that did spin off the highway (the 14) and into the middle grassy section. Like the 9/11 events that took place, watching that car glide off the freeway was surreal.
As we drove further down the freeway, we saw at least two other cars that had *spun* off the road into the marshy middle area.
Willy- you're right on the money 'cause it turned out to be the alignment.
Once I had a 4-wheel alignment done, the car now tracks straighter than ever,
*but* if I fly through standing water at speeds above 55mph (not that I ever
go faster than 55mph :P) the car loses traction like it's floating on the
wider tires and starts going diagonally towards the lower shoulder.
My neighbor's kids has a "Slip-n-Slide" mat that they had setup last weekend and let me tell you... if anyone has any thoughts of running and then diving head first in an attempt to slide along on your belly, keep an close watch of your shorts! :^) My neighbor's kid tried this and about half way down the mat, he kept on going but his shorts decided that it wasn't going to have none of that and stayed put! :^D
What does this have to do with alignments? Nada-damn thing... but it does sort of have something in common with hydroplane... :^) And I thought it was kinda funny... Only wished we had video taped it and sent it to "Funniest Video's" or some other show like that...
Here's the interesting point- all I have to do to recover is a series of quick
tap-tap-tap's on the brake pedal and the car corrects back to a straight path
almost instantly. This is George's home-brew anti-lock brakes :).
(* snip *)
The one and only time I have ever experienced hydroplane to a large degree was when I hit a body of water while on the freeway at around 50 MPH. It was under an underpass and it was still dark out (around 5:30am). It was raining lightly - a drizzle - since it had rained earlier and had left some water on the freeway still.
I sort of saw the puddle but I couldn't tell how large it really was and it didn't look as if it had gone all that much past the shoulder (this is the left lane). I guess there was a larger body of water in the general area that I just did not see because the CRX (aka: Jiggy) felt *light* and I saw the RPM actually go up and then back down and then up again before it settled back down. I also noticed that I had *floated* into the next lane (right) just a bit.
Fortunate for me it was still early and there was no real traffic out on the freeway.
The whole event took place in about 2 seconds and it did shake me up just a bit.. I pulled off at the next off ramp to calm my nerves and to do a quick check by walking around the car.
But the one thing I did remember, which I thought kinda odd, was that I did not lift my foot off the throttle. I also did not try to do any sudden movements with the steering wheel but kept it pointed straight. But then again, it happened so fast that I probably just didn't have time to react or think about what was happening (which in it's own right is spooky....
Since then (this was back in 2001), I've never experienced anything like it again.
Although later in that year (December) there was some pretty decent rain fall that I had to drive through (from San Diego to Central California) ... most of which was in the San Diego and L.A. area (up to the Grape Vine, after that, it was just cloudy).
Was in the Volvo and the AWD probably made most of the difference. For a good 2 hours, we were driving in down pours that just would not let up.. There were times where we were doing no more than 40 MPH because it was so bad.
The Volvo is also a heavier car than my CRX but I did not experience a hint of hydroplane (although I was getting ready for it in the event that it did happen... not really sure what I would have done... someone once told me not to brake but to try and drive straight through it and to try and shift down to a lower gear if possible...).
Now days, when we get any sort of measurable rain, I take surface streets to work which is perhaps worse since they tend to puddle up more but then speeds are also kept down to under 40 MPH.
CRX Owners Group President (http://www.crx.org/southcal)
1990 Honda CRXsi (http://www.hooligan.cc)
ICQ # 3714283 (nickname: godzilla)
Alpine Drive (San Diego County) - February 8, 2003
http://www.crx.org/southcal/events.html
