Veloce Raptor

DING DING DING!! Winner!

As others have pointed out, high speed = slight understeer better; low speed = slight oversteer better.

Overall, I like my race cars like I like my women: I prefer slightly tighter to looser.

Flying Finn

I'm in a "slow corners, slight oversteer & fast corners, (very slight) understeer" camp. Haven't gotten my car to work that way so it's in principle set up oversteer in every corner (I think my preferration to oversteer comes from learning to drive mostly on gravel snow & ice) although now my car is pretty damn neutral and I like it.

fork_included

a car set up for understeer can be thrown into oversteer by simple driver inputs

even easier in a RWD car than FWD

a car setup for oversteer will never see understeer, so you only have one way out of the tunnel

HOWEVER, it is my belief that a very unstable car is ultimetly the fastest, however when consistency is more important than raw speed, i'll opt out for the safer method.

DanS911

It's funny to check out the answers and then see what cars folks drive.
I grew up on rear engine cars (VWs then 911s) the first time I drove a buddy's 944 turbo and it understeered at high speed I nearly crapped my pants!
On the other hand I have had students in the same mode during power oversteer in my 911.

Greg Smith

Why do you say that?

Mike in Chi

Careful, one of Santa's elves may be watching...

Veloce Raptor

Y'know....if you jumble the letters on Santa, you get Satan.

fork_included

if you're a perfect driver you will get the car pointed in teh right direction before you power on

its easier to 'steer' a car, either by hand or foot that is inheritly prone to oversteer...

just the way i see it, its hard to put it into words, perhaps my ideas are flawed, but then again there are not clear cut rules in racing

SundayDriver

I have to disagree with the last two paragraphs. Whatever you can do to take an understeering car to oversteer can be done in reverse to force an oversteering car into understeer. Sharp steering input at turn in will slide the front tires. Throttle takes weight and grip off the front tires, etc, etc.

I also don't see how a "very unstable car" is going to be faster than a stable car, with all else being equal. For the record, I favor tail happy cars with only the slightest aero understeer at the highest speeds, but I don't want to be driving a "very unstable car" - been there, done that - they are neither fast nor fun.

Crazy Canuck

What may be loose to you may be tight to me.

fork_included

perhaps it would also depend on the power levels?

would you agree that a car that oversteers due to weight distribution and balance would be approached differently as opposed to car that oversteers due to raw power when you step on the gas?

the suspension tuning strategies will surely be different if we take, lets say, a 944 with 150 whp vs one that has 300 whp?

just asking questions, i spent most of my time competing in an underpowered FWD car. However i observed that my driving style would suit a RWD more

i wish i was a millionare and spent every day at the track learning stuff the good ol fashioned way... alas

fatbillybob

SD,

I don't have an aero car. Can you give a generic example of how you haev a car mechcanically grip oversteering yet aero assited grip understeer? Does lots of rear wing for example delete the oversteer so that understeer is the reaction so that you are still tuning/managing rear tires?

Mike Murphy

I thought that oversteer also scrubs off speed? In other words, if you take 2 drivers, one at the limit and the other over the limit, the one at the limit does not need to oversteer nor understeer the car. That person is driving at 100%. The one oversteering the car has miscalculated to, say, 105%, and must rotate the car that should have been rotated by using the steering wheel. Granted, the more power you have, the less speed you'll lose, but you gain more speed by not oversteering or understeering...

A.Wayne

It depends on the type of car as much as driver preference.

If a FWD , then i want some turn in oversteer, this way i can balance it with it's natural tendency to throttle understeer..

If rwd , i want the opposite slight turn in understeer , where i can balance the car on the throttle ...

If mid engined RWD, no understeer , at all !! but a nuetral car is laways sought by All..

SundayDriver

I find little difference with HP. At one time I was racing an SRF (102 HP on a good day) and tracked a 500+ HP 993TT that I had set up on the loose side. Tuning and characteristics were very similar. In fact, driving style, lines, etc were nearly identical with the exception of how much power you could feed and the occasional corner in the TT where I held the apex longer.

To your point, there is a big difference betweena car that is inherently loose and one that you can get loose on demand with throttle.

Finally, I will add that loose vs. push is highly subjective with drivers that have not experienced a wide range of cars (I mean street, prepped street and purpose built race cars). 95% of the DE cars that I have driven where the owner says it oversteers, in fact, does not. It is basically an understeering car that is getting close to neutral. Most DE drivers have never experienced a car that is truly set up to oversteer - only a car that occasionally oversteers.