Nick Jones will be joining us as he is sponsored by ExoticCarRacing. He will be available to answer all of your questions. Just leave him a question and he will answer.


Nick Jones
Nick Jones, 20, from Los Angeles, is in his third year as a Skip Barber Western Series driver. In the 2000 / 2001 series, he scored all the top three finishes in the six out of fourteen races in which he competed and finished 18th overall in the championship.

Cool stuff :cool:

First question for Nick... I was having an argument on another forum about oversteer and the possibility of its' occurence on FWD cars. I believe that oversteer is a tail-out attitude whether provoked by trail-braking, engine power, or e-braking, but he believed that it could only occur when the rear drive wheels had power applied to them. I vaguely remember road tests of some FWD cars (the Sport Compact Car issue when they test-drove Speedvision World Cup cars, road test of the Contour SVT, etc.) when oversteer and FWD were mentioned together. Am I right, or is he?

im not nick but i think that oversteer can be induced on any car, it just has to have the right suspension/ tire set up to give the rear less grip than the front, so with trailbraking i think it would be possible, but probably not nearly as fun as with a rwd car with power.

My Prelude has oversteered under throttle many times...and its FWD. Then again its a Type-SH with the ATTS...

yea i thought so, it all depends on the car, most fwd cars are set up to understeer just because its safer for the untrained driver.

oversteer is simply a term saying is turning too much...okay i m not good at putting things into words so forgive me

its when your rear tires loose traction before the front in a turn.

I agree with you guys... but Bliggida @ carforums doesn't quite see things my way. Oh well... I think one of his quotes to me was, "my (V6:)) Camaro was designed for Trans-Am racing, your car (NX2000, 0.89g skidpad grip, on Road and Track's Best-Handling Car list for '92) is nothing but a passenger car"...

Riiight :rolleyes:

The answer to the post by Nick Jones will appear by 11PM tomorrow night.

-Darren

o cool, so he actually talk to us and not like just sponsor us?

Oh yeah, "admin" is our tech guy- he also hooked us up with Nick.

We sponsor Nick Jones, and yes, he will be chatting with us. He isn't "stuck" up or anything, and he remembers the "little" people in life ;)

sweet ass, itll be nice to have someone with alot of experience racing.

yup...dont remember, how long has he been racing total?

ive only been in it for i think 3-4 years now...

tis cool hat hes willing to answer questions from a bb...most of the drivers i know just wouldnt be willing to do it...no time, no desire, etc etc..

and yes, fwd cars can oversteer...has to do with slip angles and such...but im sure that nick will have a nicely detailed answer...

later

Nick is a helluva guy.

Ask Nick if he wants to get jiggy with me. BTW, my name is Nick too, so I'll refer to him as Nikki.

This is Nick Jones - officially sponsored by ExoticCarRacing

Hopefully this will answer your question to oversteer in a FWD car.

Obviously, in a RWD car, it's easier to produce oversteer. A simple action to the throttle, either aggressive power or lifting off, can unload weight from the rear of the car to the front, which produces less traction on the rear tires, and it oversteers. During a race, when I've got someone behind me or in front of me and I've early apexed the turn, I'll let off the throttle for a second, to get a little oversteer, and get the car pointed.

In the case of a FWD car, it's much harder to produce oversteer than understeer. FWD cars are set-up to produce understeer because it's easier to get out of trouble when it occurs. Oversteer is possible, and you're right in saying it can be done with a hand brake. It's less likely to occur because of engine power. Under excessive throttle through a turn, it is much more likely to get understeer. It is possible to get oversteer through trail braking, but again, in a stock FWD car, it's less likely.

So, going on what's been mentioned before, you can get oversteer without modifications by using the hand-brake. To help dial in a little oversteer, front tires can be set to a negative camber (the tops of the tires pointing in toward each other) and the rear tires can have a little toe out (the tops of the tires point away from each other). A couple other small things would be to adjust brake bias or change tire pressures, with more in the front and less in the rear.

Hope this has been helpful.

Nick

Hey Nick, I have a friend who has made these neat designs of race cars. Wanna take a peak at them? See any flaws, ideas, or such? One is a really creative idea of a coupe Formula 1 car. Nice design IMO.

wait, doesnt less air in a tire provide more grip because it is like softening the suspension, i am confused.

Maybe is a double edged sword. With less air, the tire can comform easier to the ridges and tiny crevices in the ground, so therefore you can get better grip. But with that, im sure you lose some sort of input from the differential b/c it'll have more give. With a more solid tire, you don't have that "give", but you also don't have as much conforming ability. Its also easier to wear out because the tire is stretched more.

true, i just noticed from my mountainbiking experience that softer gives alot more traction but harder makes it more effecient as far as power goes.

yea i noticed that too

and i noticed that i should put my feet on the floor when i have to brake hard...bad experience

Nick, we have to get together next race season. I am preparing a ferrari 512TR to race, not sure if I'm going EMRA or SCCA yet. I run with the FCA & lots of other clubs

:deano:

Stop that.

Oh, man what have I done!!!!! Look at the trend I started.


Still mine is older :laserspeeddemon: