-RC Car Videos #003- 4WD vs Countersteer vs RWD Drifting Chasses on Asphalt! Comparison and Opinion

"Is it even possible to enjoy RWD drifitng on asphalt road?" "" How different are they?" This video might helpful to you!

I am going to introduce you my 3 different drifting chasses of 1/10 scale RC cars. Through the video, i will explain the difference of each chassis in detail and show you the demonstration on asphalt road.

Timestamps
00:00 Introduction of three drifting chasses
05:07 Setup and Equipments
17:38 Demonstration of Normal Drifting Chassis (Yokomo Drift Package Type C)
30:11 Demonstration of Countersteering Drifting Chassis (Streetja, OTA-R, TA-05 Conversion)
40:58 Demonstration of RWD Drifting Chassis without Gyro (3Racing Sakura D5 MR Ver.2)
43:57 Demonstration of RWD Drifting Chassis with Gyro

Summary of the video (spoiler alert! but also a bit of extra info)
Normal 4WD Drifting is easy to drive, fast thanks to great traction, and stable in yaw motion. Precise control of trajectory iseasily achievable. Almost no countersteering required except for flipping, switching the rotation of the car.

Countersteering Drifting makes it possible to continuously do countersteering throughout the corner. The more Countersteer Ratio (extra rotation ratio of rear wheels. e.g., CSR0%: normal 4WD, CSR100%: rear wheels rotate twice as front wheels) is, the more likely the rear wheels swing out easily. On asphalt, CSR around 50 - 60% is moderately controllable and enjoyable. CSR100% is really difficult unless using Gyro or different tires to change the balance of the traction. Because there is always speed differential between front and rear wheels, maintaining straight line or large circle is extremely difficult.

RWD Drifting is a little bit tricky at first. But with proper setup and adjustments, it can do long continuous countersteer drifting unlike any other! Because it only drives two wheels, there is a limitation in traction and therefore tends to be slower.
The use of Gyro might be kind of a cheating, but considering that the quickness of the yaw motion dynamics is greater than the full scaled vehicle and we cannot percieve the change of yow motion in the car but only visually from outside, it makes sense to rely on Gyro for the high frequency steering control for stablization, while we manually control rather the low frequency steering control for directing, and trajectroy change. Therefore, acutally Gyro only adjust the steering wheel on very sensitive area, slight adjustments and not intervene the manual input much. Although too much gain cause the car out of control lol Gyro takes over the control of servo.

Recommended Settings for RWD Drifting
Front wheels should be toe-in so that overall steering angles of left and right wheels will be greater. Smoothly rolling front wheels (less drag as possible) during large sideslip angle is the key. Of course it depends on the steering geometry of each chassis.
Front tires should be rounded on lateral direction and smooth so that the increase of cornering drag by the change of camber angle during steering will be minimized.
Location of heavy devices should be rear, so that more traction is available. For the sake of getting more traction, I raise the height of front suspension than the rear.
The gain of Gyro also plays an important role. It depends on each chassis and setup, but in my case, Sakura D5 MR Ver2 on asphalt road and Revox Reve D, I chose 40%. Less than 40% makes the car wobble because of the poor steering adjustment and more than 40% makes the car less controllable.

Which is the most fun to drive? : To be brutally honest, I would choose RWD Drifting with Gyro, even I started to think like that within only several days since I started it. Not to mention I was a type of guy like "Is the use of Gyro cheat isn't it?" "How can I feel natural to drive such an assisted car?!" "I do not believe in Gyro" "Normal 4WD or CS must be more fun!" "I simply don't need RWD!" before experiencing RWD.
But since only sticking to one particular style gets me bored, I will still drive other drifting chasses anyway lol To me, the degree of fun of each Drifting style is like, 4WD : 95%, CS : 90%, RWD 100%, so actually very close to each other. I actually all the styles. To me, "fun" comes from the balance between the difficulty and the level of mastery (how good I can control it). So I feel fun from the satisfuction of precise control of trajectory when I drive 4WD, from the satisfaction of improvement of skills while struggling with difficulty when I drive RWD. CS style is kind of "not yet found the best setup and adjustments" so feel slightly less than the other two.

Video recorded on 20240422, edited and uploaded on 20240424.

Introduction of the uploader
Sakura : Japanese guy currently working in Germany.
My main hobbies are drawing, gaming, and RC cars.
I used to play RC cars a lot until about ten years ago. Then after long hiatas, I made a comeback to RC cars since late February of 2024!!
Recently I started RWD Drifting with Gyro too.