I have an RC18T that I've been drifting (well, trying to drift would be more accurate). I taped up some road tires with elec tape and I can get a few good figure 8's every now and then, but more often than not, I just spin out. I figured it would be a decent platform to 'try' drifting given that it's 4WD and I didn't have to buy anything.

Do any of you guys drift a 18th scale car? I have adapters to use 1/10 touring car wheels so I may try some homemade ABS tires and see if I do any better than w/the elec tape. Is elec tape an accurate representation of real drift tires or ABS tires? Again, I do more spinning out than anything else.

I keep thinking of picking up a TC3 (always available used) or building up a TT01 but wonder if I just need more practice...not a new car. Or maybe just some different drift tires instead of the elec tape. I usually drift on regular asphault pavement or when it's open, I have access to perfectly smooth outdoor b-ball & tennis courts at the local playground. It's on that surface that I have the best success with decent throttle control and don't spin out as much. It's that outdoor smooth, rubber-ish painted on surface.

I'm gonna drift my Xray NT18 at some point, just for a laugh. It's a NITRO 1/18th touring car, so should be awesome. Unfortunately I have a race next weekend, and I just got the car dialed, so I'm not going to be messing with it at the moment. I think because it is such a wide flat pplatform, with the weight spread evenly across the whole chassis, it will be an awesome drifter...I haven't decided what I'm going to use for tyres yet though, does anyone actually make micro drift tyres, I won't be sticking random bits of pipe plastic on my Xray, I'm afraid... Here's a pic anyway... sorry about the crummy mobile pics, note the pack of cigarettes behind the car, and the pic next to the BEAST! lol! You can also see my XB8 in that second pic!! If anyone's curious, it develops power comparable to a micro mamba brushless 5400kv and a 2 cell li-po.

ohhhh... im savage is on e.bay as we speak...lol

got far to many cars, my baja is my latest purchase and i dont even have time for it...lol

like the x-ray though, quality build throughout!!

Physics change from scale to scale. Hence the variation in drive wheel platforms between 1:1 and 1:10. However, if you really want to ahve some substance in your drift, I'd go 1:10 scale. It's shown to be the easiest scale to drift (accurately) with. That's not to say you can't drift in some other scale. However, it's supposed to be a fun sport, not an aggrivating one.

I know 1/10th drift better than micros, they have the most efficient power to weight, but I'm not a drifter dude, I'm a track racer. I'm all about grip. I'm only going to drift the micro nitro for a laugh, because it's a little nitro, and it's different. By the way, physics don't change no matter what the scale. The contact surfaces change, and the friction between them. 1:1 tyres generate more heat, the surface is smoother in terms of scale for a 1:1 car, and they have a LOT more scale horsepower and the ability to deliver it more smoothly, a 400hp drift car would be a 1/10th scale motor worth 40HP!!!! That's why you guys use plastic tyres, cos you don't have enough power to lose traction with any other material. There are many variables, but physics is not one of them. Also, if you put RC scale 1/10th wheels on a 1:1 it would look one of those hot wheels big wheelers. In any case, I know my physics, and I'll be a monkeys uncle if that little nitro doesn't drift beautifully. I'm not trying to start an argument, I understand what you meant and I don't disagree, I'm just trying to clarify it so nobody has the idea that the physics are in fact different. They are the same throughout the universe, from an atomic level up to jumbo jets.

