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Tuning Guide for Drifting
Car
Car
Generally, any Rear Wheel Drive (RWD) car is capable of drifting. try to avoid Mid-Engine and Rear-Engine cars as the weight distribution will be more towards the rear and it will tend to make the car more grippy. I’m not saying that Mid-Engines and Rear-Engines can’t drift. If you tune them correctly, they can be very effective. (I recall that TGF KillaCali has a Porsche that drifts very well). Keep in mind that some cars can be converted to RWD after purchasing them.
Upgrades
Platform and Handling- Most people prefer all Race Platform and Handling, but the Weight Reduction, Roll Cage, and Anti-Roll Bars are not required. I would suggest Race everything.
Drivetrain- If you have the credits, I suggest purchasing Race everything because it helps out a lot. Although, Race parts aren't necesary. They basically just shorten shift time which is essential when trying to upshift mid-drift.
Wheels- Try to avoid using Racing Slicks (they are not allowed in competitions). Stick with Stock or Street tire compound. Tire Width- This is personal preference. I personally upgrade the Rear all the way and leave the Front stock so that i get more grip on the rear for speed, but others prefer to have the Front wider than the Rear. Play with it and see what you like. Rims and Rim size are optional, but i recommend Leaving the size stock and picking a pair of lightweight rims.
Aspiration- You have the choice of a Single turbo, Twin Turbo, Twin-Screw Supercharger, and a Centrifugal Supercharger. Most people stick with a single turbo, but you may experience something called “Turbo Lag”. What is Turbo Lag? While drifting, the turbo takes a few seconds to spool up. When it finally spools up, it lets out a “boost” of speed. Sometimes the boost of speed can catch you off guard and may cause you to spin out. Some people avoid using turbos for this reason, but if you get used to the “Turbo Lag”, then you can use it to your advantage. i.e. coming out of corners, you can gain a lot of speed from turbo lag.
Performance- The only required part is the flywheel. I recommend using a Sport Flywheel instead of a Race Flywheel. All other parts are optional, but be civil with the horsepower. Most cars can drift with around 400hp. anything over 650hp is not allowed in competitions (this is subject to change).
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Tuning
Tire Pressure
Tire pressure is measured in PSI. The more PSI you have, less of your tire will be touching the pavement which causes it to lose traction and vice versa. The general accepted theory is that 32PSI gives you the optimum balance between grip (Low pressure) and response (High pressure).
One of the key misconceptions about drifting is that you don't want grip at the rear. You actually want lots of it. Grip=good in drifting. Grip means you can pull back from bigger angles, you are putting more power down to the ground so you can get more speed, and you have more control over your car which is essential when tandeming; you want to be able to slow your car down when necessary if you are following someone, and if you don't have much grip then that's not easy.
Rear Tires
So, if 32PSI is the optimum PSI, then you want your tires to hit 32PSI when you are drifting. While drifting, your tires heat up causing the air inside them to expand, so you want your tires to hit 32PSI at max tempurature. While your tires are hot, check your PSI by viewing telemetry and tune your PSI accordingly. 25PSI works nicely on most cars.
Front Tires
Your front tires also heat up while drifting, but not as darastically as the rear because they aren't spinning at 130+ mph. Use the same technique for the Front tires. Drift a couple laps and then check your PSI and change it until it reaches 32PSI while hot. 28PSI is found to be ideal for this, but I suggest that you experiment yourself.
Width
Most drifters run max rear tire width because it allows you to get more grip. Front tires are preference; Skinny tires allow you to turn-in quicker, while wide tires allow you to track around the corner better. Experiment and find what you like
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Camber/Caster/Toe:
Camber
Always keep your Front and Rear Camber NEGATIVE. While drifting, your lead tire sometimes goes into positive camber which is ok, but it is illegal to tune your Camber positively. The more Negative Camber you apply to your car, the more the tops of the tires will angle toward each other.
Diagrams for camber Below (view from the front of the car)
0 Camber |_|-------------|_| <--- those are the tires. lol
Negative Camber /_/--------------\_\ <---- Sexy
Positive Camber \_\--------------/_/ <---- Not sexy
(Special thanks to Gr4phic for the Camber diagrams)
Camber allows you to control how much, and what part, of your tire contacts the pavement while drifting. Caster also helps you achieve this when mixed with Camber.
