Drifting 101

This is truly more than just letting your car’s rear end hang out as there’s a theoretical approach on how to actually do it.

Origins

Its beginnings started as a competitive sport that catered to mountain-road racers of rural Japan. Informal challenges on mountain back roads (called “Touge”) eventually evolved into a heavily funded and advertised competitive event, sanctioned by organizations and held on private tracks. Initiated by Option magazine Japan and its video department V-Option, they created the popular D1 Grand Prix to catch and expand the drifting craze. Led by CEO Daijiro Inada, the Option D1GP has now broken into other venues like the States and other countries. Drifting actually started in America around ’02 a grassroots level among Club4AG members and has now exploded into a massively popular form of motorsport with the advent of the D1 GP. However, Japanese drifters are still considered to be at the cutting edge of technique and car development, but their American counterparts are quickly catching up, like Vince Gitten Jr (D1GP Champ), Rhys Millen, Samuel Hubinette, and Benson Hsu.

Definition

Drifting refers to the difference in the slip angle between the front and rear tires of a car. When the rear wheels are slipping at a greater angle than the front wheels, the car is said to be drifting, or oversteering. What happens is that the rear end of the car appears to chase the front end around a turn, as the driver utilizes both front tires and the rear tires to control the actual direction of the car. Adding more throttle induces more rear wheel slip angle and the rear of the car wants to overtake the front. Overall, the goal of the driver here is to achieve steering lock and use the throttle to fine tune the car’s angle and direction. Think of it as a controlled slide. Many of the techniques used today in drifting were developed by rally drivers who often competed on dirt, gravel and snow. Sliding around corners for rally racing was the only way to go faster around a corner as they normally raced on loose or slippery surfaces.

Drifting for Points

Nowadays, drifting has become a competitive sport where drivers have their own styles and techniques as they compete to keep their cars sideways for as long as possible. Drifting competitions are judged based not on the time it takes to complete a course, but how much slip angle a driver can get, how long can they hold it, and how close can they stay to the racing line, or to the wall. Keiichi Tsuchiya, a well known legend in the drifting world, is considered the father of drifting. Regarded as the “Drift King” (Dorikin), he is the official chief judge in the D1 Grand Prix Series. Final rounds of D1GP competition include tandem drift runs nicknamed “tsuiso” in Japanese, where one car follows another through the course, attempting to keep up with or even pass the car in front. In the “tsuiso” rounds, it doesn’t matter if the racing line is wrong, what matters is who can execute the most exciting drift. A car does not even have to keep up, because even though the other car is left behind on the straight, but managed to execute a spectacular drift, he can still win that round. However, a spin, understeer, or collision results in the disqualification of the offending party.

Drift Cars

Any rear-wheel drive car can be set up for drift competition, but must include the addition of a Limited-Slip Differential. Popular competition cars in the US include the Nissan 240SX, Nissan 350Z, Toyota Corolla GT-S (AE86), Mazda RX-7, and Honda S2000. In Japan, the top drift machines are the Nissan S13, S14, S15 Silvia, 180SX, Toyota AE86 Sprinter Trueno and Corolla Levin, Nissan Skyline (The 4-door sedan, RWD version, a.k.a. ER34), Toyota Altezza, Toyota Aristo, Nissan Z33, Fairlady Z, Nissan Cefiro (A31), Nissan Laurel, and Toyota Soarer. There is some debate over whether or not front-wheel-drive (FWD) vehicles can drift. By the technical definition (rear wheels slipping at a greater angle than front wheels), they are indeed able to drift. However, many consider FWD vehicles a poor choice for drifting, as the frequent use of the emergency brake (necessary to drift FWD cars) slows them down and makes them harder to control. 4WD vehicles, such as the Subaru Impreza WRX STi and Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution drift at a much different angle and are usually induced by power-over. As the front wheels are also driven on a 4WD vehicle there is a noticeable lack of counter steer.

Drifting Techniques

Braking Drift

This drift is performed when entering a corner to induce the car to “set” or shift its weight to cause the rear wheels to lose traction and drift. This is performed by braking before a corner while starting to turn in, vary the brake petal until loss of grip is obtained and then balance the oversteer through steering and throttle inputs to control and sustain the drift.

Power-Over Drift

This drift is performed when entering a corner at full throttle to produce heavy oversteer through the corner, it is the most typical drifting technique for All Wheel Drive (AWD) cars.

