Drivers Skill - getting your A6 to spin out
10-28-2013, 08:36 AM
#1
Drivers Skill - getting your A6 to spin out
I attended a Porsche Club Drivers Skills event held at Bremerton Raceway Park (Bremerton, WA) on Saturday. What a great event. The last time I took the course was in 2006 to explore a recently purchased Porsche 996.
Groups of about 10 cars rotated through three stations (learning events) in the morning session and through three new stations in the afternoon. All at your own pace. Bring your own car. Instructors ride with you until both of you agree that it's time for you to do that task on your own. Some drivers preferred to have instructors with them for every run--no problem. No timing--just learning.
I ran 38lbs in all tires. Higher pressures might have made the car perform a little better, but I wanted to more closely duplicate the pressures that would be in it out on the street without having pressures so low that would encourage a tire to roll on the rim. Weather - cloudy, about 50 degrees. Dry.
Things I learned about my 2012 A6:
- The braking is a lot more capable than I expected. I have been somewhat concerned about the all season tires (which historically are "no-season" tires). But when practicing emergency stops, pedal mashed, full ABS active -- the car stopped a lot better than many of the other 'sportier' cars.
- Allowing for its physical size, the A6 corners quite well. The car was able to maneuver slaloms, decreasing radius turns and sudden accident avoidance maneuvers extremely well.
One revelation was that the car did better the faster I went through the slalom. Going slower, I had to just steer around the cones which was a bit of a thrash. Going quite a bit faster, there was enough weight transfer to the outside to help the car around the pylons. (This bodes well for accident avoidance on a highway.)
The A6 navigated the slaloms & autocross course as well or better than many of the other cars. Several instructors were openly surprised at how well it did. Yes, it has more body roll than a 911. But the roll is contained and would have been less were I smoother in my driving.
- As it should, the car steers well with full ABS engaged. That is, if you're in the middle of an emergency stop (brake pedal is pulsing with the ABS active), you can still steer well to avoid a person/obstacle in the road. Perfect.
- It is darn near impossible to get the car to spin. One station was a skid pad with a cone set in the middle.
Level 1 - Drive around the cone, hold your steering wheel in one position, then accelerate to control how close the car comes to the cone as you circle. More power--wider circle. Try to move from greater traction to close to adhesion limits while circling closer or farther from the cone without moving your steering wheel--just steer with your accelerator.
Level 2 - Now while circling at the very edge of adhesion, use the accelerator and steering wheel input to dance inside and outside the limit of adhesion. In other words, get the car to start sliding out, then catch it and twitch it back into the desired path while circling the cone. Probably a crude/slow version of drifting.
Task - cross the edge of adhesion and make your car spin out so you can practice "clutch in/brakes on" for a more controlled spin (don't have to worry too much about the clutch in the A6).
[ok...a "controlled spin" sounds like an oxymoron. But if your tires are turning while you spin, it not only increases the chance of damage to your drive train, but having them spin allows some to catch while others slide making the spin irregular and wild....somewhat increasing the chance of a rollover. Locking up the tires by applying the brakes makes a bad situation slightly safer.]
Discovered that the A6 just wants to plow (understeer). It took three attempts with three different instructors before we tried going into a plow, brake suddenly, accelerate strongly, then brake suddenly....and finally the tail of the Audi came around. Nice to be able to try this at slow speeds on a slippery surface where you can't damage the car. Take away is, under almost any normal condition, the car will just plow. You really have to have an unusual situation or behave oddly/badly as a driver to make the car spin. (As compared to some rear-engined sports cars.)
- There was one instance where the car seemed to have a delayed response. In one task there was sort of a small NASCAR oval. One end was a larger oval, other end was a sharp, decreasing radius turn. One of the goals was to come into the sharp corner hard enough to just about trigger the ABS, then turn onto the short straight to the larger oval. Overall the A6 did fine. But when transitioning from the heavy braking to nearly a stop, then accelerate strongly -- there seemed to be a delay where I kept pushing more an more on the accelerator and nothing happened. And then the electronics seems to say, "OH...you actually want to accelerate"....and then it took off in a somewhat more sudden/jerky way than it would had it responded sooner. My guess it was something to do with the traction control. A nit...but something worth knowing about.
