Whats's faster while drifting, A banked turn or a flat turn?

[Perfect Balance]

Hey, I need to get this settled, My friend says that drifting a flat turn is faster than a banked one and I say it isn't. Its gotten to the point that I'm going to ask you guys on what you think. I say banked is faster because it keeps you on the inside so you can take the turns faster without getting out of the track. I don't know how he's seeing it but I'm asking for your replys.

If there was another thread like this I couldnt find it, So if i missed something then please close it.

 

[jayballash]

I agree with you. The more the angle of the bank, the faster your entry may be. You can maintain a higer speed thoughout the drift, due to the angle increasing the amount of grip to the tires. I'm not sure of the actual equations of the physics of it, but i believe that in a banked turn, the speed of the drift can be greatly increased, and the total amount of grip to the tires is increased throughout the turn, due to the outward G-force of the car into the bank. Where as on a flat road, there is no bank to create this additional force, therefore lowering the cars grip threshold, and making the car enter the corner at a slower speed. Ultimately making the drift slower in order to maintain the needed amount of traction to carry your line all the way through the drift. This is just my opinion. maybe someone with some more experience could add on this? or at least tell me if my theory is even close?

 

[dking]

Banked turn IMO is faster...the car can hold the turn at a faster speed then if it were flat....This can be seen on test course.....try runing on the flat surface on the inside of the corner...then repeat by running right on the outside yellow line, which is banked....I guarantee (IF you run just to the right of the yellow line) that the car would be faster.....Why else would race courses be banked....and if your car is faster on flat surfaces.....you have a supercar.

 

[Boundary Layer]

Just like in grip racing (NASCAR or IRL is the perfect example), a banked turn will help to support a portion of the lateral outwards force that is experienced when a car changes direction. This force acts in a direction perpendicular to the tangent of the car's tracjectory (or, in the direction of the gradient of the curve at the car's point along its path if you want a more appropriate terminology).

It takes a little static physics and trigonometry to figure out what the magnitude of this force is at any isolated point in time, and will ultimately depend on the car's mass, velocity, and on the angle of the bank. The supporting force exerted on the car by the bank will act in a direction normal to the track surface (whatever angle that ends up being).

The way I have represented the problem, once the parameters I have specified above are defined by constant numerical values the supporting force may be determined - it should be independent of how sharply the car is turning, or if it is gripping or drifting, just so long as all 4 wheels are on the bank. There will be an upper limit to how much force the track can contribute, is what I'm saying (NASCAR driver's dont understand this, that's why they smack the walls so much )

You can find the supporting force for the entire duration of the banked turn to see how much the bank actually helps you corner over a larger time scale, but this would require the use of line integrals.


ok, think I've nerded this place up enough for now...

In short - yes, you're right and your friend is wrong.

 

[Perfect Balance]

Just like in grip racing (NASCAR or IRL is the perfect example), a banked turn will help to support a portion of the lateral outwards force that is experienced when a car changes direction. This force acts in a direction perpendicular to the tangent of the car's tracjectory (or, in the direction of the gradient of the curve at the car's point along its path if you want a more appropriate terminology).

It takes a little static physics and trigonometry to figure out what the magnitude of this force is at any isolated point in time, and will ultimately depend on the car's mass, velocity, and on the angle of the bank. The supporting force exerted on the car by the bank will act in a direction normal to the track surface (whatever angle that ends up being).

The way I have represented the problem, once the parameters I have specified above are defined by constant numerical values the supporting force may be determined - it should be independent of how sharply the car is turning, or if it is gripping or drifting, just so long as all 4 wheels are on the bank. There will be an upper limit to how much force the track can contribute, is what I'm saying (NASCAR driver's dont understand this, that's why they smack the walls so much )

You can find the supporting force for the entire duration of the banked turn to see how much the bank actually helps you corner over a larger time scale, but this would require the use of line integrals.


ok, think I've nerded this place up enough for now...

In short - yes, you're right and your friend is wrong.

My heads about to explode.