Inertia (Feint) Drift

This method is done by “rocking” the car much like a pendulum, whereby once the car is rocked towards the outside of a turn, you then use the inertia of the car to swing it back to the desired direction. By going away from the corner, and turning back in hard, you are now coming in the corner at a much sharper angle.

Hand-Brake Drift

This technique is very straightforward, upon entering a corner, pull the hand brake lever to induce traction loss at the rear wheels, and balance the drift through steering and throttle play. Some people argue that this method doesn’t actually create a drift but rather just a power slide. The bottom line here is that using the hand brake is no different from any other method of starting a drift. This method is generally the main technique to perform in a controlled drift when using Front Wheel Drive (FWD) cars.

Dirt Drop Drift

This is done by dropping the rear tires off the road into the dirt to maintain or gain drift angle without losing power or speed and to set up for the next turn. Only permissible on roads without barriers and lined with dirt or other materials which to lose traction. This is commonly done in WRC rallying.

Kansei Drift

This is performed at race speeds, when entering a high speed corner a driver lifts his foot off the throttle while slightly turning into a corner to induce a mild over steer and then balances the drift through steering, braking and throttle motions. (note: the car that is being used for this style of drift should be a neutral balanced car therefore the over steer will be induce when this technique is applied, if the car plows through any turn this technique will not work)

Shift Lock

This is performed by letting the revs drop upon downshift into a corner and then releasing the clutch to put stress on the driveline to slow the rear tires inducing oversteer. (This is like pulling the E-brake through a turn – note: this is best to be performed in the wet to minimize damage to the driveline etc)

Jump Drift

This technique is used to start a drift by letting the rear tire run on the inside of a turn or apex and letting it bounce over a rumble strip to help lose traction resulting in oversteer.

Clutch Kick

This is done by “kicking” the clutch (pushing in, then out) to send a shock through the powertrain, upsetting the car’s balance. It causes the rear wheels to slip and enables the driver to induce oversteer, thereby starting a drift.

Choku Dori

This is an advanced technique that involves using one of the previous techniques to start the drift, while using the hand brake to extend the drift into a turn. This is done by pulling the hand-brake through a straight to start a high angel drift while holding this angle to set up for the turn ahead. (note: this can only be done at high speeds)

Manji Drift

This is used while drifting on long straightaways. The driver of the car sways the car side to side (like a pendulum) while the car is in a drift, which looks impressive. It can be initiated through all the above techniques

Drift Spec Suspension Tune

Drift spec tuning gives emphasis towards making the car go sideways in a controllable state. The car needs to have a low centre of gravity and be able to spin the rear wheels with ease. This makes the car look good while going sideways.

Suspension: Setting is primarily for high grip on the front wheels and low or no grip on the rear wheels. Steering inputs need to be sharp and precise. Use of a quick rack or longer steering arms recommended. Use of stiff spring/shock rates is mandatory as this gives the car low grip levels, hence the ability to easily slide.

Brakes: Low-mid temperature brake pads recommended for front to give good initial bite which helps weight transfer to the front making the rear tires light thus being able to freely spin. Handbrake cable adjustment with ultra high grip disc/drum pads are required to effectively lock the rear wheels.

Performance: Top end (high RPM) response and power is required to hold the drift through the corners. Power tuning up top is highly recommended together with engine reliability. Large radiators and oil coolers are essential to combat over heating with the engine spinning at continuously high RPM level. As the car goes sideways.

Summary: Tuning of this level makes a very responsive and very maneuverable vehicle, with a twitchy characteristic. Power and braking levels are also high, with a very hard suspension setting.

Drifting 101

What is drifting?

Drifting is an extreme driving technique. Drifting is the fastest growing form of motorsport in the world. A car is said to be drifting when the rear slip angle is greater than the front slip angle, and the front wheels are pointing in the opposite direction to the turn (e.g. car is turning left, wheels are pointed right), and the driver is in control of these factors. Drifting is not the same thing as power sliding, because drifting is more complex than that. Instead of a drift driver causing a drift and then countering to straighten out, he will again over-counter so his car goes into another drift. A good drifter has the ability to take five or six opposing turns without having traction at any point in time.

