Hey Jason, I'm glad I found your channel since I'm a Seattle local and transitioning from full scale vehicles to 1/8 buggy racing. One area that I have difficulty with is braking as it relates to cornering in RC. Braking in full-scale cars played such a big role in cornering because of the weight transfer to the front tires. But with a trigger on a RC car, it's obviously different. Do you like to dial in some drag-brake to aid corner entry? Or just lift and "coast into the turn" then gas out? Thanks.
Hey Ron! Where will you be racing? Most of the time I'm lifting to let the car slow at the right time, maybe use understeer or a little brake to rotate the car to get to the right speed. On high speed straights into tight 180's you definitely have to use the brake and slow the car and if you and the car to rotate you can keep a little brake to keep the weight transfer up on the front tires. I avoid drake brake because it makes the car dive in the air. Some people like it and of course it's dependent on the car, in a 2wd car it might not make it nose dive nearly as much because only 2 tires are slowing. What did you race before?
Fantastic video! Something I've been thinking about a lot is how to "catch the car" at the right time as you say and arrest the rotation. I find myself oversteering in 2wd and totally spinning out a lot so I'd love to hear your thoughts on the best way to get better at this both as a beginner and then as a more advanced driver as well. I'm assuming for a beginner the answer is simply, make sure you're going slow enough so the car doesn't oversteer and spin out. But... for a more aggressive style, I know in a real car especially in loose conditions you can just counter steer and fix the rotating that way but in RC it's super hard because you're just looking at the vehicle and not "feeling" what the chassis doing underneath you. So, I'm currently practicing the concept of something like "opposite lock" to correct oversteer but it's very difficult to get just right. And then maybe something like a pendulum turn or scandinavian flick to get a 2wd to do 180 turns just for fun. Anyway, sorry for the long comment but just wondering on what your advice would be, thank you so much!
Or is it faster overall to simply make sure you don't enter the corner too fast to start with? I'm still pretty new to racing so trying to learn the best techniques to practice 2WD.
Catching rotating with throttle is much easier in 4wd... 2wd is much tougher to counter and use a little throttle. That's why most 2wd stuff is done on super high traction surfaces. With that being said the best thing will be to get your speed right on corner entry for minimal rotation and the ability to control the car and carry your momentum.
@@TheRacinJasonthank you so much for the reply! If you do find yourself in a corner where you’ve accidentally come in a little too fast, could you suggest the best technique to have the highest likelihood of saving it? Would it be counter steer and light throttle or no throttle at all?
@JakesRC-gm5fk if you're a little too fast hopefully there's more track to use and go wide without spinning. As far as saving there's probably still some variables... if the car gets sideways really aggressively you probably want to just counter steer and wait without throttle. At that point even a little throttle might just spin tires and spin you out. If it's not quite that aggressive you can add a little throttle, what the throttle is doing is transferring weight back to the rear of the car so it should put some grip back there to help you catch the car. That's essentially how you drive a rwd rally car or race car... one big thing with RC is how light they are and how powerful they are, so it's really easy to over do this and spin. 4wd is a different animal because the front tires help to pull the car or truck straight and you can save this stuff a lot easier
@@TheRacinJason that makes a lot of sense, thank you so much for taking the time to elaborate on that nuance about throttle and weight transfer, that really helps me make sense of what the chassis wants to do in that situation.
Nice, seems like a lot of principles that apply to making fast laps in actual race cars also apply to RC cars, it just looks like fast guys use a lot less of the track than I would in a full size car. How can I get better at recognizing when I can use less of the track?
Great question man. I think a lot of the time in RC racing you can't be as aggressive with your line choice because you're not sitting in the car. One place I might start is basically the farther away from the stand the less you may want to gamble, or depending on how well you can see a corner can dictate that as well. Personally I'm a big promoter of using as much of the track as you can if there's is speed and time to be gained... with that in mind RC tracks are super wide compared to the car so it may be a long way to the outside of the track, so you have to look at it in a case by case basis. Another factor if you're running Offroad is looking at where the surface is swept off you may not want to go out in the marbles and lose traction... on the flip side if the inside is the preferred line but develops some character it might be time to go the long way and carry your speed because the car isn't getting upset by the rough stuff. Hope that answered your question... another thing you might do to study it is watch the pros. Go look at the dirt nitro challenge broadcast last year. See if you can find really early heats in the week and look at the lines, then go watch Ryan Maifield in the Nitro buggy main. You'll see some way different lines
Definitley... the big difference is going to be you don't have control or the front tires so you can't use brakes as effectively to create weight transfer. And hand in hand with that is you don't have the front tires pulling so when you're trying to stop the rotation the gas input isn't as helpful, and can actually spin the car out if you don't have a bunch of traction. I typically only run 2wd indoor on high bite stuff so if you have tons of traction that's gonna help catch that rotation. You will typically drive a 2wd more like a road car, smoother lines, not sliding into corners or rotating too aggressively.