 

[Small_Fryz]

banked is faster than flat.

grip or drift


bascially what he said

 

[Funkshen]

TankSpanker Now known as Boundary Layer...

I like it, I think you've earned the right to use that name... with the incredible knowledge you have .

But yeah. i suppose ill agree with what Tank said...ohh crap i mean umm "Boundary Layer". I really can't be bothered trying to prove him wrong.

So.. in conclusion your friend is an idiot,

 

[ViXeN]

So.. in conclusion your friend is an idiot,

Shame man, some dude just don't know any better... lol...

His mate's probably thinking in the line of a flat track being easier to drift on and hense faster? Dunno... But in any form of racing a bank will always take you round faster and with more blood on one side of you body!!!

 

[Perfect Balance]

Thanks, people. Thats what I thought it was.

 

[s13SilviaDriftr]

The only way a even road turn will be faster than a banked turn is if for some reason the INSIDE of the turn was the high-end of the bank, and the Outside of the turn is the lower-end of the bank. And a race-track would not be designed like that.

 

[Boundary Layer]

^^
More likely to be called an off camber turn than a banked turn.

There are tracks that do feature those - in GT4 Infineon has at least 2. ...I'm sure the Nordschleife has a few more than that...

 

[Droptop_Chick]

^^
More likely to be called an off camber turn than a banked turn.

There are tracks that do feature those - in GT4 Infineon has at least 2. ...I'm sure the Nordschleife has a few more than that...

El Cap and El Cap II have afew, but nothing as severe.

 

[speed junkie #2]

Just like in grip racing (NASCAR or IRL is the perfect example), a banked turn will help to support a portion of the lateral outwards force that is experienced when a car changes direction. This force acts in a direction perpendicular to the tangent of the car's tracjectory (or, in the direction of the gradient of the curve at the car's point along its path if you want a more appropriate terminology).

It takes a little static physics and trigonometry to figure out what the magnitude of this force is at any isolated point in time, and will ultimately depend on the car's mass, velocity, and on the angle of the bank. The supporting force exerted on the car by the bank will act in a direction normal to the track surface (whatever angle that ends up being).

The way I have represented the problem, once the parameters I have specified above are defined by constant numerical values the supporting force may be determined - it should be independent of how sharply the car is turning, or if it is gripping or drifting, just so long as all 4 wheels are on the bank. There will be an upper limit to how much force the track can contribute, is what I'm saying (NASCAR driver's dont understand this, that's why they smack the walls so much )

You can find the supporting force for the entire duration of the banked turn to see how much the bank actually helps you corner over a larger time scale, but this would require the use of line integrals.


ok, think I've nerded this place up enough for now...

In short - yes, you're right and your friend is wrong.

Man, you just gotta love it when people explain things the right way, good job, all i needed to hear. 👍
I gues I was arguing with perfect balance in the first place on how I didnt really like to drift on banked corners and my mind ended coming up with some theory on why it sucked, it made perfect sence to me and this is what I came up with:
Since the corner is banked it would be easyer to fall to the bottom especially whenever you lost grip on the rear which is every time, and since youre sideways on a banked corner your rear tires arent perfectlly flat on the ground, so because of that, instead of having both drive tires using 100% traction to push the car forwar you would only have like 1 1/2 whereas in a flat corner both drive tires would be perfectly flat on the surface. (by the way, for my incorrect theory I was using the second turn at tsukuba as the type of turn and bank I would reffer to; big, long turns have a flatter surface than a small one like the one at tsukuba)

Anyways, when I told perfect balance that he would say, "than just enter the corner faster to have enough momentum to carry the car through" and I would say, "you cant enter it any faster because then youll just go to fast and miss the apex and end up going too wide" It went on like that for a pretty long time.

So if PB would have just explained it like you just did (not like he could), he wouldve saved a lot of key strokes.
Either way, I can only say this, the human mind sure works in misterious ways in the heat of the moment, it seems so obvious now.

 

[G-T-4-Fan]

OMG YOU CHANGED YOUR NAME? Damn you I will always call you TankSpanker lolz, sorry

I agree with all of you, but just look at the little damn banked turns in nurenburgring, or high speed ring. Man if you drift these your just outta control, the nurenburg expecially offcourse

I dunno...it's experience VS theorie

 

[Dave A]

Gripping a flat turn is faster than drifting one, and theres a reason Speedways arn't flat, because you can corner faster on them.

 

[rsmithdrift]

Think of this: WHAT IF YOU HAD A 90* BANKED TURN?
I've tested this with slot cars (set the loop on it's side) and you do not have to slow down at all. In fact the track will take such a pounding that it will break apart after the cars take it at full speed. I reinforced the track so it couldn't separate and the car exploded!!! It literally split the chasis in half from all the G-Force!!!

Using a flat turn of the same radious you have to slow down tremendously and the lap times increased by 1.7 seconds. (track was same exact length, just replaced the 90* bank with a 0* bank)

Basically with higher banking the turn becomes less sharp. At 90* there is no horizontal turn. Only a vertical turn. A car only needs to slow down and steer for the horizontal turn, a vertical turn is taken care of by the fact that the car can't go through a solid object. Note that the difference in radious between the bottom and top line throught the turn becomes smaller as the banking increases as well until at 90* there is no difference. Gradual banking makes it possible for the top line to be the same turn radious as the bottom after some careful calculations. Whoever did the gradual at New Hampshire clearly wasn't a mathmatition.

If you want to apply this to real life, then think of Daytona. If the 33* banking was laid flat without tightening or opening the radious of the turn, the track would be much, much larger and the turn would appear to have a much wider radious even though it is the same. If you simply took away the bank then the turning radious would be much sharper.

Drifting a 90* bank would be impossible because you aren't turning, you are using centrifical force to hold the car on a road that turns vertically instead of horizontally, and you don't have to steer for a vertical turn.

 

[G-T-4-Fan]

Yeah yeah, that makes sence...
Plus, we're only thinking about things like entry speed, you offcourse gotta count all other drifting issues:
-Grip at front versus back
-countersteering
-throttle control
-and more importantly: BALANCE

Cause...who thinks these factors will stay the same in banked turns is wrong.

You ever saw a replay of you drifting the banked curves of the nurenburgring? You'll see the bottom-middle section of the car will be completely lifted off from the ground.
Thats not very balancing, +you gotta increase your ride height for it otherwise your exhaust would simply scrape the road surface.
Then you got countersteering, normally you countersteer the degree of your drift angle. If you drift a 20 degree angled drift, you countersteer it with 20 degrees. Imagine this when the car is tilted forward on a banked turn!!!!! IT WILL BE STEERING TOWARDS THE INSIDE OF THE CORNER!

Drifting on banked curves will take you into unknown territory
BTW, again, I'm only 15, so I'm not totally right, but much of this is just common sence...

 

[sidewayzinCA]

You ever saw a replay of you drifting the banked curves of the nurenburgring? You'll see the bottom-middle section of the car will be completely lifted off from the ground. Thats not very balancing, +you gotta increase your ride height for it otherwise your exhaust would simply scrape the road surface.

ok first off, assuming that we are still talking about banked turns, which is the whole point of the thread, if the entire car is on a bank the exhaust and ride-height will not need to be changed the car will still be on the same flat plane but the whole road surface has an angle that is not the same as the surface of the ground. if you were really bad a choosing a line i could see that this could be a problem, if your front tires were on say the rumble strip and your rears were high on the bank than you would probably scrape your exhaust. if you were to choose the right line and actually drift on a bank you would not have this problem.

second it is proven that a car that drifts on a flat surface can also drift on a banked surface.
Ex. D1GP us stage at irwindale, as well as formula D at irwindale and Wall speedway in New Jersey

 

[Boundary Layer]

Think of this: WHAT IF YOU HAD A 90* BANKED TURN?

snip

ya - Basically you just have a straight of infinite length that is on a constant incline (or descent, depending on your perspective) - no turn at all.
Because the entire track surface is concave, the car will experience tremendous downward force when at speed, as you mention, when the car taken as the moving reference frame (it is an outwards force if the track is placed in the x-y plane and used as the reference). It's comparable to the compression you feel on a rollercoaster when you go through a valley at high speed.