History of Drifting

Modern drifting started out as a racing technique popular in the All Japan Touring Car Championship races over 30 years ago. Motorcycling legend turned driver, Kunimitsu Takahashi, was the foremost creator of drifting techniques in the 1970s. He was famous for hitting the apex (the point where the car is closest to the inside of a turn) at high speed and then drifting through the corner, preserving a high exit speed. This earned him several championships and a legion of fans who enjoyed the spectacle of burning tires. The bias ply racing tires of the 1960s-1980s lent themselves to driving styles with a high slip angle. As professional racers in Japan drove this way, so did the street racers.

A street racer named Keiichi Tsuchiya became particularly interested by Takahashi's drift techniques. Tsuchiya began practicing his drifting skills on the mountain roads of Japan, and quickly gained a reputation amongst the racing crowd. In 1987, several popular car magazines and tuning garages agreed to produce a video of Tsuchiya's drifting skills. The video, known as Pluspy, became a hit and inspired many of the professional drifting drivers on the circuits today. In 1988, alongside Option magazine founder and chief editor Daijiro Inada, he would help to organize one of the first events specifically for drifting. He also drifted every turn in Tsukuba Circuit in Japan.

What do you need for drifting?

Drift Car

You can use either a Rear Wheel Drive (RWD) or 4 Wheel Drive (4WD) vehicle, although it is advisable to use a RWD as it is easier to induce the drift and maintain it on these types of cars. Most competition vehicles are RWD, and some of them are 4WD vehicles that have been converted to RWD. It would also be advisable for your drift car to have certain components namely:

2 Way L.S.D – Limited Slip Differential

A limited slip differential (LSD) is a modified or derived type of differential gear arrangement that allows for some difference in rotational velocity of the output shafts, but does not allow the difference in speed to increase beyond a preset amount. In an automobile, such limited slip differentials are sometimes used in place of a standard differential, where they convey certain dynamic advantages, at the expense of greater complexity.

In general, there are three input torque states - load, no load, & over run. Under load, as previously stated, the coupling is proportional to the input torque. With no load, the coupling is reduced to the static coupling. The behaviour on over run (particularly sudden throttle release) determines whether the LSD is 1 way, 1.5 way, or 2 way. (source: Wikipedia)

Stiff Suspension

Stiffening the suspension of the car helps in controlling the car while in drift. Easiest upgrades would be to replace the stock items with performance shocks and springs or coilover setups which are adjustable so you can change both ride height and stiffness.

Interior Components

Inside the vehicle, it would also be helpful to replace some stock items to help control the vehicle to induce, and stay in the drift. Most drift drivers replace the stock seats with Racing Bucket seats. These help keep the driver in place as the car goes sideways, to maintain your control of the pedals and steering wheel. The steering wheel can also be replaced with aftermarket ones which are usually smaller in diameter for easier movement, and for drifting, there are deep center ones, which allow the wheel to be closer to the driver, and farther from the console controls to avoid any mishaps. You can also install a Spin Turn Knob which allows the e-brake to not lock at the top position, so you can use the e-brake faster and without worry that the e-brake engage continuously.

Open Venue

When practicing or during events, it is better to have wide open areas to assure that cars have a enough area to speed up, and more importantly enough area to stop the car. It is also important that there are no obstructions and people within the track. Since drift cars are driven hard, there is a big chance that something will go wrong, such as tires blow up, or brakes fail. This is reason enough to keep people and other obstructions as far as possible from the cars and the track.

How do you drift?

Techniques for inducing drift (taken from Wikipedia)
The basic driving techniques used in drifting are constant, though each car and driver will employ some subset of these techniques. A similarity for all drifting techniques is to be smooth and practice. These techniques include:

Beginner techniques

These techniques do not use weight transition, so are typically the first thing the novice drifter learns. However they are still used by the most experienced drifters, and require skill to execute properly. These techniques aim to induce a loss of traction on the rear wheels, either by locking the wheel (e-brake drift), or using enough power from the engine to break the traction force (power-oversteer and clutch kick).

Hand-brake drift

While the clutch is depressed, the hand brake (or Emergency brake) is pulled to induce rear traction loss. As soon as traction is lost, the driver releases the clutch, countersteers, and depresses the accelerator. This technique is used heavily in drift competitions to drift large corners, or to trim the car's line mid-drift.

When learning to drift using this technique it is important to first countersteer and wait for the car to stop rotating and face the right direction to exit the corner, and only then to press the accelerator to give the car more gas to keep it sideways. If accelerator is pressed too soon or too much, the car will spin out.