---------The Kuratchi Option: Recently my friend ADA Kuratchi messaged me and reccomended i try out a setup that he learned from a real life drifter in his area. This is what he told me.
Cars typically use around 2-3 degrees of negative camber in the front. Rear is up to driver. So this would be -2 to -3 in forza.
For caster he said you want to use the max amount of caster you can get. So that would be 7 caster on the game.
And for toe. He said competition cars use no toe in the front and around -.5 to -1 degrees of toe in the rear.
I tried it out on SIM steering with the wheel. I have to say, this works really good. So that tells me they got the physics right.
Front Caster
Front caster is how far the top of your shock is pointing toward the front of your car
More diagrams (your car is pointing -->)
1 caster | <-shock
O <- wheel (terrible diagram)
7 caster \ <- shock
O <- wheel
Sorry for my lack of Diagram-Making Skills
Caster effects how the camber changes from lock to lock. If you have 7 degrees of Caster, your leading wheel (the one on the outside of your drift) will gain excessive amounts of pocitive camber. The trailing wheel (inside wheel) will gain a lot of Negative camber. 7 Caster has the same effect as the front end of a Harley Davidson. When you turn, the wheels "slant" in either direction. Caster and Camber go hand in hand and must be tuned together.
see how the front tire "slants" because of the angle of caster.
There are two ways to tune caster and camber. It's ideal to keep the Lead tire as close to 0 camber as possible while drifting, but some prefer to tune so that the lead tire goes into the positives because it makes your car more responsive. Test it out and see what you like.
For the first method, do this: The front camber should generally be anywhere from -4 to -5. Set your front to -5 and then drift a couple laps on a track. Watch the replay with telemetry on and toggle over until it shows how much camber you have on your tires. Watch the camber while you drift. You want it to be as close to 0 without going into the positives as possible. Adjust the caster or camber until you are hitting 0deg and thats that. More caster increases the amount of posi camber gained on the lead wheel.
For the second method: Crank up the caster to 7 and turn the front camber down to between -1 and -3. More/less is preference. More camber generally makes you smoother as it irons out driver error, but less camber gives you more grip and control and allows you to go quicker. I'd say start out with more and slowly tone it down. Personally I use -2.
The rear camber will generally be between -1 and -2. If the Rear is constantly at around -.5 while drifting, add a little bit more positive camber (around -1.7) and repeat the process until it stays very close to 0 camber while drifting.
Tuning camber and caster to be perfect is a long process but it's worth it.
Toe
Toe is how close or far apart the fronts of the tires are from each other.
More Diagrams (from the top of your car and the car is pointing up ^)
*0 Front Toe |_| |_|<- front tires
|_| |_| <- rear tires
*Positive Toe \_\ /_/ <- front tires
|_| |_| <-rear tires
*Negative Toe /_/ \_\ <- front tires
|_| |_| <- rear tires
On your car, you want Positive Toe on the front of your car. The more Positive Toe you add, the more angle it allows you to achieve while drifting because it's turning the wheel out more allowing you to get more steering lock. However, too much toe makes your front end unresponsive and can also slow down your drifts. Start out small (around .5) and slowly add more until you find the right balance between Angle and Responsiveness. If you play with a steeringwheel, you'll notice that while you drift, more toe makes the steeringwheel lock in place better and gives the car a solid, planted feeling. This is why some people prefer to crank the Toe all the way up to 5.0. Although, as mentioned earlier, rediculous amounts of Toe makes steering unresponsive which means turning into a drift is more difficult, forcing you to initiate with the e-brake more often. Most people find that 2.5 Toe is a good balance.
On the rear, you generally want anywhere from 0 to -.5 Toe. Using even the smallest amount of toe-in on the back feels very different to using none; what it does is essentially turn the rear wheels in a bit which just makes the car want to go sideways. Toe in on the back can help you keep higher angle at the same speed because your inside rear wheel is pushing the car sideways. Play around with it and see what you like. Keep in mind that Toe will affect your camber while drifting
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Anti-Roll Bars
Here comes the fun part where Math takes place. Here’s the formula:
(A-B)C+B=X
I’ll break it down for you.