Sign in was 7:30am; sessions started at 8:30am and continued through 4pm. Came away with a much better sense of how the car handles and behaves. An excellent way to spend a day. Interesting to see the computer estimating about 7mpg for the event.
Groups of about 10 cars rotated through three stations (learning events) in the morning session and through three new stations in the afternoon. All at your own pace. Bring your own car. Instructors ride with you until both of you agree that it's time for you to do that task on your own. Some drivers preferred to have instructors with them for every run--no problem. No timing--just learning.
I ran 38lbs in all tires. Higher pressures might have made the car perform a little better, but I wanted to more closely duplicate the pressures that would be in it out on the street without having pressures so low that would encourage a tire to roll on the rim. Weather - cloudy, about 50 degrees. Dry.
Things I learned about my 2012 A6:
- The braking is a lot more capable than I expected. I have been somewhat concerned about the all season tires (which historically are "no-season" tires). But when practicing emergency stops, pedal mashed, full ABS active -- the car stopped a lot better than many of the other 'sportier' cars.
- Allowing for its physical size, the A6 corners quite well. The car was able to maneuver slaloms, decreasing radius turns and sudden accident avoidance maneuvers extremely well.
One revelation was that the car did better the faster I went through the slalom. Going slower, I had to just steer around the cones which was a bit of a thrash. Going quite a bit faster, there was enough weight transfer to the outside to help the car around the pylons. (This bodes well for accident avoidance on a highway.)
The A6 navigated the slaloms & autocross course as well or better than many of the other cars. Several instructors were openly surprised at how well it did. Yes, it has more body roll than a 911. But the roll is contained and would have been less were I smoother in my driving.
- As it should, the car steers well with full ABS engaged. That is, if you're in the middle of an emergency stop (brake pedal is pulsing with the ABS active), you can still steer well to avoid a person/obstacle in the road. Perfect.
- It is darn near impossible to get the car to spin. One station was a skid pad with a cone set in the middle.
Level 1 - Drive around the cone, hold your steering wheel in one position, then accelerate to control how close the car comes to the cone as you circle. More power--wider circle. Try to move from greater traction to close to adhesion limits while circling closer or farther from the cone without moving your steering wheel--just steer with your accelerator.
Level 2 - Now while circling at the very edge of adhesion, use the accelerator and steering wheel input to dance inside and outside the limit of adhesion. In other words, get the car to start sliding out, then catch it and twitch it back into the desired path while circling the cone. Probably a crude/slow version of drifting.
Task - cross the edge of adhesion and make your car spin out so you can practice "clutch in/brakes on" for a more controlled spin (don't have to worry too much about the clutch in the A6).
[ok...a "controlled spin" sounds like an oxymoron. But if your tires are turning while you spin, it not only increases the chance of damage to your drive train, but having them spin allows some to catch while others slide making the spin irregular and wild....somewhat increasing the chance of a rollover. Locking up the tires by applying the brakes makes a bad situation slightly safer.]
Discovered that the A6 just wants to plow (understeer). It took three attempts with three different instructors before we tried going into a plow, brake suddenly, accelerate strongly, then brake suddenly....and finally the tail of the Audi came around. Nice to be able to try this at slow speeds on a slippery surface where you can't damage the car. Take away is, under almost any normal condition, the car will just plow. You really have to have an unusual situation or behave oddly/badly as a driver to make the car spin. (As compared to some rear-engined sports cars.)
- There was one instance where the car seemed to have a delayed response. In one task there was sort of a small NASCAR oval. One end was a larger oval, other end was a sharp, decreasing radius turn. One of the goals was to come into the sharp corner hard enough to just about trigger the ABS, then turn onto the short straight to the larger oval. Overall the A6 did fine. But when transitioning from the heavy braking to nearly a stop, then accelerate strongly -- there seemed to be a delay where I kept pushing more an more on the accelerator and nothing happened. And then the electronics seems to say, "OH...you actually want to accelerate"....and then it took off in a somewhat more sudden/jerky way than it would had it responded sooner. My guess it was something to do with the traction control. A nit...but something worth knowing about.
Sign in was 7:30am; sessions started at 8:30am and continued through 4pm. Came away with a much better sense of how the car handles and behaves. An excellent way to spend a day. Interesting to see the computer estimating about 7mpg for the event.
10-28-2013, 09:08 AM
#2
AudiWorld Member
Thanks for a great post. It was interesting to read. This gives credence to all the professional reviews that put A6 3.0T at the top of the luxury sedan category in comparison testing against BMW 535, MB E350, Infiniti M37 and many other competitors.
10-28-2013, 10:25 AM
#3
I attended a Porsche Club Drivers Skills event held at Bremerton Raceway Park (Bremerton, WA) on Saturday. What a great event. The last time I took the course was in 2006 to explore a recently purchased Porsche 996.
Groups of about 10 cars rotated through three stations (learning events) in the morning session and through three new stations in the afternoon. All at your own pace. Bring your own car. Instructors ride with you until both of you agree that it's time for you to do that task on your own. Some drivers preferred to have instructors with them for every run--no problem. No timing--just learning.
I ran 38lbs in all tires. Higher pressures might have made the car perform a little better, but I wanted to more closely duplicate the pressures that would be in it out on the street without having pressures so low that would encourage a tire to roll on the rim. Weather - cloudy, about 50 degrees. Dry.
Things I learned about my 2012 A6:
- The braking is a lot more capable than I expected. I have been somewhat concerned about the all season tires (which historically are "no-season" tires). But when practicing emergency stops, pedal mashed, full ABS active -- the car stopped a lot better than many of the other 'sportier' cars.
- Allowing for its physical size, the A6 corners quite well. The car was able to maneuver slaloms, decreasing radius turns and sudden accident avoidance maneuvers extremely well.
One revelation was that the car did better the faster I went through the slalom. Going slower, I had to just steer around the cones which was a bit of a thrash. Going quite a bit faster, there was enough weight transfer to the outside to help the car around the pylons. (This bodes well for accident avoidance on a highway.)
The A6 navigated the slaloms & autocross course as well or better than many of the other cars. Several instructors were openly surprised at how well it did. Yes, it has more body roll than a 911. But the roll is contained and would have been less were I smoother in my driving.
- As it should, the car steers well with full ABS engaged. That is, if you're in the middle of an emergency stop (brake pedal is pulsing with the ABS active), you can still steer well to avoid a person/obstacle in the road. Perfect.
- It is darn near impossible to get the car to spin. One station was a skid pad with a cone set in the middle.
Level 1 - Drive around the cone, hold your steering wheel in one position, then accelerate to control how close the car comes to the cone as you circle. More power--wider circle. Try to move from greater traction to close to adhesion limits while circling closer or farther from the cone without moving your steering wheel--just steer with your accelerator.
Level 2 - Now while circling at the very edge of adhesion, use the accelerator and steering wheel input to dance inside and outside the limit of adhesion. In other words, get the car to start sliding out, then catch it and twitch it back into the desired path while circling the cone. Probably a crude/slow version of drifting.
Task - cross the edge of adhesion and make your car spin out so you can practice "clutch in/brakes on" for a more controlled spin (don't have to worry too much about the clutch in the A6).
[ok...a "controlled spin" sounds like an oxymoron. But if your tires are turning while you spin, it not only increases the chance of damage to your drive train, but having them spin allows some to catch while others slide making the spin irregular and wild....somewhat increasing the chance of a rollover. Locking up the tires by applying the brakes makes a bad situation slightly safer.]
Discovered that the A6 just wants to plow (understeer). It took three attempts with three different instructors before we tried going into a plow, brake suddenly, accelerate strongly, then brake suddenly....and finally the tail of the Audi came around. Nice to be able to try this at slow speeds on a slippery surface where you can't damage the car. Take away is, under almost any normal condition, the car will just plow. You really have to have an unusual situation or behave oddly/badly as a driver to make the car spin. (As compared to some rear-engined sports cars.)
