Heel and Toe?

[marshun]

talk about beating a dead horse man.

[malcolm]

yeah, I guess... I just thought I would answer his question, using minimal effort (ie. posting stuff I've already written before). :P

[marshun]

[RyanHampton]

So no driftring is not faster if you are a good driver. overcoming the slip angles in any sense is slower period. If you stay at 99% of the tires total grip you will be faster. I have been racing cars for a long time, and if you "drift" the car you will be slower. Do not confuse the fact. You are talking about things that most people even in drifting cannot do. The only time in racing I try to drift a car is in an extremely low speed corner. Yes it is true if you are on the limit you are constantly going over and under that maximun of the tires total grip. If you are a good driver like you say you can keep that car at 99% of total grip. So drifting is slower.


Ryan Hampton

[malcolm]

ryan, I started racing two years after you did. I don't have the budget that you had to do something like Barber Dodge, or any open-wheel racing, so I've been just regional racing in Canada. So far, I've been asked by three teams to race for them this year (sports car racing), but I am mostly just racing the Corvette my father and I run. That must mean I am doing something right.

I find that drifting on the entry to slow to medium speed corners can help my exit speed, especially with cars that tend to understeer (ie. ones with locked diffs, etc).

You do realize, Ryan, that every tire is slipping to a small degree when you turn, don't you? Most cars don't have perfect four wheel steering, so the rear wheels won't be perpendicular to a line going from the axis of the car to the centre of the turning circle. That means that the rear tires must slip very slightly anyway. If the tires are slipping already, then they already have a lower coefficient of friction (the dynamic coefficient of friction).

Also, you say that a good driver can take a car to 99%... what if there is a slight crack in the pavement, or a little bump? all of a sudden, the car's ultimate limit of traction is reduced, and it starts to either understeer or oversteer... now, if the car was in a slight drift (ie. maybe 2 or 3 degrees of yaw, at the most), the car would only be a little upset. If the car was actually "gripping" then it would slide. The road is exerting less force on the tires now, so the attitude of the car changes... The suspension rebounds on the outside, and the sidewalls of the tire flex less... And if you do regain traction, then your suspension compresses again, your tires flex again... if this happens too harsh, you'll lose traction again. This is a tankslapper. You've just lost a lot of time.


(this may be a little disjointed, because I was interupted a few times... haha)

[GRiDRaceTech]

Interesting and completely valid point raised, malcolm. When in a slight drift, the car's composure isn't upset as much by bumps because it is already sliding.

I've noticed that while sliding into my street... there's a dip there, and if I go in normally the car gets unsettled, but if I go in sliding a bit, the car is fine.

[RyanHampton]

Yes in fact it is true there is always slight bumps, cracks and other things in the road. However the slip angle of a racing radial tire is in the 1% to 3% range, beyond that you are losing time. With a bias-ply racing slick it is a 3 to4% slip angle. In a street / high performance tire you have a much bigger window say 6 to 8%. If you have raced on a true radial slick you would soon realize that drifting is not faster, and you would not have tires after too long. I have raced on both, and you do hear a lot of tire noise on a street/ performance tire, but go race on a slick, you hear nothing. If you do slide, your window is very small between having grip and not having grip. It comes down to simply watching a race on tv. If drifting was faster, they would be doing it. I have been a tire tester for Firestone for 2 years so I do speak with some authority on the subject. Now if you ask me if drifting is more fun, I would agree completely!! Interesting points though, I just don't want people getting misinformed of the wrong things. You are correct about the very slight slip angle being faster on a street tire, but there are very few people that can hold it there, or use it effectively to go faster. And beyond that if drifting was faster why do they have traction control on Formula 1 and Champ Cars? Why because grip is faster....just another question.....Now if you have a car in a 4 wheel drift that means you have overcome the traction point of all four tires, that is not drifting that is mearly driving beyond the limit of all four tires. Now in the laws of physics friction equals heat and a loss of energy once again.... tire rolling is faster than tire sliding. Once again loss of energy equals loss of speed.

[malcolm]

However the slip angle of a racing radial tire is in the 1% to 3% range, beyond that you are losing time. With a bias-ply racing slick it is a 3 to4% slip angle. In a street / high performance tire you have a much bigger window say 6 to 8%.

I wasn't saying that full-opposite lock is fast... :P You're just saying what I said earlier about having a very slight slip angle.

If you have raced on a true radial slick you would soon realize that drifting is not faster, and you would not have tires after too long

Drifting all the way through the corner, perhaps, but I was talking mainly on entry to assist the car in rotation prior to the apex. I currently race a Corvette C5 on radial slicks, and raced an older Corvette ('79 Trans-Am car) on bias-ply slicks. The car with the bias-ply tires responded well to slightly more slip angles on entry to the corner than the radial tire'd car, but still, I was able to improve my time by using each.