Foxy42

I hear what you're saying and...not to start an argument, but your scales are backwards. A 400hp motor 1:1 would be a 4000hp motor 1:10. Just like a 30mph 1:10 scale car would be going 300mph at 1:1 scale.
To clear something else up, plastic is cheaper. That's why we use it. Yokomo, HPI, Speedway Pal, and others make rubber drift tires. However, like 1:1 tires, they don't last more than a few runs and they cost 4 or 5 times as much as ABS/PVC material. With a 23t motor or lower (19t, 16t, 15t, etc...), you can EASILY drift on rubber. And that's not including a brushless setup (which a lot of people are running). Many nitro powered cars will drift rubber in stock trim. The RS4 comes to mind.
Also, surfaces are often the same as 1:1. I drift on concrete 1:1. I'm sure you can guess what I drift on 1:10 scale. I also drift on carpet, but most of my time is spent carving tarmac.
You are correct about standard height wheels on an rc in relation to 1:1 (which is why it confuses me that you'd get the rest backwards). They'd be dubs (20inches or better depending on actual height.). If thats' what you meant by big wheelers, then, yeah, they'd be big.
Also, the reason you need 4wd in 1:10th scale is because the physical properties of the 1:10 scale car differ from the physical properties of a 1:1 car. And, as explained above, since our motors are pushing out 10x's that of a 1:1 motor of equal caliber, you can not simply "slide" a car. There has to be a guiding and a use of traction to keep it from just overpowering into a spin. Think backwards to further understand that. Think of how hard it is to drift an AWD car with say...400hp or so. Sure, you can get some slides in, but that horsepower can not compensate for the amount of traction that you get from 4 drive wheels. Well, on a 1:10 scale car with 4000hp, you NEED 4 drive wheels in order to control a manuever such as a drift. Otherwise, you'd have 4000hp to the rear wheels and you'd just spin out. That's coincedentaly (or not so much so) why many touring car chassis (that are built for competition) are 4wd. It'd be difficult to turn with RWD.
The common misconception is that there's no grip (traction) involved in 1:10 scale drifting, when, in actuallity, that grip is what allows it to happen.
Now, my understanding is that the verb form of the word physics, as in the physics of ..... refers to the science of matter and energy and of interactions between the two. I also understood it to mean the physical properties of said object. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't there a difference between the physical properties of a 1:1 car and the physical properties of a 1:10 scale car? To my knowledge, there is. There is definately a difference of matter and energy use and the interaction between the two must be different if, for no other reason than the sheer size difference of the two objects. At least that's MY understanding. I might be rusty from my physics classes in college, but under that definition and understanding, there is a difference in physics.

You said you don't want to start a disagreement and neither do i, but you've got some things so wrong, I can't let it go...see my responses below...

Look, I don't think we actually disagree much, I just think you've made a little mistake in calculating scale power. You must realise now you read it back saying that a 1:1 of 400hp is equivalent to a 1/10th with 4000hp...think about it as a power to weight ratio, lets say a 1:1 drifter weighs 1500k and has 400hp (hp per kilo = 400/1500= 0.26HP per kilo). Lets say you then have a 1/10th car that weighs 1.5k and has 4000hp (hp per kilo 4000\1.5=2666hp per kilo!!!!!). To be scale they should have the same power to weight, ie 0.26hp per kilo. Now as it happens an RC car has a better power to weight ratio than this, but the tyres are a LOT wider, and the gear ratios totally different, which is why nitros have like 1.5hp tops and brushless, well, it's hard to quantify...but never more than 3hp.

Lastly, material of drift tyres has absolutely nothing to do with cost. If the best drift tyres were made of bridgestone F1 racing rubber, and cost $50 a set, you all would still buy them. It's the traction issue. I know some cars can drift on SOME TYPES of rubber tyres (these yokomo rubber drift tyres are still 'slidy', they have absolutely no relationship with the rubber on 1:1 drifters). I used to drift my old pile of poo thunder tiger ts4n nitro, without meaning too! As it had enough power to break traction with these crap rubber tyres I had on it (and they were suppsed to be racing slicks. lol!), but with a specifically designed drift tyre from HPI or Yokomo, they are designed to be the right grip (or non grip) so that the very weak motors we have (in scale terms), can easily break traction. Try drifting with foamies if you think that your RC has enough power to break traction. Then put the stickiest grippiest tyre you can find on a 1:1 with 400 hp. You will still be able to drift due to the extreme power. This further demonstrates what I say about physics being the same, take two tyres of the same size, the same material, on the same surface attached to cars with the same power to weight ratio, and you will get the same result, regardless of scale. Take a very powerful 2hp motor, mutliply it by 10 to get 1:1 scale. You got 20hp, congratulations. Think a 1:1 with 20hp could break traction on racing rubber? No, of course not.

Are we cool?
I hope we understand each other now...

I tried to ruin a good discussion by throwing in some facts - that was not nice of me. Therefore I have edited them out

But of course - as a maritime engineer I do not have the slightest cue about scale modelling

Okay. to keep this short and sweet, the physical properties of a 1:1 car and a 1:10 car are in no way the same. A 1:10 car is not an exact scale model of a 1:1 car. It's not shrunken down. It's simply relative in size. I'm not saying that physics actually change. I'm saying they aren't the same to begin with. HENCE, the physics of a 1:10 car and 1:1 car are not the same and we have to do different things. I clearly underthought my first statement. So, we're clear, again, the physics aren't the same.
moving on...