A= the stiffest setting (This will always be 40 if you install Race Anti-Roll Bars)
B= the softest Setting (This will always be 1 if you Install Race Anti-Roll Bars)
C= how much weight is on the front/rear of your vehicle (this can be found by going to your garage and scrolling over your car and pressing the “Y” button)
Here is what you would do for Front Anti-Roll Bars:
You take the stiffest setting (40) and subtract the softest setting (1). Then you take that answer and multiply it by how much weight is on the front of your car. Then you take that answer and add the softest setting (1).
Example: Let’s say you have 52% on the front. You would do...
40-1=39
39 x .52=20.28 (round to 20.3)
20.3+1=21.3
21.3 would be the Front Ant-Roll Bar setting.
For the Rear, you would do the same process, but use 48% instead of 52% because if 52% is on the front, then 48% is on the rear (obviously). So you would do...
40-1=39
39 x .48=18.72 (round to 18.7)
18.7+1=19.7
19.7 would be the Rear Anti-Roll Bar.
I know it seems like a lot of work, but after a while you will memorize the process. The purpose of this is so that your car is perfectly balanced.
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Springs
To determine the springs, you do the same formula as the anti-roll bars. (A-B)C+B=X
Keep in mind that the softest and stiffest setting will be different on every car.
Let’s say the stiffest setting was 1000 and your softest was 100 and you had 52% weight on the front.
you would do...
1000-100=900
900 x .52=468 (round to the nearest .5)
468+100=568
568 would be the Front Spring setting.
Rear:
1000-100=900
900 x .48=432
432=100=532
532 would be the Rear Spring setting.
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Fine tuning your Suspension
Having a perfectly balanced car is not always ideal for someones style of drifting. Sometimes it's beneficial to slightly unbalance the car to your liking. For instance, softening the rear allows more weight to transfer to the rear of the car. the more weight you have in the back, the easier it is to throw the back end around while transitioning and drifting in general. It also allows you to get more traction on the rear which results in more speed. But, more weight in the back also means that you have to work harder to keep it in check and it also makes it easy to transfer too much weight while transitioning, causing the back end to come around too fast.
Stiffening the rear end will make initiations easier, but it doesn't allow you to transfer as much weight which is essential to a good drift. Remember, there are plenty of ways to initiate your car without the help of stiff suspension, so it's typically a good idea to stay away from super stiff suspension.
Suspension can also help you create/reduce oversteer and understeer. If you stiffen the front or soften the rear, you can reduce oversteer. By stiffening the rear and softening the front, you increase oversteer. Oversteer is crutial to drifting, but too much of it can be a problem
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Ride Height
"The Tip: When you go to the ride height, It is always better to have the front end slightly higher than the rear end. The reason so is because you need the extra support for the engine when you brake. (Note: This is for both Mid Engine and Front Engine)
The Reason: When you brake, the car's mass is shifted from being in the center of the car to the front of the car. You can see this effect happen by looking at the Body Accelerometer when you press "Up" on the D-Pad. So you ask, "Well, why does this have to happen for Mid Engine?" Well, although making a car Mid Engine balances out the center of gravity of the car, when you hit the brake, a Mid Engine car has to deal with the equal amount of body acceleration applied. Therefore, upraising the front end of the car will give the front engines a bit of relief and Mid Engines more stopping power.
Want an Example? Refer to the Top Secret Silvia D-Spec S15. Notice how even without looking at the tuning setup, you can clearly see the front end is much higher than the rear end. It may be different otherwise when you actually look at the tune, but this is how I tune with a bit of science applied "
"Dividing the weight on the front springs by 4 (combined number of axles) and then by dividing that number with 3 (remaining axles) leaves you with an increment that you can follow going up or down. For example, if my front spring rate is 500lbs and I divide that by 4, I get 125. Dividing 125 by 3, I get 41.6. So i would have to add or subtract 41.6 to the Front Spring to actually tell a difference. This method can also be applied to the Rear Springs."