You were correct until you got to the part about 'centrifical force' (aka, centrifical farce) - no such thing. The term you're looking for is centrifugal force.
Centrifugal force pushes objects outwards, calculated by F=mv^2, centripetal force is any force causing an object to maintain it's circular trajectory equal and opposite to the centrifugal force (in this case the normal force the track exerts on the car).

I know you understood this, just a lesson in physics terminology, and hardly the focus of this thread. But I couldnt just say nothing.

👍

Then you got countersteering, normally you countersteer the degree of your drift angle. If you drift a 20 degree angled drift, you countersteer it with 20 degrees. Imagine this when the car is tilted forward on a banked turn!!!!! IT WILL BE STEERING TOWARDS THE INSIDE OF THE CORNER!

I think you're confused.... or else, you confused me.

 

[jayballash]

Cause...who thinks these factors will stay the same in banked turns is wrong.

Then you got countersteering, normally you countersteer the degree of your drift angle. If you drift a 20 degree angled drift, you countersteer it with 20 degrees. Imagine this when the car is tilted forward on a banked turn!!!!! IT WILL BE STEERING TOWARDS THE INSIDE OF THE CORNER!

Drifting on banked curves will take you into unknown territory
BTW, again, I'm only 15, so I'm not totally right, but much of this is just common sence...

you should go take a couple laps around the high speed ring. try and drift the banked corners there. you will find that they are indeed very driftable. yes, they are a lil bit different, but so is every corner. but they are highly driftable corners.
In the words of my high school gym teacher.... "TAKE A LAP!"

 

[G-T-4-Fan]

Well TS, imagine the 90 degree corner again, it's basically just a loop, how the....do you wanna countersteer that loop?!?....wait..maybe I confused myself again while imagining the 90* banked turn....WT.........NVM that then.

Jayballash, I did it many times. I just did a lap in a Merc R230 or something, arcade with N1's and 20% power -10% weight...or something like that, and I drifted EVERY corner in some way, power over, little feint, using curbes and brakes. But when I come to the little banked turns at the nurb.....I go in, with a drift, and well.......I get pulled sideways VERY quickly when hitting the banked corner and loose speed so I cant complete the corner.

Ok it may be possible...but for sure DONT TRY IT OUT. Cause at least drifting will be much more complicated on banked corners. So I'm talking about wether it's possible or not...

And then we still got speed....

 

[rsmithdrift]

Well TS, imagine the 90 degree corner again, it's basically just a loop, how the....do you wanna countersteer that loop?!?....wait..maybe I confused myself again while imagining the 90* banked turn....WT.........NVM that then.

Jayballash, I did it many times. I just did a lap in a Merc R230 or something, arcade with N1's and 20% power -10% weight...or something like that, and I drifted EVERY corner in some way, power over, little feint, using curbes and brakes. But when I come to the little banked turns at the nurb.....I go in, with a drift, and well.......I get pulled sideways VERY quickly when hitting the banked corner and loose speed so I cant complete the corner.

Ok it may be possible...but for sure DONT TRY IT OUT. Cause at least drifting will be much more complicated on banked corners. So I'm talking about wether it's possible or not...

And then we still got speed....

Dude don't drift the Couroussel turn at the Nurb. That's stupid, it's like 1 lane wide. Go to HSR if you wan't to know about drifting a banked turn. The Couroussel is so narrow that the car can't fit on the banking sideways.

And like I said, you can't drift a 90* banked turn because there is no horizontal turn, only a verticall one and you don't have to steer for a vertical turn. However a 30* banked turn has a horizontal radious and therefore can be drifted, at high speed anyways.

FYI High Speed Ring is my favorite drift track. You just have to get used to High Speed drifting and linking. Turn 1 is always fun at Greater than 90* the whole way around.