I don't get the point of AWD (hear me out)

[flatbutt]

Originally Posted by dad911

As anyone that has driven the Somerville Circle in NJ will tell you......

I really notice it on any wet day. Punch it to pull into traffic, and without AWD the rear tires just spin....

Outsiders probably don't know what a circle is, or a jughandle, or taylor ham.

[recycled sixtie]

If I had a choice of taking an awd vehicle or 2wd in this part of the world I would take awd. Awd is nice to have in winter particularly. There is black ice, snow etc and it just gives that extra level of protection. Car does not go sideways as readily when accelerating. Deep snow? Less chance of getting stuck.

Awd in California or Arizona might be overkill and you are getting less mpg with the extra weight but it is great to have that backup when you go into snow country....

[Salty Springs]

If I didn't have AWD I'd still be stuck in the red mud of the Porsche Corral at Petite Leman's (Road Atlanta).What a mess that was!
Dave

[Mark Henry]

I agree it also depends where you live. It also depends on the car and the drivers skill level.
We get all kinds of snow here and I've never had issue or the need for AWD, but I've only ever driven FWD or back in the day RWD T1 and T2 VW's. In my case, living in a snow belt, our roads are cleared, salted or sanded well even during a storm.

The only occasion that I wish we had AWD has been a couple of ice storms, our worst one is when the wife put our Golf in the ditch. But that time, the next day when I went to pull it out, there was a Subaru in the ditch right beside us. This was a freak ice storm, hundreds of cars in ditches. With a couple of ice (sand) mats I was able to back the Golf out of the ditch without a tow.
I think 20 years out here in the country there has only been 3-4 bad ice storms and as long as I can get out of the driveway the snow is no problem.

As far as plowing my 100m driveway, no more pissing around, I have a 4wd full size tractor with a 7' blower.

[javadog]

There's getting there eventually, and getting there now...

In 1984 or 1985, I flew down to Daytona to be part of a race crew for the 24 hour race. Coming back late on Sunday night, I had a flight that got into Kansas City just after midnight, give or take. A storm had dumped a bunch of snow on Kansas in my absence and fortunately, I'd driven a 4000 Quattro to the airport. I motored back in the dead of night on an empty, snow-packed four lane highway running between 70 and 90, in perfect comfort. Having been awake since 6:00 AM Saturday, then having done the race, I was a tired puppy and in a wee bit of a hurry to get to where I was going.

JR

[bleucamaro]

I loved my '05 STi when I had it. Just with Contisport all-season tires it was pretty unstoppable in snow or ice. Never had to put chains on it. And in the dry would run circles around most cars... I don't condone street racing, but pulling away from a GTO at a stoplight is pretty fun. With true street tires (RE-01r) I'd beat everything not on DOT slicks at PCA autocrosses.

The biggest downside to it was that it made me a worse driver, more ham-fisted, less finesse. Understeer: either reduce steering input or reduce throttle input and the nose will tuck in. Oversteer: keep the front pointed where you want it to go and that's it.

Now, I'm hot for the new focus RS.

[dad911]

Originally Posted by flatbutt

Outsiders probably don't know what a circle is, or a jughandle, or taylor ham.

It's Pork Roll, not Taylor Ham.

[herr_oberst]

Originally Posted by dad911

It's Pork Roll, not Taylor Ham.

I'll bet Morris and Somerset have self-esteem issues.

[dafischer]

When I was a kid growing up in Hunterdon (50's - 60's) it was still Taylor Ham.

[sugarwood]

Almost the entire conversation is based on snow and rain driving.
What if you're buying a 500hp GT3 that you will never ever drive in the rain or snow.
Is AWD basically pointless then?

[GH85Carrera]

GT3 are RW drive only

[herr_oberst]

^That's what I was gonna say!....But AWD and launch control have turned the TT into a bracket racer.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by sugarwood

Almost the entire conversation is based on snow and rain driving.
What if you're buying a 500hp GT3 that you will never ever drive in the rain or snow.
Is AWD basically pointless then?

I can only assume that what you were thinking was something like the 911 turbo which is awd. Honestly, I do think that having a 500hp (or even 450 or 415 like the older models) 911 turbo does benefit most people by having awd.

I have a 300 hp boxster S. It's only rwd, and does not have LSD. It's got fairly sticky 265 section tires. I don't want awd, but I would REALLY love to have LSD as I can pretty easily spin the rear tire in 1st and 2nd on some roads in a straight line.