Power oversteer or Powerslide

It is usually done at the corner exit by stepping on the gas hard, to slide sideways out of the corner. It is most commonly employed by beginners because it teaches steering and throttle control without the danger of an actual entry oriented drift.

In low-power cars power oversteer can be achieved by applying excessive amount of throttle at the end of a shift. As you are releasing the clutch during a shift, or immediately before that while the clutch is still depressed, press accelerator all the way to send more power to the rear wheels than is necessary for a smooth upshift. If done during a turn, the car will begin to slide. This technique can be used to initiate a drift at very low speeds in an underpowered car (e.g., when shifting from 1st to 2nd gear), and to enter in a higher gear while accelerating all the way up to the turn (e.g., accelerate in 2nd on the straight and shift into 3rd as you enter the turn).

The sequence of actions is as follows:

• Accelerate in the straight line leading to the turn.
• Turn the steering wheel to begin the turn.
• Clutch in.
• Shift to the next gear.
• Floor the accelerator.
• Clutch out.
• Wait for the car to go sideways, then countersteer and proceed to exit the corner.

Depending on how much power the car is making it is possible to keep the gas pedal floored from the shift throughout the entire drift, and in a low-power car this is often necessary.

Shift Lock Drifting

Shift lock (compression slide). Initiated by downshifting (usually from third to second or fourth to third, and using a very fast shift) instead of braking, without rev-matching, causing the drive wheels to lock momentarily. Helpful for very tight corners, allowing the driver to approach the corner at a slower speed and lower revs, while allowing quick acceleration when exiting the corner. This technique can be very damaging to the engine if mis-used as the ECU is unable to rev limit when the engine is oversped by the rear wheels. Premature downshifters are called "Rod Stretchers".

Clutch Kick

This is done by "kicking" the clutch (pushing in, then out, usually more than one time in a drift for adjustment in a very fast manner) to send a shock through the powertrain, upsetting the car's balance. This causes the rear wheels to slip. The foot should be at an angle (heel-toe) so the brake and gas may be pressed as well, this being needed to control speed and stop from spinning out in the drift.

Clutch kick can also be used during a drift to gain angle at the expense of speed. If the car is about to straighten itself out, kicking the clutch will cause it to rotate more. However since power delivery is interrupted while the clutch is depressed the car will lose some speed during the process.

Weight transition techniques

These techniques employ a further concept of weight transition. When a vehicle has the load towards the front, the back wheels have less grip than the front, causing an oversteer condition that can initiate a drift.

Braking drift

This drift is performed by braking into a corner, so that the car can transfer weight to the front. This is immediately followed by throttle, which in an RWD car causes the rear wheels to lose traction. FWD cars can also use this technique as it does not depend on the rear wheels being driven. In FWD cars the front wheels are not allowed to lock due to the continuous power, the rear wheels locks easily due to weight transfer and due to the general front heavy design of FWDs.

Inertia (Feint) drift or Scandinavian flick

This is done by transferring the weight of car towards the outside of a turn by first turning away from the turn and then quickly turning back using the inertia of the rear of the car to swing into the desired drifting line. Sometimes the hand-brake will be applied while transferring the weight of the car towards the outside to lock the rear wheels and help the rear swing outwards. This type of drifting causes the car to accelerate faster afterwards, because of momentum built up while drifting.

Note that the actual scandinavian flick maneuver in rally driving is more complex than feint drifting. In scandinavian flick the tires are intentionally locked by braking hard right after turning a little away from the corner. While the wheels are locked, the driver applies steering input into the corner, adds throttle while still braking and then rapidly releases the brake pedal. This causes the car to slingshot itself through the corner.

Kansei, Lift off, or Taking In

By letting off the accelerator while cornering at very high speeds, cars with relatively neutral handling will begin to slide, simply from the weight transfer resulting from engine braking. The drift is controlled afterwards by steering inputs from the driver and light pedal work, similar to the Braking drift.

Other techniques

Dirt drop

This is done by dropping the rear tires off the sealed road onto dirt, or whatever low-grip surface borders the road, to maintain or gain drift angle. Also colloquially called "Dirt Turbo".

Choku-Dori/Manji (Pendulum)

Otherwise known as over-sway, this technique is done by swaying the car's weight back and forth on straightaways, using countersteer and throttle to maintain a large angle. This is a show maneuver that usually involves many cars following the same line.