Help driving skippy

['Palestinian orphan]

Hey, i'm brand new to the skippy but have done some races with it so far but having heaps of trouble learning how to keep the car on the road. Some demo driving on my twitch archive. Some tips would be nice, seems like this thing is prone to locking wheels and oversteer

http://www.twitch.tv/bombdigidy1

[Langowski]

Heres where your mistake is your new to the car and your just jumping into races. When i first started in the Skippy and thats all I drive now, I spent about 2 weeks and well over 5000 laps just practicing and learning how the car drove. After watching some of your twitch you should spend alot more time just in practice then races.

[harryorlsen]

skip barber going faster

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQRmYMlmdqM

['Palestinian orphan]

Haha thanks, for your feed back. I know I should spend more time in practice but I've spent a lot of time reading the stickies on the iracing forum. It doesn't really feel like it helped so I've just been doing trial and error of different techniques to see if something clicks. Thanks for your input.

Don't know if you guys have read it but if you have is the book Going Faster by the skip barber school worth it. I've only read ultimate speed and I do constantly refer to it. Not the best racer or fastest driver but willing to learn, just dont know where to start.

[harryorlsen]

Start slow & clean ;D

+ Find your correct FOV is important too. Here a tut and more infos: http://www.edracing.com/edr/FOV.php

Also a nice page with lot of Infos: http://thesimpit.com/en/Driving-School

BUT mainly after being confy behind ur wheel: just drive m8 ;D and have fun.

[LithiumFox]

FOV will super help in becoming consistent

Also I just did a spontaneous race at that track. Super fun. Almost won from starting 11th :D

[Business Logic]

Watching your videos I'm noticing your pedal inputs are too abrupt. The Ultimate Speed Secrets says right in there: "The throttle is not an on/off switch". Try and be smoother getting on and off the throttle as well as the brakes. Watching your Twitch videos you mentioned you have only been driving the Skippy for a day, believe me you're doing better than I did when I started. :-P

The Skippy is a school car for a reason: The only thing you can change in the setup is Front Brake Bias, Tire Pressures, Front Spring-Perch-Offsets, Fuel, and Rear anti-roll bar. That's it. You have no control over springs and wing angle. So you have to drive it correctly.

One skill you MUST learn when driving the Skippy as well as any other car is maintaining a slip angle when cornering, and to do that you have to be able to manage the car's weight transfer from front to back, hence being smoother with your pedal and steering wheel inputs. Take a look here: http://farnorthracing.com/autocross_secrets22.html - http://farnorthracing.com/images/alignment_slipangle.jpg . If your finding yourself oversteering when you shouldn't and the rear of the car seems to have a mind of its own, this is why. As you trail brake into a corner and slowly release the brakes, the rear of the car will begin to kick out a tiny bit and the car will rotate and establish a slip angle (in the Skippy its about 6-8 degrees). Your job is to maintain this angle as you navigate the turns towards the apex as the car will actually turn and corner better. As you pass the apex, squeeze the throttle back on and unwind the wheel, and the car rotation will slowly return to normal. If you get it right, Ultimate Speed Secrets refers to this as the tires "taking a set".

This may sound simple, but it's not. It's not only the slip angle you have to hold, but it's how fast the car rotates towards establishing the slip angle. If you come off the brakes too abruptly when trail braking, the car will rotate waaayy too fast and you'll go into a full spin, especially if you add too much gas before the apex. I saw that happen a lot in Turn 3 in your video. If you hit the gas too hard coming out of a turn after the apex, you'll throw too much weight to the rear too fast, the car will return to normal too quickly and you'll understeer right off the course. I saw that happen a few times at Turn 2 and Turn 5.

Try this on the Centripetal Circuit in a Solo Test session and see for yourself. :)

['Palestinian orphan]

Thanks for the feedback, a lot of good info to take in. Been practicing easing on and off the brake and throttle while steering. Starting to feel more comfortable with it. The skippy is definitely trying its best to make me unlearn some bad habits.

[MrMagius]

I've been having problems driving in the skippy as well, from what I've gathered it's all just about practice. Finding the fastest racing line which allows the best entry and exit over corners is the biggest and most important part. Once you think you've found the proper racing line then it becomes all about consistency, hitting that line every corner every lap. The setup is also important, thankfully there isn't too much you can do to tune the skippy but making small adjustments here and there can really help out your ride. It's tough to get into but it just takes time to master, as does every other vehicle.