Special thanks to IRI GrandFX and CSI Ratava253 for the info in quotes
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Rebound Stiffness
You guessed it. Same formula. The Rebound stiffness will always be 12 if you have Race Springs installed. so if my weight was 52% on the front and 48% on the rear, it would go...
12-1=11
11 x .52=5.72 (round to 5.7)
5.7+1=6.7
6.7 would be your Front Rebound stiffness
and for the rear...
12-1=11
11 x .48=5.28 (round to 5.3)
5.3+1=6.3
6.3 would be the Rear Rebound stiffness
Bump Stiffness
Make it anywhere from 50% - 75% of what the Rebound stiffness is. For instance, if your Rebound stiffness was
Front: 6.6
Rear: 6.4
Then make your Bump stiffness
Front: Anywhere from 3.3 to 4.9
Rear: Anywhere from 3.2 to 4.8
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Brake Distribution
Brake Distribution is based on personal preference. Increasing bias to the front will encourage your car to straighten out from a drift, but it can make your braking unpredictable or possibly lock up too early under certain conditions, which could be a game breaker if you are in a tandem situation.
Brake bias to the back acts as a sort of soft handbrake, allowing you to do minor adjustments mid drift if you get it right. Doing so however can slow you down a bit.
50/50 gives you a very predictable setup that can be used to slow your car down mid drift withou affecting your line, which is probably the most useful thing if you are tandeming with someone who is quite slow, or suddenly decides to pull the E-brake at weird moments.
Overall though, there is no "best" way to setup your brakes; how you set them up depends on your style and what you want to get out of them.
Brake Pressure
Again, Brake pressure is based on personal preference. I find that 120% pressure suits me very well
Differentials
When you are drifting, you want the wheels to be at the same speed, so your diff is locked up. This is so you can have a predictable car, and to make sure all the power doesn't go to the inside wheel in a drift, because this is where the least load and grip is and it will also help "push" your car into a spin. However, you don't want your diff constantly locked, because it can make it a bit difficult to transition and initiate. So, you generally want to run between 80-90% for the accel, enough to ensure it's locked whilst drifting, but unlocked when you need it to be.
Accel, like brakes, is all preference. Less accel can make your car a bit less vicious and help you come back from mistakes by allowing your rear wheels to accept their natural wheel speeds and gain optimum grip when you lift off; so, if you are about to spin, it'll help (Not garauntee, but help) rescue the tail of your car. However, running low deccel can be slightly annoying because it can make the car unpredictable when braking; If you ever find that you applied the brakes and the car suddenly shoots off to the right or the left, it's because you have low accel settings. So, I would say run your deccel settings as low as you can without ruining the way your car slows down
Gearing
Tuning gears is essential to drifting. you have to find the "Money Gear". This is usually 3rd or 4th gear. Take your car to the track that you want the gears to be tuned on. I recommend using 3rd gear because it is the middle-most gear so you have other gears to shift into in different situations. Put your car in 3rd gear and drift a few corners. If you notice that your car is redlining (bouncing off of the rev limiter) too quickly which is causing you to lose speed, then tune the final drive 3 clicks towards the "speed" setting. This will make all of the gears a little bit longer which will make it redline later. Tune your final drive so that 3rd gear drifts most corners with around 1000rpm's to spare until it redlines.
Just tuning the final drive doesn't solve your problem sometimes. if all of your gears are perfect besides one gear, go to that individual gear and tune it. try to avoid going to extremes as it will through off your gearing a lot. for example, if you like your 2nd and 4th gear, but your 3rd gear seems like it bogs down (loses rpm's) mid-drift, then go to the 3rd gear in tuning setup and tune it about 3 clicks towards acceleration. repeat this process until you are happy with the gears. keep in mind that some cars only have 4 gears and other cars have 5 gears or 6 gears.
Congratulation. You just tuned a drift car.
I’m sure that I am forgetting things here and there and I’m sure that many of you tune differently. This is just a general way to tune your car for beginners and pros alike.
This guide reposted with permission from APX Walker from the Offical Forza Motorsports forum. All credit goes to him and those who helped write it.
I've tried this guide out with multiple cars and it's a very good base to work with. Hopefully this guide well help some new drifters out!
I'm sure it'll help me a lot with my drifting cars' setup and I think a lot applies to circuit racing as well.
