Heavyweight Vs. Lightweight drifting

Anyway.....it's looks like we got a good listing of the pros and cons of the two weights...did we miss anything?

Lol nope, I'd say we pretty much got everything.

In a real car, less weight is usually better. In GT5, lighter cars have sub par handling because of their lack of grip, which leads a lot of people (myself included) to prefer a little more weight.

The physics engine of GT5 most definitely responsible for part of this, but I would add than a lack of certain tuning options is also to blame. We don't have the ability to increase the track width (without hex modding), and we don't have the ability to adjust any tire and wheel parameters. Think about it...most of the light weight FR drift cars run on little pinner tires, and are really narrow (both the FC and S13 come to mind). I think being able to fiddle around with wheel and tire dimensions could make light cars better to drift in GT5. Maybe we'll get this in GT6?....
 
so randomly, has this got anything to do with taking off too? ive been playing with a 1300kg celica with lexus v8 any no matter how i take off, trying to grip or foot to the floor, im always at the back of the pack.ive been running a pretty soft spring rate and about medium dampers, 1 deg of camber on rear wheels and i get left behind.i also tend to catch alot of people coming into corners, but sometimes have a bit more trouble getting out of them. im running fully custom trans, but its a 5 speed and tuned to do 245kmh top speed. enough to drift comfortably in every gear at any rev.
 
so randomly, has this got anything to do with taking off too? ive been playing with a 1300kg celica with lexus v8 any no matter how i take off, trying to grip or foot to the floor, im always at the back of the pack.ive been running a pretty soft spring rate and about medium dampers, 1 deg of camber on rear wheels and i get left behind.i also tend to catch alot of people coming into corners, but sometimes have a bit more trouble getting out of them. im running fully custom trans, but its a 5 speed and tuned to do 245kmh top speed. enough to drift comfortably in every gear at any rev.

There's a number of things that could contribute to slow acceleration and corner exit speed, weight being one of them. However, I would say 1300kg is on the heavy end of what would be considered a "light weight car".

A couple things you can try to improve acceleration.
- move weight to the rear. How close to 50/50 weight distribution are you running?
- soft rear springs are good, but you can always try going softer to increase rear grip.
- try using less camber in the rear. Personally, I rarely run anything over 0.5 in the rear unless its a form over function car (most of my main drift cars run 0 camber in the rear).
- you didn't mention what your rear toe setting is, but increasing positive toe in the rear can help with acceleration.
- not sure if a rear wing is your style, but increasing rear downforce always helps with acceleration and speed (since you're building hybrids, you could add downforce with the hex moddin program so you don't actually have to have a rear wing).
- it would be my last resort, but you could always try messing around with the grip multiplier.
- and lastly, your transmission tune will make a huge difference in acceleration. Try adjusting your gears (and how much HP you're running) to limit the amount of wheelspin.
 
I find heavy cars want to keep sliding (without applying power), and find weight transfer more difficult. Makes control more difficult. With comfort hard tires of course.

Am I wrong here?

I'm a little late to this but I thought a late answer is better than no answer.


p = mv​
The above formula represents Momentum. If you don't want to know about calculating Momentum, then skip to the last paragraph, where I give my final answer to your question. So, p = mv: P stands for Momentum, m stands for Mass (Weight) and v stands for Velocity (Speed). The end result is measured in kgm/s or Ns. In other words, if two cars are travelling at the same speed, but one of them is 1000kg, while the other is 1500kg, the heavier one will have more momentum and thus slide for longer.

In a nutshell, the heavier the car, the more momentum it has, which is why heavy cars are harder to stop and why your heavy car wants to keep sliding. I personally prefer heavy cars to light cars, but that's just my personal preference.

Cheers, Nilo.

Oh, and I prefer angle over speed, but having both is never a bad thing. What do people think about heavy vs light cars for tandems? Would lightweight cars be better at chasing, due to more agility? I've recently been building an Evora for chasing and it's getting much closer than my C63 AMG, which is much heavier. Just a thought...
 
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I'm a little late to this but I thought a late answer is better than no answer.


p = mv​
The above formula represents Momentum. If you don't want to know about calculating Momentum, then skip to the last paragraph, where I give my final answer to your question. So, p = mv: P stands for Momentum, m stands for Mass (Weight) and v stands for Velocity (Speed). The end result is measured in kgm/s or Ns. In other words, if two cars are travelling at the same speed, but one of them is 1000kg, while the other is 1500kg, the heavier one will have more momentum and thus slide for longer.

