Frornt or Rear Wheel Drive?

[thebestMAX]

Ok, another car thread.

I feel rear wheel drive is superior. Never saw a serious race car with front wheel drive. What do you think???

Forget all wheel, 4 wheel drive!

 

[Vikaden]

I feel rear wheel is better also

 

[desy]

If your ever driving in snow front wheel is better and is a more fuel efficient setup. There are less mechanical problems with rear wheel a lot less.
So it kinda depends more on the environment you will be drving in.

 

[Frenchie]

FWD for safety, RWD for fun.

 

[Viper GTS]

For everyday drivers, front wheel drive.

For race/high-performance vehicles, rear wheel drive or AWD.

The reasoning behind the race cars being RWD is pretty simple. From a standing start, the engine is trying to rotate the car around it's drive axle. With a FWD car there's nothing out front keeping it from doing that. The car tends to lose traction under heavy acceleration. With RWD, you have the front wheels providing leverage holding the drive wheels to the ground. Which is why high powered cars tend to squat on their rear wheels under heavy acceleration. Which results in BETTER traction, not worse. Drag racers take this to the extreme, of course, by putting the front wheels WAY out to give a lot of leverage.

Viper GTS

 

[Robb33]

AWD

 

[yakko]

AWD.

 

[SuperGroove]

RWD

AWD won't let the tail slide out in those extremely tight turns...especially hazardous if your car understeers like mad.

FWD understeers like crazy, and it's just not fun.

RWD is where it's at...just not in the winter.

Paul

 

[4824guy]

RWD cars only for performance and racing, not for every day general road use, FWD is better suited for that.

 

[Mem]

FWD is better for bad conditions,I`ve driven both & prefer FWD to RWD.

 

[NFS4]

AWD = best of both worlds

 

[Soybomb]

<< The reasoning behind the race cars being RWD is pretty simple. From a standing start, the engine is trying to >>



I dont know if I would credit it to leverage really... When you romp on it hard to accerate forwards the weight transfers to the rear of the car
more weight= harder to spin
so if the weight leaves the front tires with less load they'll spin alot easier. Damn traction I've got 2 vehicles, one is a fwd turbo car thats a ton of fun to drive, the other is a 4wd (awd is for pansies hehe) jeep cj5. They all have their time to be fun!

 

[BiB]

Understeer is suck.

As everyone else said, rwd for fun and performance, fwd to cart the kids around in the snow

 

[Viper GTS]

Soybomb...

The reason the weight is transferred to the back wheels is due to the torque of turning the wheels. If you were to lock the front wheels on a FWD car, the car would be attempting to rotate itself towards it's back wheels.

Viper GTS

 

[Doomsday]

I prefer front wheel drive, bacause it's better at high speeds. Since I'm on the highway quite a bit, it's better for me.

 

[SuperGroove]

FWD is not better for high speeds. Most FWD cars have an uneven f/r weight distribution, usually in favor of the front end. What's left of the extremely light rear end? Sure you can put a spoiler on it to increase downforce on the rear...but that's not gonna be a valid substitute when many RWD cars have near perfect f/r weight distribution.

RWD is more stable especially when you're chuggin along at 80mph making some semi-tight turns. You don't want to overwork the front of your car, or you lose your car, assuming it's FWD.

AWD...blah...FWD, blah, RWD=fun, secure, and secure!

It's not so bad driving in a RWD car in the snow...I live in Colorado...and everyone thinks we have it bad here with snow and all...but really we only get dumped on maybe twice a year. Anyways...it ain't bad...and I drive up and down steep hills everyday.

Paul

 

[NFS4]

<< AWD...blah...FWD, blah, RWD=fun, secure, and secure! >>


Blah, you're more secure with AWD and have better traction. Why do you think that such great supercars as the Porsche 959 and 993/996 911 Turbos burn rubber through all four wheels

 

[Buddha Bart]

Understeer is not suck, it can be mad fun. I used to be able to absolutely whip my protege through a turn by understeering bad, and then when the catch they kick the back end around through the turn.

Overall, I'd like an adjustable AWD system. Where you can thow it to the rear if you need it in a corner, or split it even if you need it in dirt/snow.

RWD is a harder car to control, and frankly I beleve very few humans are up to it. Most have the ego's to try, and are lucky enough to not fvck up, but truely don't have control.

bart

 

[DABANSHEE]

Actually Supergroove, AWD is the perfect way to go for nuetral handling, you can just keep powering into the corner. Especially those cars with automatic torque bias. Such as Skyline GTRs, where by default they are set at about 65% torque at the back &amp; 35% at the front, where they are also setup to redirect torque away from whatever wheel is losing grip to the other wheels. That's one of the main reasons that the GTR dominated Group A' Touring Car racing too such as extent that FIA replaced Group A with the '2 Litre Touring Class' (such as BTCC) as the premier touring car class.

Hence virtually all the top performance car makers make such AWD drive cars (either using electronics or viscous clutches or other technics). From the original Jenson Interceptor MKIII 'FF' of the early 70's, which used a AWD setup that was initially designed for agricultural equipment to such vehicles as the Subaru WRX &amp; Porsche 959 &amp; Carrera. Even the Top Lambigini is AWD now.

I preferr RWD over FWD anyday, once one is experianced in the limitations of a car, &amp; knows what they are doing, RWD is much better at taking to the limit. RWD is also better for working on.

 

[Aquaman]

For everyday driving FWD.

for racing RWD.

I used to have a 76' Camaro (like Jim Rockford) and that baby went like stink. To bad I had to get rid of it. I really loved that car.

Cheers,
Aquaman

 

[Stallion]

I thought Rockford drove a Pontiac Firebird?

 

[bozack]

For everyday driving at my age-rear wheel drive
(even though I now have a front wheel drive car I wish I still had my rear wheel drive car again)
you get used to driving in the snow if you have to, especially if your from the northern new england area.

If I have kids then I would say either FWD or AWD

For racing I would again say RWD or AWD depending on the situations

 

[PCAddict]

If it's between RWD and FWD, I'll take RWD in a heartbeat. RWD vehicles generally ride better. Personally, 4x4 is where it's at for me.

 

[ElFenix]

i thought the 911 turbos burned through all 4 wheels because its ridiculously easy to break traction with 400hp going through two wheels of a very poorly balanced car, instead of 300 in the back 100 up front.

 

[geno]

AWD is where it's at - just look at the Skyline! =)