Understeer question

The dilemna: ----------- Now suppose i am in a state of understeer.. a) If i increase power on the pedal, i will understeer more b) If i decrease power from the pedal, i might stand the chance to oversteer by engine braking (and sometimes the curve is too tight to keep it smooth) c) If i tend to keep the power stable, i will keep understeering since i've already started it! So, what's the solution? Or is the fact of having started an understeer is wrong in the very beginning? How do i get out of understeer smoothly by keeping a smooth curve? Wael

Assuming that you're in a 996 and understeering in a curve like the the Carousel (turn 9) at Road America: Subtle, quick corrections are the solutions to understeer. Come out of the throttle a bit and make steering corrections until you've balanced the car back on line. I drive into the carousel as hard as possible- invoking a bit of understeer and then use the throttle and subtle steering corrections to bring the front end back online clipping the end of the curbing before tracking-out (10) and setting up for the Kink (11, 11A).

I agree w/ Gonzo. The jey is to make all of your corrections smoothly. Definitely, the first thing to do is ease up on the throttle. But don't jump off the pedal, do it deliberately but smoothly. The 996 is pretty forgiving and won't transition from understeer to snap oversteer unless you're in a low gear and you step off the throttle completely and immediately. Make smooth steering corrections too and you'll be fine. If you find that the handling balance favors understeer too much (I do), consider getting the RoW M030 suspension or at least adjustable sway bars so you can tune to your preference.

Guys, I understand that a mild lift of the pedal in order to adjust should put me back on track.. Ok the least i can say is that i will think about your replies as much as to train my mind into it before application.. does this apply at low speed as well as high speeds (am reffering to 4th gear speeds and 2nd gear speeds).. Thanx, i'll let you know.. Waz *racing neurones overworking like soldier ants..!*

Hey hey hey, am reading further into your replies.. steering corrections? If i gently lift the pedal am sure the car will drop its nose and the fronts will bite again, so what's the steering correction for? I know that in front wheel driven cars (my former Lancia HF) i used to steer in excess of the curve keeping power surging to hold the car to the curveline, that was easy.. I know the 996 is a backengine-rwd with much more grunt ok, so what's the steering maneouver while understeering? what's the correction about? details?? Waz *panic mode *

It is difficult to just explain it Wazz. But if you are well into understeer with the front sliding a lot and back off the throttle then the front might bite hard again and around you'll go! This is the best way to spin a FWD car. But it will happen on ours too. So you must open up the steering a little at the same time. Then when it grabs it will not try to tuck in quite so much. Better still, you learn not to get so deep into understeer. Really that's the first mistake. The rest just follows. Also, remember that there are limits to everything. You can be so on the edge that even a litte bit less throttle will make you spin. That's called knowing that you are completely f**ked. Happens mostly at higher speeds. The best thing you can do for yourself in driving is to be looking ahead and correctly judging corners. Once you get in over your head there is just more opportunity to drown. If you really are going as fast as you possibly can then there is going to be no margin to correct for understeer and any tightening of the line will make you spin. So then it just becomes a matter of having your entry speed and line absolutely correct. If you watch the pro's, you'll see that when they enter a corner too fast they don't try to tighten the line or make corrections. Instead they just let it go out on to the grass. Then they just deal with that situation. But they know that if they try to make any correction whatsoever they will loose it right there. Happy Holidays! S.

So it's just like waterskiing, if you get it wrong you're supposed to bail out or face the consequence of snapping your shoulders or back.. Now i get it, more food for thoughts fwing! Keep it coming, tx.. And BTW, any pro-waterskiers around? You're invited to dreamwaters of Nigeria's lagoons. A 250Hp Correct Craft with full ski gear ahead awaiting the dunks of your lives! *fellow renlisters, it's for free this is no advert!* Waz 996 C2 99 6sp 928S 84 Aut. Ski Nautique Correct Craft 1994 66inch O'brian LaPointe 1996 ..and the list goes on!!

This is what works for me when I understeer usually in the rain, Let off the gas smoothly and if you still need to, open the steering angle a bit until you gain traction back again. Then when the weight tranfer is complete and stabilised then close the steering angle back again at the now lower speed to be able to make the corner. Only once did I lift off to fast and induced oversteer but it was to avoid rear-ending and idiot who jumped into my lane (inside lane) when I was under hard aceleration comming out of a curve in third gear under the rain. Luckily when the tail went out I had the outside lane to myself

Presenting Carlos, earning another bonus life in planet Earth.. Ok, here you assure me again that the process is to let the front wheels bite again but not enough to lift the back of the car, as previous replies state.. Ok, i get the conception more and more.. Tx Waz

The throttle is nothing but a leaver to move weight between the back and the front of a car. Press down on the leaver and the weight goes to the back. More traction for acceleration and more traction to the back wheels in a corner. Let up on the leaver and the weight goes to the front. Now more traction at the front and less at the back. You just play around with the throttle to get the handling you desire. The brake does the same thing but in a bigger way. Brake hard and lots of weight goes to the front. In other cars it is common to use this to get traction at the front so that you can make the car turn into the corner very quickly. A few who are really good do this in the Porsche too but most don�t as it is just too easy to spin a Porsche if it gets away from you (no weight on the back and big massive engine hanging out back there is a recipe for disaster). Actually, the Turbo with AWD works really nicely when you use the brakes like this. S.