Tires: Smoke is irrelevant. Smoke is apparent in shows and in shows only. It takes an immense amount of speed and power to create it and an average drifter has niether when entering a corner. Really. A 1:1 car can't drift on foam. And, because you don't drift, I'm assuming you have no idea how much power it takes to break tires free for an extended amount of time. You will not drift on grippy tires. Bottom line. Unless you're driving a gutted AE86 with a 1jzett swap to the tune of about 500+hp, you're not breaking free on grip tires. Also, "drift" tires for 1:1 ARE specially made. They're not your average everday all weather tires. And, even for the amateur drifter, we don't drift on new tires cuz it takes waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa aay too much effort. Maybe you should drift before you speak on what it takes to do so.

Cost: cost has everything to do with the materials we use. Who wants to spend 70bux on 4 tires that last for a couple of hours when you can spend 5 bux on tires that last for months. Again, maybe if you did drift, you wouldn't say such things.

Now, let me clear up some simple drift misconceptions that you have. I drift, so I'm talking from experience and not watching it from afar.
1) Front tires do loose grip. For quite some time. If they did not, the car would just pivot.
2) Front wheels are pointed in towards corner entry and out towards exit, regardless of scale. Now, to achieve more angle, the wheels may turn in more, again, regardless of scale. To straighten the car out, you will turn away. Regardless of scale. Doing this repeatedly while drifting is call correction. You loose points for that.

Physics aside, your biggest mistake is that you DON'T DRIFT. hence, everything you said, albeit incorrect, is mere heresay. It's not based on anything. A stock Evo won't drift because it takes an IMMENSE amount of power to drift using 4 drive wheels. There arent' any awd drifters. Any Skyline GTR, WRX or Evo that you see has been converted to RWD because, even with 400+hp it's very hard to break free using 4 DRIVE WHEELS. And the reason we use 4drive wheels in rc is because it's hard to control (next to impossible) a drift with that much power shifted to only 2 drive wheels.

If you think about it, it doesn't even make sense that we wouldn't have enough power to drift with rubber, but we use 4 drive wheels to drift. I think you should really rethink your argument.

edit: I retracted a statement that I made about co-signers because I can't say whether or not you know Captain Firearms. So, I don't want to start any personal attacks.

That being said, Captain, what you said is true in a linear relationship and in a linear relationship only. Your statement is to assume that, again, a 1:10 scale rc car is simply a 10th scale regular car and it is not. It's really irrelevant to this argument and is slightly confusing. Not saying YOU''RE irrelevant, but your point is.

You totally misunderstand what I'm trying to say, and have cleverly avoiding tackling the points I actually called you out on. This has got **** all to do with drifting, we're talking about physics and scale. Forget it. It's too tiring trying to explain this stuff. As for your cheeky comments like 'watching from afar' and all that, you don't know me.

At this point we're talking about different things...I'm not interested in how much money you spend/save on tyres...

My only points were...that an RC car has much less scale power, which is why extremely hard rubber tires are used (much harder than 1:1 drift tyres) or plastic, so that you can break traction with 4wd, I know the 1:1 drifters don't use road rubber and I know they don't use 4wd cars for drifting (well, sometimes). I think you are basically saying the same thing here, so we are in agreement...point 2: physics don't change due to scale, they are mathematical constants (this can't be argued). And lastly 3: that RC drifting technique is different from 1:1 drifting technique, due to the difference in the amount of friction a tiny tyre can get from asphalt compared to hoogin 1:1 tyre, not because the actual physical properties of the material change just cos your car is smaller.

The rest of this stuff about drifting, like you say that the front wheels on a 1:1 drift more than I said they do...fine, that's not what I'm talking about, I'm sure you do know more about drifting than me, but perhaps less about physics and how scales are related.

Can we at least agree that to take a mathematical constant (such as speed/acceleration/friction) from a rough 1/10th scale up to 1:1 scale that we are simply multiplying by ten, not dividing in the case of horsepower for instance, as you wrote above. I think Captain Firearms is applying dimensional factors (length/height/width) when he talks about 3d, which does not apply to mathematical constants, as it does to volume (size).

At least we agree about Cap's post! Lets be friends, we are talking aboutdifferent things, and the more this progresses, the more we seem to agree ont he fundamentals...the only disagreement we had was in how scale horsepower is calculated and the reason for the use of hard tyres...I think we DO understand each other, I certainly think I understand what you are saying, and I respect your experience as an actual drifter.