- There was one instance where the car seemed to have a delayed response. In one task there was sort of a small NASCAR oval. One end was a larger oval, other end was a sharp, decreasing radius turn. One of the goals was to come into the sharp corner hard enough to just about trigger the ABS, then turn onto the short straight to the larger oval. Overall the A6 did fine. But when transitioning from the heavy braking to nearly a stop, then accelerate strongly -- there seemed to be a delay where I kept pushing more an more on the accelerator and nothing happened. And then the electronics seems to say, "OH...you actually want to accelerate"....and then it took off in a somewhat more sudden/jerky way than it would had it responded sooner. My guess it was something to do with the traction control. A nit...but something worth knowing about.
Sign in was 7:30am; sessions started at 8:30am and continued through 4pm. Came away with a much better sense of how the car handles and behaves. An excellent way to spend a day. Interesting to see the computer estimating about 7mpg for the event.
Groups of about 10 cars rotated through three stations (learning events) in the morning session and through three new stations in the afternoon. All at your own pace. Bring your own car. Instructors ride with you until both of you agree that it's time for you to do that task on your own. Some drivers preferred to have instructors with them for every run--no problem. No timing--just learning.
I ran 38lbs in all tires. Higher pressures might have made the car perform a little better, but I wanted to more closely duplicate the pressures that would be in it out on the street without having pressures so low that would encourage a tire to roll on the rim. Weather - cloudy, about 50 degrees. Dry.
Things I learned about my 2012 A6:
- The braking is a lot more capable than I expected. I have been somewhat concerned about the all season tires (which historically are "no-season" tires). But when practicing emergency stops, pedal mashed, full ABS active -- the car stopped a lot better than many of the other 'sportier' cars.
- Allowing for its physical size, the A6 corners quite well. The car was able to maneuver slaloms, decreasing radius turns and sudden accident avoidance maneuvers extremely well.
One revelation was that the car did better the faster I went through the slalom. Going slower, I had to just steer around the cones which was a bit of a thrash. Going quite a bit faster, there was enough weight transfer to the outside to help the car around the pylons. (This bodes well for accident avoidance on a highway.)
The A6 navigated the slaloms & autocross course as well or better than many of the other cars. Several instructors were openly surprised at how well it did. Yes, it has more body roll than a 911. But the roll is contained and would have been less were I smoother in my driving.
- As it should, the car steers well with full ABS engaged. That is, if you're in the middle of an emergency stop (brake pedal is pulsing with the ABS active), you can still steer well to avoid a person/obstacle in the road. Perfect.
- It is darn near impossible to get the car to spin. One station was a skid pad with a cone set in the middle.
Level 1 - Drive around the cone, hold your steering wheel in one position, then accelerate to control how close the car comes to the cone as you circle. More power--wider circle. Try to move from greater traction to close to adhesion limits while circling closer or farther from the cone without moving your steering wheel--just steer with your accelerator.
Level 2 - Now while circling at the very edge of adhesion, use the accelerator and steering wheel input to dance inside and outside the limit of adhesion. In other words, get the car to start sliding out, then catch it and twitch it back into the desired path while circling the cone. Probably a crude/slow version of drifting.
Task - cross the edge of adhesion and make your car spin out so you can practice "clutch in/brakes on" for a more controlled spin (don't have to worry too much about the clutch in the A6).
[ok...a "controlled spin" sounds like an oxymoron. But if your tires are turning while you spin, it not only increases the chance of damage to your drive train, but having them spin allows some to catch while others slide making the spin irregular and wild....somewhat increasing the chance of a rollover. Locking up the tires by applying the brakes makes a bad situation slightly safer.]
Discovered that the A6 just wants to plow (understeer). It took three attempts with three different instructors before we tried going into a plow, brake suddenly, accelerate strongly, then brake suddenly....and finally the tail of the Audi came around. Nice to be able to try this at slow speeds on a slippery surface where you can't damage the car. Take away is, under almost any normal condition, the car will just plow. You really have to have an unusual situation or behave oddly/badly as a driver to make the car spin. (As compared to some rear-engined sports cars.)