Dude! these are great! Im definitely going to poach your teaching to try to explain to my kids. we are starting dirt this summer, coming from carpet and turf. We had our first race this weekend and man there is a lot to learn for the kids. Me and my son (9yo) are running ebuggy, and my daughter 12yo is running a SCT AE pro4. We had a blast but have a ton to learn!
Welcome! Dirt is the best, but you gotta learn how to drive without crazy traction. Taking advantage of straight lines can be really helpful, that's where all 4 tires are working for you to accelerate and slow down if needed.
@asproductions6400 good setup will definitely make driving easier. Gotta have a good baseline and a good consistent car for sure, but gotta be able to make the best of it if your setup is off too... sometimes I'll practice on worn out tires so I've gotta finesse the car a bit more. Good practice.
@@TheRacinJason you should make a video discussing how to set up cars it would be very helpful for the rc community such as things like camber and suspension and weight distribution because those are the variables to make a car corner properly
I was faster with a broken piston. Than finding the issue and running with too much pack and high cst Driving is skill, I've been sandbaged from lack of help since I started.
![Go Faster on Rough and Bumpy R/C Tracks [Beginner Tutorial with Ryan Lutz of LutzRC]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/w0prm2AEQpY/mqdefault.jpg)
![Go Faster on Rough and Bumpy R/C Tracks [Beginner Tutorial with Ryan Lutz of LutzRC]](/img/tr.png)
Watch this video about jumping techniques as well if you want to be a better RC driver! th-cam.com/video/mplbecDkOfo/w-d-xo.html
Man! You really take the time to answer the questions thoroughly.
Haha I’m the green one!! I appreciate the little bit of love even though it may not have been the best la😆👌🏾
Hey Jason, I'm glad I found your channel since I'm a Seattle local and transitioning from full scale vehicles to 1/8 buggy racing. One area that I have difficulty with is braking as it relates to cornering in RC. Braking in full-scale cars played such a big role in cornering because of the weight transfer to the front tires. But with a trigger on a RC car, it's obviously different. Do you like to dial in some drag-brake to aid corner entry? Or just lift and "coast into the turn" then gas out? Thanks.
Hey Ron! Where will you be racing? Most of the time I'm lifting to let the car slow at the right time, maybe use understeer or a little brake to rotate the car to get to the right speed. On high speed straights into tight 180's you definitely have to use the brake and slow the car and if you and the car to rotate you can keep a little brake to keep the weight transfer up on the front tires.
I avoid drake brake because it makes the car dive in the air. Some people like it and of course it's dependent on the car, in a 2wd car it might not make it nose dive nearly as much because only 2 tires are slowing.
What did you race before?
Great advice! Can you provide a link to the baseball cap? Love it!
beachrc.com/hats/ but it appears to be out of stock. Maybe I should make a racin Jason version!
Fantastic video! Something I've been thinking about a lot is how to "catch the car" at the right time as you say and arrest the rotation. I find myself oversteering in 2wd and totally spinning out a lot so I'd love to hear your thoughts on the best way to get better at this both as a beginner and then as a more advanced driver as well. I'm assuming for a beginner the answer is simply, make sure you're going slow enough so the car doesn't oversteer and spin out. But... for a more aggressive style, I know in a real car especially in loose conditions you can just counter steer and fix the rotating that way but in RC it's super hard because you're just looking at the vehicle and not "feeling" what the chassis doing underneath you. So, I'm currently practicing the concept of something like "opposite lock" to correct oversteer but it's very difficult to get just right. And then maybe something like a pendulum turn or scandinavian flick to get a 2wd to do 180 turns just for fun. Anyway, sorry for the long comment but just wondering on what your advice would be, thank you so much!
Or is it faster overall to simply make sure you don't enter the corner too fast to start with? I'm still pretty new to racing so trying to learn the best techniques to practice 2WD.
Catching rotating with throttle is much easier in 4wd... 2wd is much tougher to counter and use a little throttle. That's why most 2wd stuff is done on super high traction surfaces. With that being said the best thing will be to get your speed right on corner entry for minimal rotation and the ability to control the car and carry your momentum.
@@TheRacinJasonthank you so much for the reply! If you do find yourself in a corner where you’ve accidentally come in a little too fast, could you suggest the best technique to have the highest likelihood of saving it? Would it be counter steer and light throttle or no throttle at all?
