Is there anywhere I can see a head to head of a modern car in the R8 V10/458 range with and without traction control on specifically for lap times and control. Where they deliberately tried to go as fast as possible with all the systems on and then off. Something a winning regional autocross driver would have trouble with the power/traction but had the ability to really whip it around.
Watch old Top Gear episodes for the "Traction control off" videos.
As a supplement ot your question, is Stig driving, or is James May driving? I would think there would be a massive difference in TC off mode, far less in TC on mode.
I can only tell you from sim experience that having the ABS on is worth a lot.
As an industry insider, I can tell you “pretty friggin’ Good.” But I can’t give you flying lap time comparisons.
Second.
GameboyRMH said:I can only tell you from sim experience that having the ABS on is worth a lot.
That can be a problem in a racing situation, as you tend to run higher brake temps IIRC. We had a brake failure on one of the T25 cars that was attributed to the ABS having been turned on. Not so much an issue with TT or autox.
I'll bet Ferrari has published Fiorano times with and without the traction control. I've seen statements by a few of the high end car makers that the cars are faster with than without. I'm working on enabling the stability control on our V8 cars, it'll be interesting to see what happens there. that will be cornering assist without throttle adjustment, so basically just the brakes triggering to revector the car.
GameboyRMH said:I can only tell you from sim experience that having the ABS on is worth a lot.
Having ABS is all I have right now and its a poor setup. I had an accident and while I know this one was not avoidable due to the other driver it scared me. I want everything in the next car but keep wondering if it really helps on the track. On the street I imagine its really nice with the lower speeds.
Keith Tanner said:GameboyRMH said:I can only tell you from sim experience that having the ABS on is worth a lot.
That can be a problem in a racing situation, as you tend to run higher brake temps IIRC. We had a brake failure on one of the T25 cars that was attributed to the ABS having been turned on. Not so much an issue with TT or autox.
I'll bet Ferrari has published Fiorano times with and without the traction control. I've seen statements by a few of the high end car makers that the cars are faster with than without. I'm working on enabling the stability control on our V8 cars, it'll be interesting to see what happens there. that will be cornering assist without throttle adjustment, so basically just the brakes triggering to revector the car.
I found this:
Study on braking temperature differences with ABS on vs. off for aircraft
I actually could've compared brake temps in the sim but didn't bother because they still worked fine, one of the advantages of running carbon brakes you don't have to pay for 
The best drivers in the best cars with the best systems available (Formula 1)...........are still faster with the computer goodies.
Streetwiseguy said:Watch old Top Gear episodes for the "Traction control off" videos.
IIRC, there was a 'new' Top Gear episode where Sabine Schmitz drove an R10 at Laguna Seca, and she was slightly faster with the TC/Stability control off.
I can't personally attest to the high end cars, but when I put RE71s on our NC Miata, the stability control would freak out on hard turn in and had to be turned off for optimal times. I would assume more 'track ready' cars would have the system tuned to deal with high grip tires.
Not a comment on general effectiveness, but word on the BMW DSC/e-diff setup is that it tends to eat rear brakes when worked hard. I haven't tracked mine so no personal experience.
02Pilot said:Not a comment on general effectiveness, but word on the BMW DSC/e-diff setup is that it tends to eat rear brakes when worked hard. I haven't tracked mine so no personal experience.
That's my experience too. But don't try to tell that to the regulars at the Bimmerpost E92 M3 track forum. So who knows. Based on what I have seen at a lot of HPDEs over the last six years, traction control on out-right sports cars (Corvette, Porsche) tends to be better at the track than traction control on sports sedans.
Also, I can spin the E92 M3 with the traction control on, no problem, but it happens at a much higher speed, the computer is useless for recovery, and my powerslide through the grass is much longer. Unless there's a barrier to shorten it up. So, I turn it off.
ABS at the track is interesting. Our instructors have figured out, ABS is great if the car is on the pavement, the front wheels are pointed pretty straight, and it's dry. If it's wet, or if one side of the car is on grass and the other is on pavement, it takes away braking power to maintain steering, and stopping distances are much longer than a trained driver with no ABS. If the student is in a spin, "both feet in" doesn't work as well because they usually have steering input frozen in the wrong direction at the end of a tank slapper, and the ABS steering arcs the spin into a barrier instead of moving in a straight line down track with the center mass under locked brakes.
JBasham said:02Pilot said:powerslide through the grass is much longer. Unless there's a barrier to shorten it up. So, I turn it off.
ABS at the track is interesting. Our instructors have figured out, ABS is great if the car is on the pavement, the front wheels are pointed pretty straight, and it's dry. If it's wet, or if one side of the car is on grass and the other is on pavement, it takes away braking power to maintain steering, and stopping distances are much longer than a trained driver with no ABS.
