Is it posible to loss traction with traction control on?

[okfoz]

My 2016 is an RS3, and I can put it in "Ice and Snow" or whatever it is and I can break the tires loose at will up to 70mph.

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[Huck FInn]

A/S tires are OK for winter if you winter in South Carolina. If you are in the north and want to stay on the road in the winter, and aimed in the right direction, get a set of Sotozero 3s and stay off cruise control when there is any chance of ice on the road. Be wary of bridge surfaces and the road under bridges. Be especially careful at highway speeds in strong or gusty cross winds. Minimize lane changes when there are deep slush ridges between lanes, and keep both hands on the wheel with neutral throttle when crossing them. In the spring, watch ahead for large deep puddles so you can avoid them rather than water ski across them with wide Mustang tires. Most important, do whatever you need to avoid travel in knots of cars. Some idiot will be running on cruise control, with bald A/S tires, texting, and will head toward the ditch, then badly over-correct, and all hell breaks loose for everyone in the knot. 'Been running dedicated premium winter tires for 13 winters on Mustangs in Wisconsin and Minnesota, 364k miles total summer + winter, and never been stuck or went off the road.

 

[Vlad Soare]

In the olden days before electronic nannies, one used to learn how to recover from a slide. Understeer with FWD, slow down and unwind the steering a bit. Oversteer with FWD, turn the wheels towards where you want to go and step on the gas. Oversteer with RWD, countersteer a bit and be prepared to straighten the steering as soon as it has recovered. And so on. For each situation there was a procedure.
But does this still apply with electronic stability controls?
If you go round a corner a bit too fast and the car loses traction, should you apply a standard recovery method, or should you simply take your foot off the pedals, turn the wheels towards where you want to go, and hope for the best?
Can recovery maneuvers actually do more harm than good, by interfering with the electronics? I mean, the ESC might struggle to put the car on the course indicated by the steering angle, while your stabilizing maneuvers might cause the wheels to point in a completely different direction than the one you want to go - won't this confuse the ESC?

Also, assuming you decide not to do any corrective maneuvers and to just let the electronics do their job, should you be braking, or not? If you don't touch any pedals, then the ESC will selectively brake each wheel to correct your trajectory, whereas if you stepped on the brakes all four wheels would brake at the same time. Or wouldn't they?

I can't seem to find a definitive answer to this question. Exactly what do you have to do in a traction loss situation with an ESC-equipped car?

 

[Blown86GT]

I used to think I was an average driver. But now I'm promoting myself to above average after reading some of the posts in this thread!

A 3300lb SN95 with 600+ rwhp and NO TRACTION control which can break the tires loose @ 60+mph on cold days? Remind me not to toss some of you the keys!

 

[Norm Peterson]

Also, assuming you decide not to do any corrective maneuvers and to just let the electronics do their job, should you be braking, or not? If you don't touch any pedals, then the ESC will selectively brake each wheel to correct your trajectory, whereas if you stepped on the brakes all four wheels would brake at the same time. Or wouldn't they?

I'd defy most people with much experience making the corrections themselves to simply sit by and let the electronics do it all for them. Not "in the moment" where the choice to do nothing yourself would have to be the result of conscious thought to go against what you'd have programmed yourself to do. Which takes time that you wouldn't feel that you had to spare. Letting ABS do its thing in a straight or mostly straight line is one thing; you'd still be mentally ready to make any course corrections yourself.

I can't seem to find a definitive answer to this question. Exactly what do you have to do in a traction loss situation with an ESC-equipped car?

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In limited experiences I've had (Subarus), there may not be much you can or need to do. At least not as long as the car stays generally headed in a direction that promises to stay on the black part. Intervention does tend to be benign in such situations (combinations of power, gear choice, and lateral g's outside what the system wants you to stay within?), but frustrating because you're likely to be left sitting there without much ability to do anything except wait the intervention out.


Norm

 

[shogun32]

will start to not push the car on cold nights never thought it could happen with traction control on.

the laws of physics are not arguable no matter what some sensor geek and numskull programmer might think.

The 32bit chassis dynamics CPU is doing a lot more calculation than the human brain is capable of. If you're correcting for the slide, it'll compensate to a lesser degree until sensors are back in the programmed tolerance range.

 

[Michael_vroomvroom]

I took a one-day "safe driving" course the previous weekend. One thing the instructor demoed was electronic stability control. For this he did three drives towards some cones laid out in a couple of lines. Drive forward, and immediately before the first line, turn left really hard to avoid hitting the first line of cones, then almost immediately afterwards hard right to avoid hitting the second line of cones.

