On ABS, TC and SCCA

Anyone care to add to this confusing debate that I have been having with my
co-workers? Some ppl I talk to say that if you know how to drive, these are
nice "piece of mind" safety features and not really necessary. Some say that
under slippery conditions that ABS will actually increase a car's stopping
distance. Saturn's TC works based upon ABS and will cut down on fuel or even
shut off fuel if upshifting the engine isn't enough. My SC2 doesn't have
ABS/TC, I am old school and know how & when to pump my brakes to slow down.
Some say ABS is for panic only situations, and that in the race circuits ABS
is against the rules and many actually will disable ABS/TC to enhance thier
handling. What do you think?

 

If you read Grassroots Motorsports, they were able to get better lap
times when they disabled the "nanny controls." They do allow people to
control their vehicles in emergencies, but what happens when you get
into a car that doesn't have them???

I'm a firm believer in teaching people to drive, and know how to control
their vehicles in emergencies. Driver's training in the US, and
license requirements, are a joke.


Some say that

It doesn't increase the stopping distance. It allows for threshold
braking without the driver having to know how to do it.

ABS is not allowed in some racing classes, such as F1, but within the
SCCA, if you are racing a production car that came with ABS, you can
continue to run it.

And I know of some racers who do disable it, because they are better
able to threshold brake than the ABS system.

 

I've seen this debate before and here is my opinion. In only a few months,
I'll have owned my '94 SC2 with ABS for 14 years.

The main advantage to ABS is being able to maintain control of the direction
of the car when full braking force is applied. This is most noticeable on
wet, gravel, snow, etc. I've seen this always as being the point it is sold
on, and NOT claims that it necessarily will get you stopped any faster.

On dry pavement, popular opinion feels that an expert at threshold braking
can --marginally-- outperform ABS. This may be slightly advantageous during
autocross or road racing provided the driver is actually good at it. But
for the average Joe on the road... Too bad that not even an expert has time
for any mental processing in most accidents or emergency situations -
actions come from instinct which is usually to jam on the brakes and crap
your pants (but not necessarily in that order).

My ABS has saved my butt several times. The instinct of jamming the pedal
thru the floor in an emergency situation makes the safety belts knock the
wind out of you without a hint of tire squeal or lockup. That's pretty good
in my book.

Now, if you're talking SCCA or some form of on-track competition comes into
play... I believe Kevin covered that best in his post on this topic.

Lane [ lane (at) evilplastic.com ]