And beyond that if drifting was faster why do they have traction control on Formula 1 and Champ Cars?

That's for acceleration, and if you've ever heard about their set-ups, you'll know that they have different settings to allow the tire to slip just a little bit.

Also, Michael Schumacher always drifts the car (ever so slightly) on entry to medium to slow speed corners, and takes an earlier apex, yet somehow manages to get a faster run out of the corner. The team has said in the past that he and Ayrton Senna have been the only ones to be able to have their fastest time be faster than the computer model, because they can't model their styles.

I'm not saying that I'm up there with those guys, as Formula cars would be a little more tricky to drift on entry than a big GT car... :P

[RyanHampton]

Goog points. We are saying the same thing. When I raced the bias ply tire in F2000, you should rotate the car on entry. Especially with the side wall deflection and making the tire take a set. However on an IRL car with radials, you want no slip whatsoever. Thats because you want no wall contact, cause it hurts. All I am saying the only time you would use drifting is in low speed corners to rotate the car. High speed corners you want no slip in the car. Cause rolling is faster. Now I do know that tires are slipping all the time, you can't avoid that. However if you can keep the tire from slipping and keep the tire at 100% traction it will be faster. If you look at a tight turn compared to the wheelbase of the car, sometimes it will be faster to rotate the car and get on the gas sooner. When I drove the F2000 cars my nick name was asses and elbows, because I used to drift into the corners. Now we need to define "drifting"... I do not consider rotating the car "Drifting". The problem with saying drifting is faster is you will get these people that watch too much intial D, and they think that is faster than "Grip" driving. I consider the best drivers in the world to be the guys that can adapt to any car, From oversteer to understeer you can manipulate the car to do anything you want, that is what makes a good driver not drifting, or griping. It all depends on the situation. So I guess if you define drifting as slight oversteer you could say it is faster in low speed corners. However, if you make it in to ALMS be sure you drift the 150mph kink at Road America it ought to be fun. Good points and good luck in your racing..

[malcolm]

I figured we'd be on the same page... haha. I totally agree that in a situation with IRL cars with concrete inches away, I would be a little hesitant to try to rotate the car on entry to turn three at Charlotte...

I agree that the term "drifting" has become a misnomer... I am used to the pre-initial-d days (never seen initial-d, no desire to). Back then, a drift was ever-so-slight oversteer (like the 2% slip we talked about), and anything more than that was a slide... "show drifts" are slow, but slight "four-wheel-drifting" can be fast, if executed properly.

Also, once you get into cars with aero, then you lose downforce as the yaw increases... I heard that F1 cars lose 50% of their downforce at five degrees of yaw. The car can step out a little bit, but if it goes beyond that, then all of a sudden, you're just gone... and into the wall.

It's hard to say that there's one technique that's guaranteed to make everyone go faster, because so many cars have so many different traits. I agree with you, the best drivers are the ones where they don't need to adapt the car to them, but they can adapt to the car. I strive towards that, and before I make a set-up change, I try to overcome it myself by trying different things (left-foot braking, trail-braking, tapping the throttle mid corner... these are ones I use when the car is understeering). This will hopefully help in endurance racing, when the car is never perfect.

Thanks man, and good luck with your racing and drifting too... Looks like you're doing quite well so far.

[RyanHampton]

Hey Malcom,

I am going to be in Toronto for the drift event on the 1st of August. do you know anything about this?

[malcolm]

yep, it's put on by driftnation... (www.driftnation.com) it's a Canadian drifting organisation, and it's the only one sanctioned by a motorsport body in Canada. I am not sure if it's still a US-D1 event or not (heard some rumours it isn't anymore), but it still should be a good event. As far as I know, it's a drift battle.... Mainly for amateurs, but not sure. It will be held on the Driver Development Track at Mosport, not the big road course. (the DDT is actually the karting circuit I raced at when I was younger... it's pretty wide though, and should be good for drifting)

I won't be able to make it there, because I am racing at the GP de Trois Rivieres, in an open GT class...

[Craftsman]

Amazing what a discussion about heel toe became a discussion about drifting vs. traction...

Thanks for the details and the information. I read through it all and I learned quite alot. Hopefully I'll be able to be able to drive and be hotshots like you guys...

Matt.

[malcolm]

I swear, the key to being good is experimentation... Try slightly different lines... Try doing different things if you feel that the car isn't behaving like you want it to. It drives me nuts when I see people make the same mistakes (ie. wrong lines), lap after lap, because they're afraid to try anything different.

Get to know your car, and how it feels... try to feel your way around a track. if it feels like the car is abnormally twitchy through just one corner, then try a wider line or something.