[javadog]

Originally Posted by sugarwood

Almost the entire conversation is based on snow and rain driving.
What if you're buying a 500hp GT3 that you will never ever drive in the rain or snow.
Is AWD basically pointless then?

Originally Posted by masraum

I can only assume that what you were thinking was something like the 911 turbo which is awd. Honestly, I do think that having a 500hp (or even 450 or 415 like the older models) 911 turbo does benefit most people by having awd.

I have a 300 hp boxster S. It's only rwd, and does not have LSD. It's got fairly sticky 265 section tires. I don't want awd, but I would REALLY love to have LSD as I can pretty easily spin the rear tire in 1st and 2nd on some roads in a straight line.

It's definitely a benefit in dry weather, too. A GT3 has enough power to spin the tires coming out of corners in several gears. It's not just in a straight line that you get wheelspin. I had the same Boxster S that Masraum has and you had to be pretty careful coming out of 2nd and 3rd gear corners, if you were pushing the car hard, so a GT3 with another hundred or two hundred horsepower is going to be a real handful.

I recently have put some miles on a 991 Turbo S and that thing is a real weapon. It wouldn't be the least bit fun in 2WD. You'd just destroy your real tires. Absolutely, positively there's no way I'd be interested in a 2WD version of that car. That's also the first Porsche I wouldn't want a manual gearbox in. It's just so much faster with PDK.

JR

[wdfifteen]

Originally Posted by sugarwood

Almost the entire conversation is based on snow and rain driving.
What if you're buying a 500hp GT3 that you will never ever drive in the rain or snow.
Is AWD basically pointless then?

500 hp on dry pavement and a 100 hp car in the wet. Same traction problems.

[aschen]

Its hard to generalize about awd because as with most things implementation is more important than architecture.

I like awd for daily drivers and absurdly powerful sports cars, but prefer rwd for moderate power sports cars. Im on my 3rd wrx/sti as a daily driver.

I suspect a gt3 would be slower on most tracks with AWD added. Maybe on the tightest and most technical tracks with low gear corner exits. I suspect Porsche will add awd if the power creeps up. For a daily driver like a turbo it makes complete sense.

Front engine AWD is a bit more of a compromise. Look how far forwards the engine is in an audi or a wrx. These cars all under steer pretty severely at the limit which is good for a street car but a bit frustrating on track or autocross.

In general awd cars do make less power at the wheels than 2 driven wheels. Look up whp dynos for cars available in both configs like a 335. the rwd version will have 10-20 more whp. 100-200 lbs is significant in a sports car. I think a c2 will be faster than a c4 for most tracks/drivers/tires.

Many racecars are built to minimum weight specs so there is no awd weight penalty, unless written into the rules

[Mark Henry]

The one thing, in going back to the OP's post, is all the cars being discussed are really "wants".

You only "need" a $10K econobox and a small percentage like farmers need a P/U truck.
All cars that are more expensive than the econobox are for show, performance, more comfort, to prove your rich, bragging rights, pick-up chicks, etc.
Pure "wants", bells and whistles.
It's human nature for many people to gravitate to the car that does what they perceive will ooze there coolness. Manufacturers not only know, the exploit this fact.

That said this experiment has already been done... and the conclusion was who the fark want's to drive a Lada.

[T77911S]

Originally Posted by nzporsche944s2

I had grip explained to me very simply as "a tyre can only do a 100% of anything at a given time". If the driven tyre is also the steering tyre (e.g front wheel drive) then you can't get 100% steering while asking for 100% acceleration at the same time.
So hard into a corner, foot down will result in lost grip (understeer, wheelspin) because the inputs are exceeding the 100% threshold. Now that is at the extreme...

.

thats really not quite right,

go around a turn while braking but below max speed for the turn. you have just split that 100% grip.
a tire can only UTILIZE 100% of its grip. it can be 40%turning and 60% braking or what ever combination you choose.

[aschen]

THe typical model for this is known as the friction circle.

If a tire can support 1g max cornering, it can support something like .7g braking and .7g turning at the same time. The resultant vector acceleration is then 1g for this scenario

[Deschodt]

Originally Posted by jwasbury

Why the rant?

That's what Sugarwood does... start topics with seemingly innocuous questions. Sometimes I suspect he's employed by Pelican to keep the OT boards active ;-)
No harm done...