{"id":44157,"date":"2023-07-04T07:00:46","date_gmt":"2023-07-04T14:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/?p=44157"},"modified":"2024-03-23T08:18:36","modified_gmt":"2024-03-23T15:18:36","slug":"q-how-can-i-reduce-the-amount-of-understeer-i-experience-with-my-driving-technique-or-cars-setup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/q-how-can-i-reduce-the-amount-of-understeer-i-experience-with-my-driving-technique-or-cars-setup\/","title":{"rendered":"Q: How can I reduce the amount of understeer I experience \u2013 with my driving technique or car\u2019s setup?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Q<\/strong>: \u201cI am struggling with one specific aspect with my racing car. That is\u00a0<\/em>mid-corner<\/em>\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>(largest steering, no brake or throttle) understeer.<\/em> Not only does this lead to exit oversteer, but also it seems I can\u2019t influence it or dial it out with trail braking in the corner entry. No matter how late I stay on the brakes, the car\u2019s behavior doesn\u2019t change and it just understeers.<\/em> Is this only fixed by car setup changes?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

A<\/strong>: My first thought is to be sure about what you are doing when the understeer begins, and continues. You say you\u2019re not on the brakes or throttle, so okay, that suggests that you\u2019re not overloading the front tires with too much trail braking, nor are you unloading the fronts by accelerating too aggressively. But the fact that it leads to oversteer makes me think about your steering.<\/p>\n

What are you doing with the steering wheel when the understeer begins, and then when it continues? Many, and possibly most, drivers turn the steering wheel more when they have understeer. Why? Because it\u2019s human instinct to turn the wheel more if the car is not following the arc through the corner that you want.<\/p>\n

If you do turn the wheel more when you have understeer \u2013 and even if you don\u2019t turn it more, but you keep the same amount of steering input \u2013 think about what\u2019s happening with the front tires: they\u2019re at an angle where they can\u2019t grip the track surface, and then you put even more steering angle in. At this point they begin to scrub off some speed until your car is slowed down enough where the steering angle is not excessive (for that speed), they grip the track and begin to turn the car more, and suddenly you find the car turning more than you wanted \u2013 it\u2019s oversteering.<\/p>\n

Amongst race engineers, this is referred to as the \u201cundersteer-snap-oversteer\u201d issue, and nine times out of ten it\u2019s because the driver turned the steering more when they really should have straightened it very slightly, back to angle where the front tires can grip the track.<\/p>\n

So, the first thing you should think about and be aware of when you have this understeer is whether you\u2019re straightening the steering just a slight amount. If not, that\u2019s how you cure the problem.<\/p>\n

Later in your question you mention that no matter how late you stay on the brakes, you can\u2019t get the car to turn \u2013 it just understeers. Keep in mind that trail braking more can help reduce understeer by keeping load on the front tires, but it can also increase the understeer because you\u2019re asking too much of the front tires. So, at some point, try reducing the amount of trail braking to see if it reduces the understeer.<\/p>\n

Finally, yes there comes a time when the only way to fix understeer is through changes to your car\u2019s setup. Of course, how you actually do that is a huge topic, and you can download a free eBook I wrote on the subject, How to Tune Your Car\u2019s Handling: A Driver\u2019s Guide<\/em><\/a> by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Q: How can I reduce the amount of understeer I experience \u2013 with my driving technique or car\u2019s setup?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44158,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ask-ross"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44157"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44157\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44159,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44157\/revisions\/44159"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}