[s-cars] Re: EDL fails (but my new 22's worked great!)

[Keith Maddock]

> Taka Mizutani wrote:
> > I stand corrected- no lockers on them, interesting.
> >
> > Taka

That makes sense now - back in 2000 I was down in Florida doing some
traction-control testing on a RWD pickup-truck and we needed some
"off-road" testing which we don't have at our own test track down
there.

So we rented some time at this place which does "Hummer Driving
Schools", and the guy there took us for a wild off-road  / obstacle
course in a H1, pretty cool.  He was describing to us the technique if
one of the wheels was in the air, you had to apply some brake in order
to get some power to the wheel on the ground.

This never sat well in my mind - knowing that if you're doign that
with an open diff, there is no net benefit (except generating heat
perhaps and wearing out your brake pads), since whatever brake torque
you put on the "in the air wheel", you're putting same on the "on the
ground" wheel, so any extra engine power you're able to put in at that
point is soley going to the brakes (none actually to the ground)

However with a Torsen, this makes a lot of sense, and is a good trick
for anyone stuck with a torsen (center and/or rear).

If you have a wheel with no traction simply apply a little bit of
brakes.  This will add some "perceived traction" to that wheel for the
torsen.   The torsen can then multiply this by 4 (or whatever your
Torsen bias ratio is) and send that much torque to the wheel that is
on a good surface.  Now of course of this 4x, 1x of it is absorbed the
brake, but then 3x of it can actually go to the surface...

So in the end here, you have 3/5 of the engine power going to the good
wheel, which is much better than 0 if you didn't apply the brakes...
(lightly, mind you!)

So add this to your mind if you get stuck with a torsen rear 92-95....
It might help you get out! :)

Cheers,
Keith