TSC VSC

[Hawk77FT]

Originally Posted by kster

I agree anybody who is inexperienced or not confidient in there ability should not turn off these safety features at all.

Not an attack on you at all, but do you consider yourself a confident enough driver to have them off? If the answer is yes, please see below few REAL experienced drivers that died/injured in accidents.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driver_..._in_motorsport

So take them off on the track not on the public road because believe it or not, on public roads, doing stupid shit is putting others in danger too. Or if you do it, at least do it somewhere that is safe for others at least. I would hate to hear you injured someone by mistake budy!
Be safe!

[kster]

Yes i do feel confident that wikipedia link is irrelevant in regards to our discussion regarding TCS/VSC.

[Panman]

First of all this isn't directed at any individual or individuals, nor do I expect to change anyone's mind.

Unfortunately 64% of drivers think that they are "Better than average" which means a significant percentage of us overestimate our abilities.

I'm the first to call out that there are way better drivers around than I am; even before this thread started, and yes I've done lots of Advanced Driver Training and track days and a bit of competition, and I've owned a number of high performance cars.

Personally for those of you who for some reason feel that you need to turn them off because they are limiting your driving in some way on a public road - you are doing it wrong.

From personal experience at Lakeside in an M3 (BMW Driver training Level III so I wasn't being gentle with it), at Mt Cotton in a 911 Turbo, they were faster with the nannies on.

There's a reason they banned most of the nannies from F1 (And it wasn't because it was a) making it dangerous, or b) slowing the cars down).

Justify why you turn them off on the public road (to yourself) all you like - but don't base it on your perception of your own expertise, or on the basis that "we never used to have it", or even that in some warped way it's safer.

You aren't that good (I know I'm not), there's a reason we have them now, and it isn't.

[ziggz501]

Originally Posted by MACCAA

Sounds like the old "when in doubt,power out" school of thought.
Loss of traction resulting in oversteerON'T power out-that's what got you in trouble in the first place!
Correct response is to come off the throttle-and that's what the VSC is mimicing-and counter steer.
Loss of traction is predominately operator error.
Couner steering with traction control on brings the vehicle back into line-that's how it works.......
A lot of the thinking here explains the pictures of cars wrapped around trees on the nightly news....
Cheers
Len

I live in a snowy climate, so that's what i'm referring to. I can lose traction going under 5mph. It happens almost every day. I flip on vsc sport every day here during the winter because it causes problems for the system to be completely active. During the summer I don't have a need to turn off the systems because if i lose traction at 70mph on the highway i'm screwed either way

[kster]

I never said i was any good at driving but as i have said i feel more confident with these overly intrusive safety features off, that hamper my driving experience and in my opinion in certain conditions can be dangerous.

[Slip]

I genuinely cannot believe what I am reading about people turning off VSC and TSC and believing this is SAFER!

I drive a VE ute. A rear wheel drive, no weight at the back ute. Now, I can turn off traction if I so choose, and I have done this once or twice for "a bit of fun". I will never do that again, especially in the wet. You must drive slow around corners - really slow. If you go a bit too quick you will slide. Fun? Yes. Dangerous? Hell yes. Not just for me, but for the cars that may or may not be near. Spinning the car is incredibly easy to do.

I know how a rear wheel drive car handles, and not just from my current car. I also know I am a more than competent driver. My experiences show this. However, there is no chance I will be turning off TSC in the wet. Zero.
I am not risking my life, my wife becoming a widow, and others lives on the road.
I am also not risking things as 'minor' as having to wait another 6 months for a replacement car, or replacement parts. And my no-claim discount. And the embarrassment of having my new sportscar pulled out of a ditch.

I bet Mark Webber would not even turn these things off on the roads. Why??

People who claim TSC is a hinderance are hoons. There is no other way of describing them. TSC has saved me in my ute. A few times. Each time with a really wet road, and I have NEVER wished it did not interfere. Finally, I DO know how to slide, rally and drive fast. Public roads are not the place. Overconfidence kills people. Regularly.

Be smart people. Come on.

[cuddefred]

One more thing to consider. The little black box in these cars knows what you were doing at the time of any accident occuring. Therefore potentially the Police and Insurance Co's COULD get access to the necessary information.

Each to their own, but on public roads I will take all the safety features available to me and having had the car for 6 weeks or so I can honestly say that leaving them on should not spoil your fun at all.

PS - not long to go now Slip. Will PM you later on to see if we can meet on your trip South buddy.

[Red5]

Okay, I know I'm not an Aussie, but I know what a ute is. THIS IS NOT A TRUCK!