This isn't news. Limited traction, abs will stop longer than just locking everything up. Much easier on tires, but still, all it really does is allow you to steer into the collision.
The newer the better, and I presume cars with an aim towards high performance will also be better than grocery getters. Personal experience suggests American lawyers have a lot more to do with programming than engineers. I forgot to pull the fuse on my Neon road race car once, and it desperately tried to drive me off the end of the back straight in Calgary, because the left rear is unweighted in the braking zone. There is a system that was in common use 20 years ago in American vehicles that lifts the brake pedal when it turns on, and really compromises the braking if you lose traction on one wheel because of a turn in, or a pothole. My old Silverado is terrifying on a potholed road- The ABS fuse is in the glovebox, I think.
Other than straight line acceleration, I'd bet a good driver in a good car would have been much faster with TC off 20 years ago, faster 10 years ago, a bit faster now. Maybe the programming will eventually catch up. Drag racing, I'm pretty sure the computer will win, and probably has been ahead for quite a while.
JBasham said:If the student is in a spin, "both feet in" doesn't work as well because they usually have steering input frozen in the wrong direction at the end of a tank slapper, and the ABS steering arcs the spin into a barrier instead of moving in a straight line down track with the center mass under locked brakes.
...But at least the tires won't be flat spotted.
In my friend’s H-Street Fiesta ST, we were both quicker with the car in Sport mode vs everything turned off. Experimented with it at 2 test n tunes at 2 different sites. The modern stuff is pretty darn good.
So maybe about a decade ago one of the manufacturers (GM I think) did a test at Spring Mt Motorsports with the car in race/sport mode. I can't remember the driver but he was a big name and while he was able to do a lap or two faster without the nannies but over a series of laps he was faster with the nannies on.
I would also suspect that the results would vary dependent on the type of car; short wheelbase vs long, high horsepower vs low horsepower. Wide tires vs skinny tires I also suspect it might be track dependent.
I can tell you that as an instructor I quite happily have students leave the car in sport mode rather than turning everything off. The new systems allow you to get it wrong while still keeping the car on the road. Now due note I instruct at desert tracks that quickly turn to deep sand and rock once your off track, once you drop a wheel your going to start damaging the car very quickly.
I seem to recall that Brianne Corn fought the traction control on a new BR-Z at the RXNC in 2013, and was going to write an article about driving around/with stability control (instead of against it) for GRM or some other magazine. I guess nothing came of it.
Teh S60R is the only vehicle I've extensively driven with nannies. They CAN be turned "completely" off, in a sense. The first level eliminates most throttle reduction but maintains brake activation. The "completely" seems to only use the ABS for yaw vectoring (want torque on the outside rear wheel? engage the rear axle and apply the inside rear brake), but this is also a kind of a nanny in a sense. Either way it is too heavily tied in to the active suspension/diff to be able to truly turn everything off. Anyway, it turns into a game to see how screwed up you can get the car's attitude and have the computers pull you out of it, which is kind of fun in its own way. Feels like the Hand of God reaches down, grabs the car, and realigns it.
With it fully on, it's no fun. At the first hint of either end of the car approaching its limits (usually the front, because it's a four door 3000GT), it cuts power. Bleah.
There's more than a few high-end sports cars that can go faster with certain systems intervening than they can without. I'm talking mostly about the exotic or semi-exotic stuff (McLaren, Viper, NSX, Vette, Porsche, Ferrari, etc) that has dedicated "track" modes or highly customizable nannies.
Basically it comes down to those systems being able to do things like independent control of individual wheels that no human driver could ever control. The NSX in particular has an exceptional system that is nearly completely transparent. It just makes yu feel like a better driver. You never feel. like you're fighting anything.
Streetwiseguy said:JBasham said:ABS at the track is interesting. Our instructors have figured out, ABS is great if the car is on the pavement, the front wheels are pointed pretty straight, and it's dry. If it's wet, or if one side of the car is on grass and the other is on pavement, it takes away braking power to maintain steering, and stopping distances are much longer than a trained driver with no ABS.
This isn't news. Limited traction, abs will stop longer than just locking everything up. Much easier on tires, but still, all it really does is allow you to steer into the collision.
My apologies for chit-chat instead of breaking news.
Knurled. said:I seem to recall that Brianne Corn fought the traction control on a new BR-Z at the RXNC in 2013, and was going to write an article about driving around/with stability control (instead of against it) for GRM or some other magazine. I guess nothing came of it.