In a nutshell, the heavier the car, the more momentum it has, which is why heavy cars are harder to stop and why your heavy car wants to keep sliding. I personally prefer heavy cars to light cars, but that's just my personal preference.

Cheers, Nilo.

Oh, and I prefer angle over speed, but having both is never a bad thing. What do people think about heavy vs light cars for tandems? Would lightweight cars be better at chasing, due to more agility? I've recently been building an Evora for chasing and it's getting much closer than my C63 AMG, which is much heavier. Just a thought...
Tandeming is all about the driver.
 
I've seen vids of dudes drifting in sixth gear...that's a problem.

1100kg.... 500hp, that's a problem

Cars that have sixty to sixty five percent of its weight in front...that's a problem. (You can move the weight to the rear, handling will change, wheels will still spin. I need to test this more)

Just an observation i've made that may help some of you.
 
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I've seen vids of dudes drifting in sixth gear...that's a problem.

1100kg.... 500hp, that's a problem

Cars that have sixty to sixty five percent of its weight in front...that's a problem. (You can move the weight to the rear, handling will change, wheels will still spin. I need to test this more)

Just an observation i've made that may help some of you.

Drifting in 6th is not a problem if you can control it and have it set up right. I've seen a video of a team Nemesis member kissing doors with a Supra while using 5th-6th gear.

What's wrong with 1100kg and 500bhp? My Evora is 1218kg and has 730bhp, it drifts and tandems very well.

My SLS AMG had around 60% of the weight at the back when I first got it and it didn't drift too well; I had to add ballast to the front to make it slide well. So weight and where that weight is located is a massive issue.
 
When talking about being left behind after taking off,those short gears will bite you.

That amount of power with so little weight is a problem...when taking off.

We are talking about taking off now.

I'm not saying anyone's wrong, I'm just saying a sacrifice will have to be made.
 
When talking about being left behind after taking off,those short gears will bite you.

That amount of power with so little weight is a problem...when taking off.

We are talking about taking off now.

I'm not saying anyone's wrong, I'm just saying a sacrifice will have to be made.

Oh I see, I thought you were talking about drifting in general.

If you have enough grip, the weight is not an issue. The gears are a pain though. Maybe that's just because the transmission is arguably the hardest thing to tune on GT5.
 
so randomly, has this got anything to do with taking off too? ive been playing with a 1300kg celica with lexus v8 any no matter how i take off, trying to grip or foot to the floor, im always at the back of the pack.ive been running a pretty soft spring rate and about medium dampers, 1 deg of camber on rear wheels and i get left behind.i also tend to catch alot of people coming into corners, but sometimes have a bit more trouble getting out of them. im running fully custom trans, but its a 5 speed and tuned to do 245kmh top speed. enough to drift comfortably in every gear at any rev.

i think the reason why your catching people coming into corners is because your coming in way faster then they are and running a late apex (im referring to a drift line not race line but i think the theory applies the same) which means your time to accelerate coming out of the corner to the next corner is shortened and thats why your you have trouble catching up coming out of corners. now if you were to start your drifts earlier and hit an early apex you will elongate the distance you have til the next corner thus giving you more time to catch up.

another thing that might be slowing you down is that you could be reactive to your drift partner/opponent instead of proactive. if your reacting to the guy in front of you, you waste precious mini-seconds. the likelyhood of you reacting to your partner's drift, iniating your own drift and finishing then building up speed and/or getting ready to link into the next drift is unlikely (in general terms: skills and car setup may change that) but if you were to time your drifts to begin before they start theirs you've gained the advantage because u will drift and recover before they do. of course this is easier said then done because it'll take a few laps to figure out your partner's timing (and thats if theyre consistant, if theyre not then it'll be a russian roulette for timing your drifts to begin before their's do). plus when you get it right it looks so bad ass because it looks like you start the drift at the same time, and if your door to door its extra badass :)

btw i run harder spring rates, i reference actual drift machines specs, look up some heavy drift cars and u'll see they run fairly hard spring rates. supras, chasers, skylines, most average over 10-14kg.
 
I've played with a few things and have fixed a few problems. Im not having the problems I had been experiencing before. I've been playing with a new style, some new tuning, and a more comfortable rig.
 

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