Technical Would you risk it?

I think there are many safety issues to be considered when building a car however I think having a catastrophic tire or suspension failure or tire failure are very low, and very rarely will a tire or a suspension component fail without warning.

When I was driving my 1953 Chevy regularly, I was always working on it doing maintenance, checking components, and I would always do a "preflight" check.

I am 41 I got my divers license at 18, in 23 years of driving I have only had two failures. both on my "modern" vehicles

I cut one tire (ran over something) on the interstate at 65 M.P.H. I got over to side and changed it. There was no waring on that, but if you have a bad tire likely it's going to give you a shake, a vibration, wabble some kind of indication that something is wrong.

I have broken a rear spring shackle in a ratty old truck I was driving to welding school, but it was an old ratty truck that had spent all its life in the salty winter roads of New York state. Not a hot rod, custom, or racecar built with new, or rebuilt parts, I also knew the shackle was questionable, but I only had one truck and had to get to school, and I was only about 20, Today if I were to see this on my modern truck or 53 there is no way I would drive ether of them before fixing it!

My father is 74 and has been driving for 57 years in that time he said he has only a had two catastrophic tire failures, both on the same trip.

He was given four snow tires he was going to wear out instead of buy tires for his truck, he was towing a friend's racecar at different points in the trip both rear tires let go.

Two of the three examples were "Should have known better" but did it anyway.

I also wonder how hard/fast people are driving to do some of the damage I have seen, I have hit holes in the road at speed it has sounded and felt like the whole suspension was ripped out, but when I pulled over to look things over there was no damage.

 

I used to have a 90 mile one way commute to work, 5 days a week. I drove the speed limit. Over the course of 13/14 years, I’d have to make a guess without racking my brain, but had to be well over 10 replacement tires with the road hazard warranty on them.
The three cars I had were compacts, unmodified, just commuters.
What that tells me is in any drive anytime, stuff can happen. Why take a chance?
Now I will say with modern radials vs Bias plys I used to have, things like leaks from nails, etc the radials hold more air longer. Seems like the older Dunlops and KS springfields I ran let you know a lot sooner than a radial that you were losing air.

 

I live in a European country where we have all sorts of type approvals and inspections and such cars are illegal anyway but, even if they were not, to me there is the "too much of a good thing" principle. In general, I am yet to see a car which does not benefit from being somewhat lowered but the broken suspension trend leaves me cold. Same for extreme chops by the way. At some point it becomes a caricature (and is bad for handling/dangerous/pain in the butt). So no.

 

Well it ain't done yet, but will I? No. For fun I might run a snowy dirt road near home just for a photo op but past that a shameless fair weather hot rod mostly. If I get caught in the rain so be it.