Sport or No Sport

[Outrageous]

Originally Posted by X5Jay

While this may be true, I'm not sure it's the reason narrower tires work better in snow. I always thought is was because there is less surface area at the contact patch which means more weight per square inch.

The only way to have a smaller contact patch is to put more pressure in the tire. At the same pressure, a narrower tire will have the same area touching the ground as a wider tire, although the shape of the contact patch will be different. As an example, using easy numbers, if your vehicle weighs 3000 lbs. and you have 30 psi in the tires, the area touching the ground is 3000 lbs. divided by 30 psi which equals 100 sq. inches, or 25 sq. inches per tire.