Driving advice

[wanda]

Merry Christmas everyone.

I was looking at some track videos and wondered. If you ever ought to be driving and the back end gives way, what is the best way to recover it?

Could it be:

(1) Floor it and fight with the steering wheel?

(2) Hit the brakes?

(3) Or let go of the gas and brakes and purely concentrate on steering?

[Stranger]

None of the above, you need to control the throttle whilst steering appropriately.

[wanda]

None of the above, you need to control the throttle whilst steering appropriately.

Like this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPCGnkApnDU

[Stranger]

Something like that yes

[AlexB]

It depends...

A FWD car, if properly balanced, oversteers only if you lift up or brake in a bend. It may be enough just to stop braking and put your foot on the accelerator. Basically, you need to stop breaking traction on the rear and, possibly, break traction on the front (the physics is a bit more complex in reality). The downside of stepping on gas is that the turning radius will increase... So, learn to steer with both the steering wheel and accelerator.

Braking in a bend is only advisable if you already know that you are going to crash and trying to cut the losses. Braking when the car is already oversteering will send you in a spin. An exception is left foot braking while on gas in a RWD car...

[eric]

How about trying it out in a big gravelly empty car park or similar? So you know what it feels like if it does happen.

Alex - couldn't aggre with you more about braking on a bend, and don't know why driving instructors don't deal with this from the start. Still, I've seen worst, changing gear whilst braking on a bend

[AlexB]

Ha ha, ...and eating a sandwich while on the phone, texting!