Ok, first off let me start this thread with the definition of drifting as defined by the drift king himself (the guy who basically pioneered drifting as a sport)
Drifting: the act of creating over-steer in a car and maintaining control through the duration of the corner.
Now, why did I have to define what is already obvious to most people in this forum? Because there is a lot of nay-sayers that don't think anything but rear-wheel drive cars can drift. This is in fact, WRONG. Anything with four wheels and the ability to create over-steer in a controlled manor can and is a drift.
Now that we cleared that up, lets get on with how to actually go about this in a front-wheeled drive car. First, lets talk theory (my favorite) then I'll explain set up later on in this post.
There are two basic ways of initiating over-steer in a FF:
1. The let-off over-steer
2. The e-brake slide
1. The let-off over-steer
This technique is pretty self-explanatory but I'll continue to explain how to do it right. First, come into the corner while still accelerating and at the last second lift completely off the gas at the same time as you flick the steering-wheel into the corner. What this does is as you let off the gas, the weight of the car is transferred to the front creating less traction in the rear. Jerking the wheel into the corner unsettles the cars balance and takes advantage of the fact that the rear has little traction and send the car into a slide.
This technique is best suited for long sweepers with wide angles. Practicing where to be in relation to the corner is the key to getting this one right. there is no real right place to be but most of the time you want to be on the inside of the turn when it starts as it takes a second to take effect but once it does, you'd be surprised how much over-steer it really creates.
2. The e-brake slide
Again, pretty self-explanatory but I'll still cover it. As your coming up to the corner, feint your car to put the weight to the outside then hit that e-brake and hold it till about the half-way point in the turn. Basically the same for any drive type.
Best suited for tighter corners the trick to this one is learning when and how much e-brake to use.
So now on to how to hold a slide.
Most people say that FF can't hold slides very long and i beg to differ. I have held a FF car in a slide through sweepers like that found on EIGER MT. short track before the tunnel. Now the most confusing part is that it is opposite of drifting rwd and awd/4wd cars as in accelerating creates under-steer instead of over-steer. So throttle is used to pull your car out of a drift. In order to maintain the over-steer we need the e-brake is heavily relied upon. After initiating the slide, watch for the car trying to straighten out, once it starts to, start tapping or holding the e-brake depending on how hard it's trying to go straight, how long the corner is, and how much over-steer you need. Counter-steer is hardly ever necessary and should rarely be used while on throttle since it will flick the car in the other direction so hard that most the time control is lost. So in order to decrease over-steer, simply let go of the e-brake. A good time to use counter-steer on throttle is when one needs to transition from one corner to another in a chicane. Usually you will be steering into a corner or leaving the wheels straight while on the gas to counteract the drastic over-steer created by using the e-brake. Staying on the gas through most the corner is also necessary in order to keep speed up enough to keep the car sliding. For long corners it is usually necessary to keep holding the e-brake and giving it full gas to drag the sliding rear end through the rest of the corner( hence the nickname assdragging). This is also a situation in witch counter-steer on throttle is sometimes necessary in order to pull the car in the right direction but the key here is not to let go of the e-brake or control will be lost.
So now that we know how to drift a FF car, lets set it up to favor letting the rear slip out in a controlled manor.
Car Choice:
Most cars will do but the best are cars those that can still move forward from a dead stop while e-brake is being applied. This will allow for those long corners o be pulled of while still sliding. Hatchbacks are a really good choice as the extra body in the back will help to create a slide.
Tire Choice:
I found that the best tires in the rear are always going to be comfort hard in any case because the rear needs as little traction as possible in order to maintain a slide.
Now front tires depend on how powerful your car is and how much speed is needed for the corners. Most tire selections will be between comfort soft and sport soft. Comfort soft will provide the most under-steer, good for getting out of hairpins. Sport soft will give the care more front pull, good for pulling a car through long corners and for high-powered FF's.
Gearing:
In most cases can be left alone. But, if a car is still under-steering to much, the gear ratio can be lengthened and vise-verse. This kind over resembles the effect of traction control but the the problem with TCS is that if you use it while trying to drift, it brings the car to a stop like any other car no matter the drive.
Differential:
I find that a really loose diff. is best as it lets the outside tire maintain traction enough to keep over-steering. I usually run Initial torque at 5, and accel. and deccel at 20 to keep it even and balanced. This can also be used to combat under-steer by decreasing accel. torque in order to keep that outside wheel pulling in on the front during a slide and vise-verse.
