Driving home, all good, nothing out of the ordinary. Turned off the main road and onto a country lane not far from home, booted it up hill (pretty regulation stuff for me) and experienced horrendous torque-steer to the right...road has massive camber to the left. Suddenly front end felt loose, no grip, front tyres seemed to be squirming all over the place?

150 yards later, and a badger decided to run out infront of me! Stamped on the pedal, lots of squirm and all ABS, very little stopping. Badger made it across okay, bless.

For the rest of the way home I just had no confidence at all in the car. I thought I had a flat, except there was no tell-tale change on ride. On arriving home, a cursory checkover with a torch revealed all four wheel, attached and inflated, and apparently straight, but I'm not looking forward to tomorrow morning's drive.

I'm mystified as to what happened, it was 7 deg (i.e. warm), dry, I think there might be some muck on the road. Any ideas? Could a console or tracking bush have 'gone'?

Muck, salt or diesel on the road. The grit and salt this time of year can make the road slippy, and booting a Fabia vRS tends to find the slippy bits quite well.

Sounds like a typical Fabia vRS

Sounds like a typical Fabia vRS

That's just it, I've been driving the wee black one for three and a half years from new and this was definitely not typical behaviour. Ah well, I'll just take it steady in the morning and hopefully I'll get to work on four wheels.

What tyres do you have, 7 degrees is NOT warm at all, and the Good Year GSD3s were rather **** in the cold to be honest.

Toyo T1Rs - actually I see what you mean - plus 7 deg air temp might mean the ground was cooling fast. It was clear...

ToYos are not good in damp, only very dry or very wet.

my felicia did something like this today.

going round a long off camber bend, the front stepped out, let off, back steps out, balance with right foot, come out alive.

thought to my self "dont think much of this tyer set-up". so on the next two corners i tested it. and had all the grip in the world.

so on the return journey i tested the corner in question, to find the surface was fine, no oil etc...

just random bout of "car trying to kill me" ness.

Toyos not good in cold/damp. I hold back quite markedly on cornering in this kind of seasonal weather. It will do it if pushed, but it's not as inspiring as it would be in the summer when it's 20 degrees out.

ToYos are not good in damp, only very dry or very wet.

And are absolute carp when you drive over a diesel spill like we did cutting across from the m20 to the m2.Think we both had a bit of a fright there.

Kathy

I would agree with the diesel spillage theory. Sounds just like an experience I had driving towards Bromley on the A21, massive torque steer-esque behaviour, ABS going bananas every time the middle pedal was touched and the ESP light going like the Blackpool illuminations.

There was a HGV pulled over because he had lost his fuel cap and spilt the devils petrol all over the road. It took about a mile for the car to regain it's composure.

T1-R's are poo when its slightly damp cold and gritty.

Mine felt well weird too.

I would drive steady till the weather improves then see how you go from there :thumbup:

there could be tyre damage that you can't see... I had this in my vRS, and really lost confidence in its ability to go round corners... after I changed the tyres, all was fine... one of them (avon ZZ3's) was split on the inside , completely unable to tell without taking the tyre off the rim! :eek: needless to say, never bought the avons again, replaced with pirelli p nero's, and all was 'normal' again.....

150 yards later, and a badger decided to run out infront of me! Stamped on the pedal, lots of squirm and all ABS, very little stopping.

Funny you should mention that, but my ABS has been a bit keen this week. I had an old duffer accelerate out from a roundabout on me (not quite a bagder), but the ABS kicked in. I have been thinking about taking the car in to be checked out, but it could just be road conditions I guess...

my abs has been a bit keen this week also but I put it down to putting some different wheels and different tyres on.. they certainly don't have the levels of grip that my old tyres had.