Is there such a thing as driving too smoothly?
Discussion
I'm always very wary about doing anything which will unsettle a car, but when you get a typically nose-led FWD hatch they do sometimes seem to respond well to a more aggressive turn in - deliberately throwing the car in to make use of the weight transfer. Do you reckon it's possible to be too smooth on occasions if you treat these relatively inert cars like you would a more highly strung sports car?
I would say yes. Just look at rallying. I know that the inputs are generally very smooth but during cornering cars are deliberately unsettled to get the driven wheels helping out in the corners.
ETA, I should caveat the above by saying that for road driving, smooth wins for a number of reasons.
ETA, I should caveat the above by saying that for road driving, smooth wins for a number of reasons.
Edited by Gad-Westy on Friday 29th July 11:10
You can go faster by sacrificing smoothness, sometimes - but I'm not sure that'd qualify as 'driving too smoothly'. Whenever you do it you're making a conscious decision to take a risk by pushing the car closer to limits of grip (or even beyond them), and limiting your options if something were to go wrong.
in my clio i can throw it onto roundabouts and lift a little to bring the back end round but in the noble i go in at a higher speed but more neutral throttle and steering and then driving out of the corner. two totaly different driving styles that you have to be able to jump from one to the other.
In terms of generating the maximum lateral acceleration, the smoother the better, but in terms of actually getting somewhere as fast as possible, there are some situations where you will trade a reduction in max lat acc to enable earlier application of power (trading corner speed for peak straight line speed) The "lift to get the arse around" fwd technique being the prime example.
In rallying, where typically lateral grip is low, and the corners are often sharp, it makes sense to trade off some ultimate corner speed to gain a greater advantage accelerating out of the corner (as the distance travelled down the next "straight" is much longer than the distance around the corner). Again, watch the WRC cars doing hairpins on the handbrake, they get the car turned 180deg in it's own length, practically come to a stop (instead of trying a "racing line") but the cars (with 4wd and masisve torque) are so accelerative, that having the car then pointing immediately down the next straight means the drivers can just nail the loud pedal and shoot off into the distance
In rallying, where typically lateral grip is low, and the corners are often sharp, it makes sense to trade off some ultimate corner speed to gain a greater advantage accelerating out of the corner (as the distance travelled down the next "straight" is much longer than the distance around the corner). Again, watch the WRC cars doing hairpins on the handbrake, they get the car turned 180deg in it's own length, practically come to a stop (instead of trying a "racing line") but the cars (with 4wd and masisve torque) are so accelerative, that having the car then pointing immediately down the next straight means the drivers can just nail the loud pedal and shoot off into the distance
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