First drive was with stability control at 30 mph. Looked a bit scary, but the car (mid-range KIA) did not seem to have too much trouble with this. The wheels lifted a bit, but never looked dangerous, even though he seemed to turn the wheel as hard as he could and and only at the very last moment.

Second drive was at 45 mph with stability control. Lifted up quite a bit more on the first turn, and even more on the second turn. Still looked scary, but did not look dangerous.

Third drive was without stability control, again at 45 mph (he popped the hood and disconnected something). The wheels on one side lifted up a bit on the first turn, and a lot on the second turn. Difficult for me to estimate exactly, but looked to be 60-80 cm off the ground on the second turn and looked scary and dangerous.

After seeing that, I have no idea why anyone would want to turn off stability control while driving on a regular road.

The course also included practising correction of over-steer, under-steer, and handling aquaplaning. All braking applied as normal (assuming normal includes ABS for you, so you do not manually try to pump the brake and confuse the ABS system doing the same), regardless of what the car electronics/computers do to help.
I don't think anyone is going to be stupid enough to develop a driving aid system that makes things worse if the driver does what would be the correct thing to do without the driving aid system. Even ABS, from some personal experience, works more or less fine if you out of old habit start pumping the brake rather than just holding it in and letting the ABS pump it in a more optimal way for you while you concentrate on other things.

 

[WildHorse]

After seeing that, I have no idea why anyone would want to turn off stability control while driving on a regular road.

If you know how to use the throttle & brake properly then your nannies should never come on in the first place. The only feature I'm grateful for is ABS on the street, due to varying conditions whereas at the track it's controlled conditions more or less so you need not rely on ABS. My buddies always tell me' yeah man.. then advancetrac kicked in and saved my ass', I tell em 'Nannies don't make you a good driver, if you were, then you wouldn't have needed it.' Anyways, if your doing stupid schitt, no amount of technology will save your arse. Just my opinion.

 

[Andy13186]

If you know how to use the throttle & brake properly then your nannies should never come on in the first place. The only feature I'm grateful for is ABS on the street, due to varying conditions whereas at the track it's controlled conditions more or less so you need not rely on ABS. My buddies always tell me' yeah man.. then advancetrac kicked in and saved my ass', I tell em 'Nannies don't make you a good driver, if you were, then you wouldn't have needed it.' Anyways, if your doing stupid schitt, no amount of technology will save your arse. Just my opinion.

So, in other words, everyone should keep it on because if they dont need it, it wont kick in. And if they do need it, it will kick in and possibly save lives. Telling people to just turn everything off is irresponsible in my opinion. These cars NA in dragmode can rip tires loose in 80 degree weather from 50 to 80 mph easily, people should just keep advancetrac on its not invasive in these cars.

 

[WildHorse]

Telling people to just turn everything off is irresponsible in my opinion

Never told everybody to turn it off. I really don't care if they do or don't. But it makes for good car and coffee vids vids when they turn just the TC off to be youtube superstars.

 

[Andy13186]

Never told everybody to turn it off. I really don't care if they do or don't. But it makes for good car and coffee vids vids when they turn just the TC off to be youtube superstars.

The crashes are when they turn both the TC and advancetrac off 100% serious.

Its impossible to apply only the rear brakes by applying the brake pedal, but the advancetrac system can apply any brake it wants whenever it wants. It really does make it much much harder to lose control as long as you have control of the steering wheel

 

[Linkster1666]

Everyone needs to learn to drive drunk, on ice and snow, on 60' wide streets with 8" vertical curbs in early 70s, 4 door iron on 60s.

 

[Norm Peterson]

The crashes are when they turn both the TC and advancetrac off 100% serious.

Even that's not the real story.

Crashes like those happen specifically because drivers try to operate out past what their skill set can support. It really is that simple.


Norm

 

[Andy13186]

Even that's not the real story.

Crashes like those happen specifically because drivers try to operate out past what their skill set can support. It really is that simple.


Norm

Testosterone filled guys want to show off for the camera, they dont let off the throttle no matter what, advancetrac forces that if its going bad and does save lives, keep it on. I know some may argue natural selection but innocents could get killed so IMO always leave advancetrac on on the streets. I learned the hard way. There is no valid argument to turn advancetrac off on the streets.

 

[WildHorse]

Testosterone filled guys want to show off for the camera, they dont let off the throttle no matter what, advancetrac forces that and does save lives, keep it on

But those are the guys turning it off, to, as I said earlier try to become youtube superstars. As Norm said, they're driving well beyond their skillset, and/or the cars capabilities. The last HPDE course I took, the instructor used cars with all those nannies disabled. He said 'it's like the teacher giving you the answers.. you might get a A+, but your still a dumbass'.

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