What happened to narrow tires?

[stricular]

I want to know the reason for something that has been bothering me for some time.

I drive a 1991 toyota tercel. It's OEM specified tire sizes are as follows:

145/80 r13

or

Optional 155 r13


When I bought my car, it had some pirelli2000 165/65 r13's on it, which are close to the diameter of the 145/80. When it came time to replace, I wanted to go back to oem size, but I couldn't find 145/80 r13's anywhere. WH-wh-wh-what? The hell?

Most people would just say,get a set of 155/80 r13's, but wouldn't the 145's would be the best option for fuel economy(less rolling resistance, smallest diameter allowable requiring less turns of the axles<trans<engine etc.)? Most tercel owners use 175/70 r13's nowadays, from what I can gather, including myself. Those a hair smaller in diameter than the 155's, but they are wider, further wasting gas.

Fuel economy being what it is, why dont tire manufacturers recognize that narrower tires have their selling points, too? The average driver never hears their tires squeal(until they lock up the brakes), so why do they need wider tires?

My theory is that the tire manufacturers have made their business into such a racket, that now they tell most people what they want by taking advantage of the consumer's ignorance. What most people seem to want is usually the cheapest tire available. The irony about this is that the smaller tires would theoretically be cheaper, since they require less materials to make. I mean 13's are cheaper than 16's and so on. Correct me if i am wrong.

Which brings me to my next point: it seems to me that if you pushed them, you tire companies would sell more narrow tires. they wear out faster since the load is distributed over a smaller area, right?

I feel like this deserves some discussion,if for no other reason than it just seems to make bad sense.

[touringcamry]

There are few cars rolling around with narrow 145mm wide 13" tires so due to low demand tire manufacturers don't produce many if any at all because they don't sell. They make what people want and the low demand is unattractive to manufacturers because there isn't much money to be made. Additionally, small production runs can often cost more per unit than long runs.

Right now the trend is larger wheels and that is what customers want or at least what car manufacturers think customers want. So again they sell what people want. Larger wheels are in now and smaller wheels are out so car come with larger wheels and larger tires. Cars have also grown larger in the past 20 years or so. The current Corolla is only slightly smaller than the Camry from 1990! Brake caliper sizes have grown also so they need larger wheels to clear the calipers.

My 16" steel wheels are just enough to clear the calipers on my Camry. On my 2000 Camry, the 15" wheels were big enough to clear the calipers but 15s won't work on my 2007.