Suspension:
Similar to how you would set up a RWD drifter but backwards.
Ride Height: more personal preference but i like it as low as it can go with the rear being about 2mm to 5mm higher in the rear to control how much weight is thrown forward during a let-off over-steer
Spring rate: edit Most often twice as stiff as stock setup and usually stiffer in the front in order to break the rear tires lose and send the weight to the back wich keeps the suspenion compresed in order to hold a slide. If the car wont pull out of a drift easy or having a hard time transitioning then stiffer springs are needed and vise-verse.
I found that if the rear is softer you don't need touse a much brake wich means speed is retained more.
Dampeners: Have kinda the same effect as springs. I'm not to good at tuning this but I find keeping them even all the way round allows for a well balanced car. I usually run 6 for all 4 settings
Anti-roll Bars: Stiffer in the front than the rear allows for favored body roll in the rear that not only helps start a slide but as helps hold it too. Experiment with this setting to help start your drift
Camber: twice as much in the front as in the rear helps the car slide well. If your having a hard time sliding, increase rear, while if your spinning out too much or having to correct too much than decrease it
Toe: Again not one of my strong points but i found that decreasing rear toe decreases both initiation and the straightening out while increasing both increases initiation and the cars tendency to straighten out.
Everything else is more personal preference so I wont get into that but I will say that, like drifting anything else, the low end turbo charger is most preferred.
Hope this was helpful and encourages everyone to at least try FF drifting before they start bashing on it. It really is its own art form and a nice change of pace from RWD drifting. These tips can also be applied to FF cars in less intensity to increase its speed through a corner.
Please feel free to leave me any comments on what you think and if I got something wrong. But if your only going to post a comment on how lame FF drifting is or whether or not it is really drifting you can take that comment and shove it where the sun don't shine because your not changing my opinion and only wasting your time being an arrogant a**hole
.
I hope to get a lot more people interested in FF drifting and if you see a FF drifting room most likely I created it since everybody else seems to be afraid to otherwise, so feel free to join and ask as many questions as you want and maybe we could even try to tandem FF.
Drifting: the act of creating over-steer in a car and maintaining control through the duration of the corner.
Now, why did I have to define what is already obvious to most people in this forum? Because there is a lot of nay-sayers that don't think anything but rear-wheel drive cars can drift. This is in fact, WRONG. Anything with four wheels and the ability to create over-steer in a controlled manor can and is a drift.
Now that we cleared that up, lets get on with how to actually go about this in a front-wheeled drive car. First, lets talk theory (my favorite) then I'll explain set up later on in this post.
There are two basic ways of initiating over-steer in a FF:
1. The let-off over-steer
2. The e-brake slide
1. The let-off over-steer
This technique is pretty self-explanatory but I'll continue to explain how to do it right. First, come into the corner while still accelerating and at the last second lift completely off the gas at the same time as you flick the steering-wheel into the corner. What this does is as you let off the gas, the weight of the car is transferred to the front creating less traction in the rear. Jerking the wheel into the corner unsettles the cars balance and takes advantage of the fact that the rear has little traction and send the car into a slide.
This technique is best suited for long sweepers with wide angles. Practicing where to be in relation to the corner is the key to getting this one right. there is no real right place to be but most of the time you want to be on the inside of the turn when it starts as it takes a second to take effect but once it does, you'd be surprised how much over-steer it really creates.
2. The e-brake slide
Again, pretty self-explanatory but I'll still cover it. As your coming up to the corner, feint your car to put the weight to the outside then hit that e-brake and hold it till about the half-way point in the turn. Basically the same for any drive type.
Best suited for tighter corners the trick to this one is learning when and how much e-brake to use.
So now on to how to hold a slide.