Teh S60R is the only vehicle I've extensively driven with nannies. They CAN be turned "completely" off, in a sense. The first level eliminates most throttle reduction but maintains brake activation. The "completely" seems to only use the ABS for yaw vectoring (want torque on the outside rear wheel? engage the rear axle and apply the inside rear brake), but this is also a kind of a nanny in a sense. Either way it is too heavily tied in to the active suspension/diff to be able to truly turn everything off. Anyway, it turns into a game to see how screwed up you can get the car's attitude and have the computers pull you out of it, which is kind of fun in its own way. Feels like the Hand of God reaches down, grabs the car, and realigns it.
With it fully on, it's no fun. At the first hint of either end of the car approaching its limits (usually the front, because it's a four door 3000GT), it cuts power. Bleah.
The TC/VSC in the twins is horrible. Many times it was downright dangerous. Trying to turn into traffic from a stop, it would sometimes cut power before the tires had even lost traction. Rush hour traffic, with no power for 2 seconds while the car figures out what it wants to do is no fun.
z31maniac said:Knurled. said:I seem to recall that Brianne Corn fought the traction control on a new BR-Z at the RXNC in 2013, and was going to write an article about driving around/with stability control (instead of against it) for GRM or some other magazine. I guess nothing came of it.
Teh S60R is the only vehicle I've extensively driven with nannies. They CAN be turned "completely" off, in a sense. The first level eliminates most throttle reduction but maintains brake activation. The "completely" seems to only use the ABS for yaw vectoring (want torque on the outside rear wheel? engage the rear axle and apply the inside rear brake), but this is also a kind of a nanny in a sense. Either way it is too heavily tied in to the active suspension/diff to be able to truly turn everything off. Anyway, it turns into a game to see how screwed up you can get the car's attitude and have the computers pull you out of it, which is kind of fun in its own way. Feels like the Hand of God reaches down, grabs the car, and realigns it.
With it fully on, it's no fun. At the first hint of either end of the car approaching its limits (usually the front, because it's a four door 3000GT), it cuts power. Bleah.
The TC/VSC in the twins is horrible. Many times it was downright dangerous. Trying to turn into traffic from a stop, it would sometimes cut power before the tires had even lost traction. Rush hour traffic, with no power for 2 seconds while the car figures out what it wants to do is no fun.
That sounds like how Brianne went from something like dead last to a second out of first place in Stock RWD in a complete slimepit of a weekend, while trying to drive around the nannies.
Meanwhile, Goofus in a Volvo amused himself by overdriving onramps in 40F rain on snow tires with the stability control set to "reduced" just so he could feel it kicking the car around mid-corner, like holding a happy wiggling puppy in your hands. Only you're inside the puppy and it weighs about 4000lb and you're going 50-60mph and cornering.
There must be some really crappy ABS implementations out there because I've read about ice-mode enough to believe it, but I haven't had that experience.
My experience is that pre-abs, the shortest brake line tended to limit your braking ability. Once the front right is impending lockup, you either leave traction on the table for the other 3 wheels or flat spot your tire. And once it has a flat spot, it's going to start locking up there even earlier the next time.
ABS is a godsend. I've raced and tracked extensively without it, and I'll take it every time. But then again, maybe I've never experienced a really crappy implementation.
TC/DSC systems run the gamut from invisible to torturous. If the driver is good enough to feel what's going on before engaging it, what's the harm?
All of these aids have the potential to exploit traction that can't be accessed through the traditional control inputs...that's the narrow envelope where they shine on track. Whether they are tuned to allow you to get there varies by vehicle.
Some ABS systems are good and will help you, but a lot (especially in non-performance cars are tuned somewhat poorly and based on crappy stock all seasons that lock up at a very low slip percentage, so they don't allow enough tire slip to achieve maximum braking force before they engage. And that leads to the ABS not allowing you to use all of the traction you've got for braking.
On top of that, some systems are so sensitive to even a little bit of slip that if you hit a bump under braking, the ABS will (unnecessarily) take away a bunch of braking power for a half-second or more because it thinks you're locking up a tire due to the slight momentary drop in wheel speed when hitting the bump.
Traction control systems are much the same way, depending on how much slip they're tuned to allow and how aggressively they react to limit slip. In a lot of cars, any wheelspin results in a violent and excessive power cut. In others (like the BMW systems I've driven), you'll feel the tires start to slip a little before the system cuts in noticeably as it'll allow a bit of slip (I think the older BMW systems target 5% slip) and unless you snapped the tires loose very suddenly and aggressively, the good systems tend to be a lot more gentle and mild in their power reduction or brake application. The only way I've gotten a hard power cut in the BMW is if I gas it suddenly and break the tires loose significantly and quickly at low speed. If they're broken loose gently, you just feel a slight power reduction to keep wheel sliip down to just a little bit.
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