@JakesRC-gm5fk if you're a little too fast hopefully there's more track to use and go wide without spinning. As far as saving there's probably still some variables... if the car gets sideways really aggressively you probably want to just counter steer and wait without throttle. At that point even a little throttle might just spin tires and spin you out. If it's not quite that aggressive you can add a little throttle, what the throttle is doing is transferring weight back to the rear of the car so it should put some grip back there to help you catch the car. That's essentially how you drive a rwd rally car or race car... one big thing with RC is how light they are and how powerful they are, so it's really easy to over do this and spin. 4wd is a different animal because the front tires help to pull the car or truck straight and you can save this stuff a lot easier
@@TheRacinJason that makes a lot of sense, thank you so much for taking the time to elaborate on that nuance about throttle and weight transfer, that really helps me make sense of what the chassis wants to do in that situation.
Nice, seems like a lot of principles that apply to making fast laps in actual race cars also apply to RC cars, it just looks like fast guys use a lot less of the track than I would in a full size car. How can I get better at recognizing when I can use less of the track?
Great question man. I think a lot of the time in RC racing you can't be as aggressive with your line choice because you're not sitting in the car. One place I might start is basically the farther away from the stand the less you may want to gamble, or depending on how well you can see a corner can dictate that as well.
Personally I'm a big promoter of using as much of the track as you can if there's is speed and time to be gained... with that in mind RC tracks are super wide compared to the car so it may be a long way to the outside of the track, so you have to look at it in a case by case basis.
Another factor if you're running Offroad is looking at where the surface is swept off you may not want to go out in the marbles and lose traction... on the flip side if the inside is the preferred line but develops some character it might be time to go the long way and carry your speed because the car isn't getting upset by the rough stuff.
Hope that answered your question... another thing you might do to study it is watch the pros. Go look at the dirt nitro challenge broadcast last year. See if you can find really early heats in the week and look at the lines, then go watch Ryan Maifield in the Nitro buggy main. You'll see some way different lines
Hi Jason! Where is this track?
The filming of the audio is all at my house... the race track is up in Burlington, WA
This is top knowledge.. dam. Basics but clear
All the tracks are fenced-in and don't have key to get in use it... could i go to my local sports field and bring a ramp and practice jumping??
Definitely! Find some sort of small hill to land on too
thanks for the tips! this helps a lot. Just getting into Buggy and truggy racing, so all this helps.
No problem! Where are you racing
Do these techniques hold true for a 2WD car as well?
Definitley... the big difference is going to be you don't have control or the front tires so you can't use brakes as effectively to create weight transfer. And hand in hand with that is you don't have the front tires pulling so when you're trying to stop the rotation the gas input isn't as helpful, and can actually spin the car out if you don't have a bunch of traction. I typically only run 2wd indoor on high bite stuff so if you have tons of traction that's gonna help catch that rotation. You will typically drive a 2wd more like a road car, smoother lines, not sliding into corners or rotating too aggressively.
@@TheRacinJason Thank you for the quick reply.
Any time!
Dude! these are great! Im definitely going to poach your teaching to try to explain to my kids. we are starting dirt this summer, coming from carpet and turf. We had our first race this weekend and man there is a lot to learn for the kids. Me and my son (9yo) are running ebuggy, and my daughter 12yo is running a SCT AE pro4. We had a blast but have a ton to learn!
Welcome! Dirt is the best, but you gotta learn how to drive without crazy traction. Taking advantage of straight lines can be really helpful, that's where all 4 tires are working for you to accelerate and slow down if needed.
Nice video!! I think a thing of 2 thanks
That was brilliant for a novice like me Jas… sub for sure! 👍
You must follow the lines and be smooooooooooooooooth
oversteer = dry dirt no blue groove.. got it
Car is only as good as the driver and set up
Lot of times the car is better than the driver... and the other way around sometimes
@@TheRacinJason oh for sure but before you master the driving you gotta master the set up
@asproductions6400 good setup will definitely make driving easier. Gotta have a good baseline and a good consistent car for sure, but gotta be able to make the best of it if your setup is off too... sometimes I'll practice on worn out tires so I've gotta finesse the car a bit more. Good practice.
@@TheRacinJason you should make a video discussing how to set up cars it would be very helpful for the rc community such as things like camber and suspension and weight distribution because those are the variables to make a car corner properly
I was faster with a broken piston. Than finding the issue and running with too much pack and high cst
Driving is skill, I've been sandbaged from lack of help since I started.