Fwing, what really disturbs me is that i spent time with my HF (lancia) enough to be able to control my understeer while using the method you mentioned above.. I used to let go of the pedal to ease the curve by lifting its back (like you said) and understeering.. now the PSM in the carrera is not really making things natural like i am used to ... Anyway, i will try now that i have more info from you guys.. Waz

Porsche isn't setting its street cars up to be neutral. They�re dialling in a bias towards understeer. This is in large part because of the rear engine pendulum effect I was talking about. Today there is a rule of thumb that if a driver crashes straight ahead then it is driver error. If the car goes off tail first then it is manufacturing error. So there is a tendency to make cars understeer. The Lancia HF you had was notorious for its excellent handling balance. So it doesn�t surprise me that you were able to play with it and control it. From my experience, the 996 is perfectly predictable and mostly understeers in almost all circumstances. The only time you start to see some of the old 911 oversteer tendencies are at higher speeds when they really can be quite frightening if you aren�t prepared. Happy landings! S.

Waz, which understeer are you reffering to with the 996 in particular? Because it needs a different approach depending on: if you are on the brakes hard comming in, on the gas hard comming out, or no gas or brakes in between.

Carlos, I understand what you mean, but I cant gather my thoughts to know which one.. You have a point there, so i will keep myself alert for my next understeer experience and let you know.. Wael

In any case, these are the three understeer scenarios I can think of: 1) YOU WILL UNDERSTEER BECAUSE COME IN WAY TOO FAST TO TAKE THE CORNER: A)You brake all you can before you initiate the turn to take off as much speed as you can waiting until the last moment before you run out of road: i) you have reduced speed enough to be able to take the corner with none or minimal understeering which can be corrected with the steering. You have to be very smooth in the trasnsition between leting of the breaks and initiating the turn or you will induce severe oversteer (this was the only way along with lift-off oversteer that I could induce oversteer in my first car, a FWD and front engined Honda Prelude... ahhh those college years) ii) you are still going way too fast to take the corner: don�t try to take the corner because you will understeer wildly out out the road, so you want to maneuver to minimize the damage running out in a "controled fashion". B) you don't brake all you can using as much road as you can and instead you try to negotiate the turn as you would normally would, this is the bad understeer and you will most likely run out of the corner in a nasty fashion with a lot of speed. 2) YOUR TOO FAST OVERSTEERING WHILE IN MANAGING THE CORNER NOW OFF THE BRAKES AND BEFORE ACELERATING such as when a turn tightens on you: you can't touch the breaks because the 996 will severely oversteer on you, you are not on the gas so you can't use that, so you open the steering angle to reduce the understeer and maybe use sa little engine breaking depending on the situation. You will run thw corner wide and hope you have enough road spaca before you corrected the understeer. 3) YOUR COMMING OUT OF THE TURN AND DUE TO TOO MUCH ACELERATION YOU UNDERSTEER: this is the most frequent, at least in my case, and due to the excellent feedback of the 996 you can detect it just before it happens and match the aceleration to that limit of traction. If you still start really understeering then this is when you back off the gas smoothly (to hard and the 996 rear-end inertia due to the engine will make you oversteer) and if need be open the steering angle. The same thing I apply to the bike except that case 3 scenario doesn't happen in bikes.

Hi Waz I know little about understeer - I only collected my 996 4 weeks ago and since then I have been out of the country. However, couldn't help but notice " any pro-waterskiers around? ". I don't waterski but wakeboard, not as often as I would like - but interesting I am the Chairman of the Wakeboard World Council for IWSF (International Waterski Federation)and have been the Chief Judge on the European Wakeboard Pro Tour for 8 yrs. I notice you are from Nigeria, is there much riding over there. Last year we held the World Championships in Sun City, South Africa which was cool. Feed back would be great. Tx. <img src="graemlins/roflmao.gif" border="0" alt="[hiha]" />

Wake-Judge!!! that explains the nick! My God, am talking to a pro! Well, we've started the whole thing here back in '92 and we got our first nautique here, followeed by a couple of other ski boats.. 'WE' means we were a bunch of rookies here and tried to excel as much as possible knowing the limitation of this country BUT BUT the lagoons here are great!! especially in this season, the water is calm like oil in a pan. The lagoon side bushes act as a wave breaker and it is just awesome! I wish you could come here and see for yourself! We even represented the IWSF for a couple of years! Unfortunately, we stopped our sport and just take it as a leisure.. After all, the reality is that we cant really take this kind of sports to IWSF standards.. Wael

Carlos, I've printed your literature to study tomorrow.. It's too late + i have a serious cold (fever) Thanx, will feed you back on the results.. Waz

Picked up a 2001 C4 a few weeks ago...I now know about the understeer. Wow, a bit scary. Great info above, thanks to all who posted. I drive a very twisty road (luckily!) to work each day and the C4 is amazing if there is rain/mud. I mean amazing. In dry, the car is pretty good, handles about as well as my M3's did but has much more understeer. I love the car though.

Dman, This post has taught me to at least realize and think when such a situation occurs.. Now I am still experiencing but i can surely say my attitude towards understeer has changed from fear to curiosity.. And am getting better at it! Waz

It is so unfortunate that my practice grounds are the streets themselves.. I have been able to cut curves much more gently now, but with increased speed (and higher gears).. The feeling of the front tyre 'biting' the tarmac is now being communicating to me and i am slowly being able to adjust with the throttle only (no more brakes).. It is so beautiful when you start acquiring it! More and more convinced what a great car this is! Wael *coming from a test run*

[quote]Originally posted by Waz996: <strong>I have been able to cut curves much more gently now, but with increased speed (and higher gears).. The feeling of the front tyre 'biting' the tarmac is now being communicating to me and i am slowly being able to adjust with the throttle only (no more brakes).. </strong><hr></blockquote> Just make sure that you don't start communicating with a tree. S.

it can happen to anyone Fwing.. waz