- There was one instance where the car seemed to have a delayed response. In one task there was sort of a small NASCAR oval. One end was a larger oval, other end was a sharp, decreasing radius turn. One of the goals was to come into the sharp corner hard enough to just about trigger the ABS, then turn onto the short straight to the larger oval. Overall the A6 did fine. But when transitioning from the heavy braking to nearly a stop, then accelerate strongly -- there seemed to be a delay where I kept pushing more an more on the accelerator and nothing happened. And then the electronics seems to say, "OH...you actually want to accelerate"....and then it took off in a somewhat more sudden/jerky way than it would had it responded sooner. My guess it was something to do with the traction control. A nit...but something worth knowing about.
Sign in was 7:30am; sessions started at 8:30am and continued through 4pm. Came away with a much better sense of how the car handles and behaves. An excellent way to spend a day. Interesting to see the computer estimating about 7mpg for the event.
Best thing ever. And that is also why the car performs better at faster speeds, as you can leverage the Quattro better. Add in some acceleration to fully utilize Quattro and the car is damn near on rails and will go where ever you want. Nice to know just how hard A6 is to get out of control.
10-28-2013, 11:35 AM
#4
AudiWorld Super User
If you disable the ASR and ESC, I'd bet the car could be put in a spin a lot easier. If the systems sense a severe lack of traction, i.e. accelerating fast into a sharp turn from a stop, they engage and stop the engine for a moment. If they are disabled, that won't happen. Not recommended though for safety's sake other than to play on the track.
If the C7 is like my previous B8 A4, one push on the ESP button disables DSR, a second push while holding for a couple of seconds disables the ESP.
If the C7 is like my previous B8 A4, one push on the ESP button disables DSR, a second push while holding for a couple of seconds disables the ESP.
Last edited by snagitseven; 10-28-2013 at 05:49 PM.
10-28-2013, 12:18 PM
#5
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Amazing. It's also nice to know that there's not one mention of the electric steering being an issue. I think electric steering provides for more laser-guided accuracy. Did you get a sense that the steering was astonishingly accurate?
10-28-2013, 01:39 PM
#6
QUATTRO!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Best thing ever. And that is also why the car performs better at faster speeds, as you can leverage the Quattro better. Add in some acceleration to fully utilize Quattro and the car is damn near on rails and will go where ever you want. Nice to know just how hard A6 is to get out of control.
Best thing ever. And that is also why the car performs better at faster speeds, as you can leverage the Quattro better. Add in some acceleration to fully utilize Quattro and the car is damn near on rails and will go where ever you want. Nice to know just how hard A6 is to get out of control.
10-28-2013, 05:14 PM
#7
If you disable the ASR and ESP, I'd bet the car could be put in a spin a lot easier. If the systems sense a severe lack of traction, i.e. accelerating fast into a sharp turn from a stop, they engage and stop the engine for a moment. If they are disabled, that won't happen. Not recommended though for safety's sake other than to play on the track.
If the C7 is like my previous B8 A4, one push on the ESP button disables DSR, a second push while holding for a couple of seconds disables the ESP.
If the C7 is like my previous B8 A4, one push on the ESP button disables DSR, a second push while holding for a couple of seconds disables the ESP.
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10-28-2013, 06:06 PM
#8
AudiWorld Super User
It's possible that only the ESC can be defeated with the button and not the ASR on newer Audi models. I'll have to try the ESC long button press to see if it turns off the ASR in my car.
10-28-2013, 06:09 PM
#9
Little known fact and definitely not trying to be rude, just pointing it out, but "quattro" is spelled with a lower case "q". It is actually trademarked that way, next time you are near your Audi take a peak and you will notice it is lower case everywhere it is used. This has been my random Audi fact for the day
10-28-2013, 06:16 PM
#10
AudiWorld Senior Member
Before i sold it, i was able to spin my car at Summit Point in WV. in the carousel, enter hard, throttle lift. The track was slightly damp, and it was really fun learning how to get the car to step out and then recover at higher and higher speeds.