Case in point... a few years ago at the Brazilian GP, it started to rain mid-race. Everyone pitted, and Schumacher was in the lead. For the next three laps, Schumacher was about 2 tenths faster or so... Then after those three laps, he was suddenly about 2 seconds faster. The commentators were mystified, but I realized that for those first three laps, he was experimenting. He was trying different lines around the track to see what was best. After he found that, he pieced all the good parts together, and decemated everyone. From there, his experimentation was more subtle; he was trying different lines by a matter of inches, as opposed to entire car-widths.

[SilviaLove]

I decided to come back and see how this post came out after Malcoms large post about grip/slipangles and such. It's good to know that there are people with creditable knowledge on this board, thanks for all the info.

[Craftsman]

Originally posted by SilviaLove
I decided to come back and see how this post came out after Malcoms large post about grip/slipangles and such. It's good to know that there are people with creditable knowledge on this board, thanks for all the info.

yea, I'm learning alot about driving from these guys and their debate here...



Matt.

[chuaboi36]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by URMachines
chuaboi36- heel toe is a process of downshifting and rev matching so you dont upset the driveline and weight transition. the process goes as follows:
1.push brake firmly and steadily
2.push in clutch and down shift to the desired gear
3. while still holding the brake, with the side of your foot(heel), blip the throttle to rev match the tranny for the higher gear,and release clutch when the revs match

it sounds a bit confusing but after a days practice, youll be good.
ive been doing it so long now it is 2nd nature and i cant drive normally with out it. [/QUOTE

thanks, big help i have a alot better understanding after doing research

[scirocco]

Originally posted by GRiDRaceTech
Well, there's a certain slip angle (the angle of the tire's path to the car's true path, in a very simple nutshell) range through which the tire operates at its peak. (6-10 degrees for most race and high-performance street tires, usually) Below that range, the tire is being under-used and is not delivering full grip. Above that range, the tire is being over-used and is not delivering full grip. We consider over-use to be a fully sliding condition. In truth, the fastest way around a track is in a very subtle four-wheel slide around every corner to utilize the tires to their fullest. If the front tires are at a higher slip angle than the rear, then the car is understeering; if the rear tires are at a higher slip angle, then the car is oversteering.

Thus, drifting/excessive oversteer is not usually faster than grip except in instances when understeer is severe. (Very tight turns, mostly) I use initial oversteer to rotate my car and get it pointed the right way, and to overcome understeer.

Confuscious say: Tire sliding ever so much faster than tire gripping absolutely or sliding greatly.

YES! this is the explanation this site needs... make this post a new thread and it should be made sticky. i belive this builds on what alex said about 10% slip being best. it must have something to do with the diagonal path across a tire's contact patch (which is essentially a rectangle wrapped around a circle) being farther than a straight path through the contact patch... and yes i think the whole downshifting in the middle of a drift is cleared up and when i had my hachigo i would downshift in the middle of a drift if i made a mistake. but my scirocco has a CVT so

wait a second... i just realized something: this means that understeer is faster than grip since you can get that slight angle of drift on the front tires in a FWD

[scirocco]

actually, traction control is more accurate then regular driver control since it is perfect. If all drivers were perfect like a computer for traction control, you would get the slight amount of slip you get from turning with lateral grip... now i understand...

[malcolm]

wait a second... i just realized something: this means that understeer is faster than grip since you can get that slight angle of drift on the front tires in a FWD

haha, not quite... a slight drift angle helps more because it assists in rotating the car through the corner. With understeer, you aren't getting the car to rotate as much. It would be a lot better if you could get into a true four-wheel-drift, where it is neither understeer or oversteer, and all four wheels have that ever-so-slight slip angle.

[scirocco]

ya i figured so since whenever my friends cars understeer at all it is just that: the car is steering not as good as it does on grip or drift driving.. thanx anyways malcolm!

[scirocco]

Originally posted by malcolm
I swear, the key to being good is experimentation... Try slightly different lines... Try doing different things if you feel that the car isn't behaving like you want it to. It drives me nuts when I see people make the same mistakes (ie. wrong lines), lap after lap, because they're afraid to try anything different.

Get to know your car, and how it feels... try to feel your way around a track. if it feels like the car is abnormally twitchy through just one corner, then try a wider line or something.

Case in point... a few years ago at the Brazilian GP, it started to rain mid-race. Everyone pitted, and Schumacher was in the lead. For the next three laps, Schumacher was about 2 tenths faster or so... Then after those three laps, he was suddenly about 2 seconds faster. The commentators were mystified, but I realized that for those first three laps, he was experimenting. He was trying different lines around the track to see what was best. After he found that, he pieced all the good parts together, and decemated everyone. From there, his experimentation was more subtle; he was trying different lines by a matter of inches, as opposed to entire car-widths.

i remember that race i loved it!

[Heav3nzHell]

Give it a go ladies and gentlemen. If its not your style then dont do it but if you like it then thats ok too

[Thai Juku]

Never got an e-mail from this thread in a long time...I guess ^this^ guy wants to close it...