Skidpan in my Z

Hey guys,

I took my 260z to a skidpan last Friday night for a bit of fun. After fretting the whole trip there about potentially damaging my car I ended up having a great time.

The engine never heated up more than it does when highway driving, and I didn't have to change gears. The total cost of the night was 115, and to return will cost me 60 each time. I actually really enjoyed myself and improved a lot throughout the night. There are no instructors and none of my mates are particularly good at drift but its great for anyone to learn how to control their car in a safe wet environment.

Steve

Good stuff Steve

In any sort of Motorkhana or Slalom event it's not about flamboyance - it's about corner speed & not loosing traction.

Glad you had fun mate - at least you now know what you & your Zed is capable of

damn that barricade-bollards looks daunting..

I tried this a few years ago at the Sutton driver training centre in Canberra (I also knocked back a session 5 weeks ago also  )

its a purpose built skid-pan with heaps of open space around it, a slightly cambered bank and built in drainage and water hydrant....I had a ball !! On the day we had Jason Bright and Thomas Mezera as our instructors, I learnt more in 5 hours than in 20 years of driving.

So does this mean you will be brave enough to come out and do a motorkhana now 

So does this mean you will be brave enough to come out and do a motorkhana now 

Hahaha tell me when and I'll see! 

damn that barricade-bollards looks daunting..

I tried this a few years ago at the Sutton driver training centre in Canberra (I also knocked back a session 5 weeks ago also  )

its a purpose built skid-pan with heaps of open space around it, a slightly cambered bank and built in drainage and water hydrant....I had a ball !! On the day we had Jason Bright and Thomas Mezera as our instructors, I learnt more in 5 hours than in 20 years of driving.

Its a good skidpan, but i have still seen someone break their car their, though he was in an S13 and trying to show off drifting and slapped the dirt wall (southern end)with the rear end. It was funny.

But yeh they are a good place to learn to control the car sideways and by that i mean that should it happen by accident, you have a better idea of how to handle it.  Good fun.

stevo.. im going out on the 20th.. if your interested in heading out again. i'll be in the 32, not the 26 of course.

Hey man,

I won't be there on the 20th, I've got to save funds for the nationals next month  . You should definitely post up a video if you record one though.

That wasn't the skid pan thats set up at drift practice nights was it?  If it was, thats the first drift practice I missed in a long time and a zed was on the pan.  Shame on me!

Yeah thats the one, haha.

We'll have to make sure to catch up at the Nationals, and I'm sure there will be a skidpan practise I can convince sushi to come along to where we can meet.

gday people, well i went to the skid pan practice night last friday and took some video of it for stevo.. it was taken on my mobile fone, so the video is really not the best at all.. which is pretty terrible for me considering.. but anway.. you can see the car and get the idea of what im doing. I hope the link works.

you bet, it's shocking to be honest.

whose heading out next 17th.. for some dori dori practice?

Hey steve, i too did a skidpan recently and it was fantastic, car didnt overheat at all and performed even better then i expected!

ahhh i got a 17th to go to! I don't like my chances of being able to do both...

We got the drive in on the 16th too

Well I've just found out that I'm able to go to the skidpan tonight Hope one of you guys can make it.

I sliced my finger open on wednesday.. so im out.. as much as i want to go.. knowing my luck.. the steering wheel will flick and my finger will hit it and split the stitches open..

at least u guys got somewhere to go in safe environment.

here well im sure you guys see it on the news what happens on every weekend in SA.

another street race gone bad another casualty. 

Went to the skidpan again a couple weeks ago. Not very impressive camera skills on this one but you at least get the idea. I recommend watching it in HD the quality is wayy better.

I really want to have someone riding shotgun who knows about drifting - I feel like I will take forever to improve if I just teach myself.

dont tempt me to drift my 240 when its going

what kinda off diff do you have, if its an open wheels that will be a large chunk of your problem

and that skidpan looked not that great of a setup ie really small

this is an old one of me, and one of the only vids ive got, not the best of runs

Very cool video man.

Yeah its an open diff. So you don't think its worth learning until the car has an LSD?

yeah my old NA s13 had just a open wheeler, sudked to drift, was very uncontrolable

but after i chucked in a 2nd hand viscous it made it alot better

the 180 was pretty much a stock car, lowered springs, cat back and boosted a lil. still using the stock viscous diff

from what ive read (forgivve me im learning ) diffs for a 240 arent a normal r200, and therefore expensve

a cheap option is to get out the welder, but im not a fan

Zeds use the long nose 'R' series diffs...

a cheap option is to get out the welder, but im not a fan

Very stupid idea on a street driven car.  Can create phenomenal understeer on turn in, as the diff is locked both under accel and decel.  Inside rear wheel can't slow down, only skip on the surface to account for the difference in speed required, and if the front wheels have less grip than the rear, they'll just push wide.

Very cool video man.

 

Yeah its an open diff. So you don't think its worth learning until the car has an LSD?

Personally, I wouldn't say that.  If you get a decent handle on initiating and controlling a slide with an open diff, you'll be able to make even better use of the LSD once you get it - and it will blow your mind the first time you get the back out with a decent LSD.  The steering inputs required with one are so much less to keep it stable than with an open diff, and if you have a bit of a handle on controlling an open diff slide, you'll find keeping an LSD sliding to be instinctive.

  Just had a look at the video, looks to me like there is that much water on the pan that an open diff shouldn't be a HUGE impediment.  The biggest problem it seems to me is your throttle control at the moment, lots of hard and prolonged throttle imediately before a spin.  There are a couple of spots where I can hear you lifting the throttle a bit, and those spots have a much smoother line to them.  You don't always need full throttle to keep the wheels spinning, and on that surface you should very rarely need it to keep your tyres just past their point of grip.

  You also seem to turn around the cone slowly, then plant it hard on the exit to make it break, which throws it into the slide pretty violently.  The area looks fairly tight, but if you can approach the cone turn-in with a little more speed than you have, then back off the throttle a tiny bit (just enough to hear the driveline go back to unloaded) while at the same time give steering a gentle flick AWAY from the cone, then turn in and give it some power, you should be able to ease the back out more gently (therefore controllably, as its swinging slower), and much earlier.  Rally drivers trick, known as a Scandanavian flick, or 'feint drift' if you've watched the drift bible.  Basic idea is that instead of the rear wheels just following the fronts into the corner, the back end is actually changing direction, because you've just shifted the inertia of the back end to load the tyres up as though you were turning (for example) left, but you're now turning right. 

A simpler version is if you are turning in a constant curve with constant throttle, just let the steering straighten up a couple of degrees (no throttle lift in this one) then turn it back to just past where it was while increasing power a little.  I used to be able to slide my mates Sprinter up a hill in second gear doing this - on a dry day when it still had open diff and a gutless 4AC lump - just foot flat the whole way through the corner, about 1/4 of the way through I'd just straighten the steering a bit for a split second, then turn back in, and the body roll did the rest, all the way to the end of the corner.

I'm no expert, this is just things I notice, and ways of thinking about it that work for me.  Other people may well disagree completely, and thats fine - just take everyones comments on board, and experiment a little.