Before you bolt those 20-inch alligator skin alloys onto your MkI Golf, take heed of the possibility that bling can be bad for your car.
The car modification industry is not without its moments of irony – at least if the latest statement from SEMA (the US-based Specialty Equipment Market Association) is anything to go by.
Normally associated with showcasing stock metal turned into pimped-out, nitrous-spitting riots of body kits and alloys capable of generating localised wind shear conditions, SEMA is now putting pressure on America’s National Highway Traffic Administration to make ammendment to its proposed regulation to make electronic stability control standard on all new vehicles by 2012.
The aftermarket gurus contend that different-sized tyres, wheels and suspension add-ons that raise or lower the ride height of a vehicle can adversely affect standard-issue stability control systems.
To strengthen its case, SEMA recently provided the government with a list of problems that have occurred as a result of modifications to electronic stability control-equipped vehicles.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is due to make a final ruling on the aforementioned proposal in April, but Sema hopes to interject with an ammendment that pushes for an adaptive learning system that would allow stability systems to recognise and adapt to new parts accordingly – a sort of “pimp-my-ESP/DSC/VDC/ETC”, if you will.
CAR technical editor Jake Venter doubts the viability of “adaptive learning systems”, though. “Passive safety equipment utilises software that computes hazardous driving conditions by specifically defined algorithms and reference values… Although the systems can compensate for different wheel sizes (for traction control purposes), changes to a vehicle’s spring weights, shock absorbers and bodyweight can affect the efficiency of vehicle stability systems, which are designed to operate under conditions that manufacturers anticipate for normal use and within standard specification.
“To adapt a stability system to operate to satisfaction with most or all after-marked modifications is not cost-effective and near impossible, given the variety of tuning parts and the thousands of ways in which they could be combined,” he added.