Most people say that FF can't hold slides very long and i beg to differ. I have held a FF car in a slide through sweepers like that found on EIGER MT. short track before the tunnel. Now the most confusing part is that it is opposite of drifting rwd and awd/4wd cars as in accelerating creates under-steer instead of over-steer. So throttle is used to pull your car out of a drift. In order to maintain the over-steer we need the e-brake is heavily relied upon. After initiating the slide, watch for the car trying to straighten out, once it starts to, start tapping or holding the e-brake depending on how hard it's trying to go straight, how long the corner is, and how much over-steer you need. Counter-steer is hardly ever necessary and should rarely be used while on throttle since it will flick the car in the other direction so hard that most the time control is lost. So in order to decrease over-steer, simply let go of the e-brake. A good time to use counter-steer on throttle is when one needs to transition from one corner to another in a chicane. Usually you will be steering into a corner or leaving the wheels straight while on the gas to counteract the drastic over-steer created by using the e-brake. Staying on the gas through most the corner is also necessary in order to keep speed up enough to keep the car sliding. For long corners it is usually necessary to keep holding the e-brake and giving it full gas to drag the sliding rear end through the rest of the corner( hence the nickname assdragging). This is also a situation in witch counter-steer on throttle is sometimes necessary in order to pull the car in the right direction but the key here is not to let go of the e-brake or control will be lost.
So now that we know how to drift a FF car, lets set it up to favor letting the rear slip out in a controlled manor.
Car Choice:
Most cars will do but the best are cars those that can still move forward from a dead stop while e-brake is being applied. This will allow for those long corners o be pulled of while still sliding. Hatchbacks are a really good choice as the extra body in the back will help to create a slide.
Tire Choice:
I found that the best tires in the rear are always going to be comfort hard in any case because the rear needs as little traction as possible in order to maintain a slide.
Now front tires depend on how powerful your car is and how much speed is needed for the corners. Most tire selections will be between comfort soft and sport soft. Comfort soft will provide the most under-steer, good for getting out of hairpins. Sport soft will give the care more front pull, good for pulling a car through long corners and for high-powered FF's.
Gearing:
In most cases can be left alone. But, if a car is still under-steering to much, the gear ratio can be lengthened and vise-verse. This kind over resembles the effect of traction control but the the problem with TCS is that if you use it while trying to drift, it brings the car to a stop like any other car no matter the drive.
Differential:
I find that a really loose diff. is best as it lets the outside tire maintain traction enough to keep over-steering. I usually run Initial torque at 5, and accel. and deccel at 20 to keep it even and balanced. This can also be used to combat under-steer by decreasing accel. torque in order to keep that outside wheel pulling in on the front during a slide and vise-verse.
Suspension:
Similar to how you would set up a RWD drifter but backwards.
Ride Height: more personal preference but i like it as low as it can go with the rear being about 2mm to 5mm higher in the rear to control how much weight is thrown forward during a let-off over-steer
Spring rate: edit Most often twice as stiff as stock setup and usually stiffer in the front in order to break the rear tires lose and send the weight to the back wich keeps the suspenion compresed in order to hold a slide. If the car wont pull out of a drift easy or having a hard time transitioning then stiffer springs are needed and vise-verse.
I found that if the rear is softer you don't need touse a much brake wich means speed is retained more.
Dampeners: Have kinda the same effect as springs. I'm not to good at tuning this but I find keeping them even all the way round allows for a well balanced car. I usually run 6 for all 4 settings
Anti-roll Bars: Stiffer in the front than the rear allows for favored body roll in the rear that not only helps start a slide but as helps hold it too. Experiment with this setting to help start your drift
Camber: twice as much in the front as in the rear helps the car slide well. If your having a hard time sliding, increase rear, while if your spinning out too much or having to correct too much than decrease it
Toe: Again not one of my strong points but i found that decreasing rear toe decreases both initiation and the straightening out while increasing both increases initiation and the cars tendency to straighten out.
Everything else is more personal preference so I wont get into that but I will say that, like drifting anything else, the low end turbo charger is most preferred.
Hope this was helpful and encourages everyone to at least try FF drifting before they start bashing on it. It really is its own art form and a nice change of pace from RWD drifting. These tips can also be applied to FF cars in less intensity to increase its speed through a corner.
Please feel free to leave me any comments on what you think and if I got something wrong. But if your only going to post a comment on how lame FF drifting is or whether or not it is really drifting you can take that comment and shove it where the sun don't shine because your not changing my opinion and only wasting your time being an arrogant a**hole
.I hope to get a lot more people interested in FF drifting and if you see a FF drifting room most likely I created it since everybody else seems to be afraid to otherwise, so feel free to join and ask as many questions as you want and maybe we could even try to tandem FF.
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