User guide

Racelogic Ltd Drifting
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Drifting
DriftBox is the first performance meter to measure Drift Angle. A car is said to be drifting when the
rear wheels have a lateral (sideways) motion in relation to the road as well as a longitudinal (fore-
aft) motion. In fact, the moment a car starts to turn a corner, the rear wheels need a certain amount
of side-slip to go around the corner, even if you are going very slowly.
DriftBox will measure the angle between the direction the
car is pointing, and the direction the car is going.
Because the rear wheels need to slide a small amount to
turn a corner, DriftBox will show a small angle (usually
<5 degrees) when cornering normally, but round very
tight bends this can sometimes be up to 10 degrees.
When using DriftBox, a drift is defined as anything over 5
degrees and 25kmh, but in most cases you are not really drifting unless you are showing 10
degrees or more. The very top drifters have recorded angles (using DriftBox of course!) of 65
degrees, at over 100km/h, but this requires a lot of power, sticky tyres, a modified steering rack
and a large amount of skill.
NOTE: Drifting should only be carried out in a controlled environment, and under no
circumstances on the public highway. Please make sure you are in a large open area, and
you are wearing a suitable helmet. Drifting can be immensely rewarding when you have
mastered the technique, but you run a high risk of spinning out of control every time you
lose traction of the rear wheels.
Drifting techniques
There are many ways of making a car drift, here is a brief explanation of some of the more popular
methods. Techniques vary depending on whether your car is Front engined Rear wheel drive (FR)
or Front engined Front wheel drive (FF).
Hand Brake (FR & FF)
This is the simplest way of breaking traction on the rear wheels. Pulling on the handbrake will lock
up the rear wheels, and this will cause the amount of grip at the rear end to drop very suddenly and
the car will slide from the rear. The downside is the car will slow down during application of the
handbrake. This technique is normally used to initiate the drift, but you cannot use this for
sustained drifting.