| Wheel and Tire Basics |
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Obviously, tires are important. Tire maintenance is critical to trouble-free travel. I’ll show you how to select, inspect, maintain, and even repair tires and wheels in other sections of this website. How “Stock” is a “Stock Car”? Ever wonder what’s under the hood of that racing stock car that looks a whole like yours (except for the big decals)? Jeff Gordon’s Chevy racing stock car has a 750+ horsepower engine (a really stock Monte Carlo has 200 hp) and requires 108-octane fuel (yours is probably 87 to 92 octane), and it costs about $135,000 (you can buy five of the street models for that price). And the tires cost about $400 each and last maybe 100 miles – if the car doesn’t spin out at 150 miles an hour! Yes, it’s cheaper to drive your look-alike. And you’ll get better gas mileage!
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We’re finally at the wheels. Power generated by the internal combustion engine has traveled through the transmission and differential to arrive at the wheels. Wheels are simple. They include tires and rims (onto which the tires are mounted) and the brakes (to be discussed in a moment).