I know the arguments for or against TSC/VSC, but saying "my ute handles shitty in adverse conditions means every other rwd vehicle handles the same in similar conditions" is just as stupid. Utes/ trucks have a weight distribution of around 70/30 at best, so yeah, in rain and snow there is no grip on the back end and spinning is super easy. The frs (for example) has a 53/47, so there is substantially more grip in wet weather and snow. Is it un-spinnable? No; but its not like you're automatically going to be pirouetting through intersections because you dared to turn off the magic 'crash avoidance' computers. There are extremes in everything, and there is a certain amount of risk we all assume when driving a sportscar. If you choose to drive with the nannies off, feel free. If you crash with said nannies off, you get to live (or not) with the consequences. But saying that turning the nannies off automatically makes you a hoon and a wannabe racer and a danger to society is ridiculous.


Sent from...somewhere?

[JiB]

This makes sense ^

[Slip]

Originally Posted by Red5

Okay, I know I'm not an Aussie, but I know what a ute is. THIS IS NOT A TRUCK!

I know the arguments for or against TSC/VSC, but saying "my ute handles shitty in adverse conditions means every other rwd vehicle handles the same in similar conditions" is just as stupid. Utes/ trucks have a weight distribution of around 70/30 at best, so yeah, in rain and snow there is no grip on the back end and spinning is super easy. The frs (for example) has a 53/47, so there is substantially more grip in wet weather and snow. Is it un-spinnable? No; but its not like you're automatically going to be pirouetting through intersections because you dared to turn off the magic 'crash avoidance' computers. There are extremes in everything, and there is a certain amount of risk we all assume when driving a sportscar. If you choose to drive with the nannies off, feel free. If you crash with said nannies off, you get to live (or not) with the consequences. But saying that turning the nannies off automatically makes you a hoon and a wannabe racer and a danger to society is ridiculous.


Sent from...somewhere?

Yeah, it's obvious you are not from Australia. If you were, you would know that my car is clearly not a truck... Dude, stay on forums where you know what you are talking about.

I know the 86 is has more weight above the rear wheels. That is sort of obvious... what I am getting at is I know about driving rear-wheel drive cars, even to the extreme (like my commodore). I know about grip and power having driven HSVs with wide tyres (google "HSV" buddy). Do you think the grip level on the 86 is high or low? What about the grip level in the wet? My point is that people need to drive according to road conditions. In the snow, sure do what you need to do to be safe - I have no idea what that is because I have never driven in snow. But I have driven on Australian roads. Hundreds of thousands of kilometres of it. No 'incidents' and that is because I save the fast cornering/sliding/pushing limits to when it is appropriate. And then I enjoy it.

Re: calling people 'hoons' - I totally stand by it. If your car is needing these aides, you are pushing its limits. There is no reason to push a cars limits in everyday driving. After driving my "truck", I know about a tail happy car. My ute has barely ever needed aides. So if this is apparently ultra slippery, yet traction control has barely been used (only in wet conditions), why will an apparent grippier car need to break traction? In the dry?? How then is it intrusive?

Bad justifications everywhere. Im afraid after so many reasonable posts explaining why these things exist, there are those that just wont care. More pages of arguing wont help I fear.

[MACCAA]

Originally Posted by kster

It's definitely a matter of opinion of whether having TSC is more safer to have on or off.
As same with the argument of whether ABS is safer to have or not with braking conditions in different environments causing variable results in braking in distance although i would prefer to have this feature on during road conditions, but on a track i would prefer to have it turned off.

It's not a matter of opinion at all.
I have no problem with turning it off on the Track,but we've done heaps of tests proving its abilities in the real world.
One Audi day I did with Brad Jones was to show how these systems worked.
We had a dramatically flooded skid pan that the punters drove on with ESP on and Off.
The ESP won easily,even the Instructors couldn't beat it.
In the early days of these systems they were a bit crude.
ABS pulsed in 1/10th of a second increments.It was pretty easy for a decent steerer to out perform it.
Thanks to Formula 1 technology[from when they had ABS] bleeding through to road cars it now operates in milli-second increments.
Seriously,you can't beat that.
Cheers
Len

[Varvs]

If you turn them off and you're driving within the confines of the law I see absolutely no problem.

if you have said "my trip to the shops was hindered by intrusive traction control systems" you are driving like a prick.

[Red5]

Originally Posted by Varvs

If you turn them off and you're driving within the confines of the law I see absolutely no problem.

if you have said "my trip to the shops was hindered by intrusive traction control systems" you are driving like a prick.

Thank you for effectively summing up my point. Sadly, there are two crowds here: 1) the "I don't need driving aids, they get in my way" and 2) the "if you turn the nannies off for any reason ever outside of a racetrack, you are a danger to society and you should never ever do that".

[kster]

i don't think alot of australians will get it, as the current state of things even speeding is considered a hoon offence adding to donuts and loss of traction. Where as they should be focusing more on fatigue/alcohol use while driving as speed kills message is very overated and the usual state of things in australia is nannie state so you must keep those on otherwise be labelled as a hoon which is a very wide ranging as anyone with a speeding ticket is a hoon.

Also OT our restrictive Gun laws unable to own a AK47,AR15 sucks only way to get these is by illegal means.