I was going to address each and every point you called me out on, but that would've taken forever. However, I will do it if you'd like. the multiplication vs division thing: 30 REAL mph that an rc car travels would be 300mph if that same car were 1:1 scale. You misunderstood my point. However, going up, you mulitply, down, you divide. We are not disagreeing. We are misunderstanding.

I made no "cheeky comments". You SAID you don't drift. That's it.

I didnt' say physics change between scale. I said they're not the same to begin with. THEY'RE NOT. I'm not arguing something different. I'm saying that the physics are not the same. Nothing changes. Nothing is the same to begin with.

Okay. Under your rc power logic, it would be easier to drift a rwd rc because you have to get LESS tires to slide. That being said, what you are saying about tires does not make sense. If we have to have slick tires to slide 4 wheels, we should be able to do better with 2. However, this is not the case. Reason being, rc cars are grossly overpowered when it comes to power/weight ratio. A rc car may have 4hp. To scale, that's 40hp. Now, you can't drift a full size car if it only has 40hp. But, it's not because of the hp that it won't drift. It's because that 40hp has to move FAR MORE WEIGHT. So, that 40hp will not do nearly as much on a 3000lb car as the 4hp (four horses) will do on a car that wieghs 4lbs. The amount of horse power is only relevant in relation to the weight of what that horsepower is moving. That's...nevermind.


We will just agree to disagree on this.

Again, I'm not trying to get your goat, so to say. But, yeah. no love lost.

I've given it a lot of thought since this started, and though I have plenty to say to what you just posted, I concede that some of what I say may be wrong, it's all conjecture, neither of us are actually physicists to do the math based on footprints of the cars, torque at different rev ranges etc, material of the tyres, surfaces, etc. etc. The truth is probably that we both have it half right, some of what you say is right, some of what I say is right. I'll agree to disagree on some points and concede that you may be right on some points, as I hope you do to me.

agreed.

Good man!

I still bet the micro nitro drifts sweetly [>:], I just haven't found anything suitable to use for micro drift tyres, don't suppose you have any suggestions do you?? I don't really want to put ABS/poly as I don't really want that extreme 'on-ice' drifting. Someone posted a vid recently of HPI drift tyres on a 1.10th, and it looked really positive, you know what I mean? Grippy yet slidy... Is there anything available for the micro like those?

Might try electrical tape at first, but would like something that will stay on for more than half a lap!!

Elec tape is about all. I think they have some drift compound tires for micros but I'm not sure. I know Radio shack had something for their little mini-gizmos, but I don't know how far that extends.

Elec tape is all I can think.

Well I drift both 1/10 and 1/18th. In my opinion I like better 1/10th scale, you could drift 1/10th in a lot of more surfaces. In contrast with my micro rs4 i need a really smootr surface without liitle rocks or pebbles. But they are both equally fun, I just think the 1/10th is more capable and easier to drift.

here is a Pic of my micro

Nice ride dude,

all about the science[:'(] and stuff man!!!!!!

The abs tires will of course give you more slip, thats what you want in rc drifting little to no traction. the problem is with the rc18t is it has a very short chassis foot pattern, and its more wide so you spin out alot. if you really want to drift with your 1/18 convert to a 18r

I'll just jump in to comment on scale power and weight.
A 1/10th scale has 1/1000th of the volume of a 1/1 scale (10^3 since they are 3d objects) and likewise, if it were to have the same density, it would have 1/1000th of the weight of a 1/1 car. A 3lbs 1/10 rc car would weight 3000lbs if build up to 1/1 scale.
Likewise for power. A 600hp 1/1 car would only need to have 0.6hp in its 1/10 form to have the same power/scale and power/weight ratio.

Hmmmmmm. Well, given that the average Formula D car has around 400hp, that means, to scale, the car would only need 0.4hp to achieve similar results. That's interesting. You know, that's an average of less than HALF a horsepower. So, what you're saying is if a 1:10 scale RC car had....say....2-3hp, which is 5 times or more what it needs, it would not only have sufficient hp, but would be, relatively GROSSLY overpowered in its scale relation? Wouldn't it, therefore, make sense that you would need all 4 wheels to be functional in order to control it? I mean, that SOUNDS correct. And, it really does make sense. Maybe I really WAS right.

Careful Flyojumper - I tried to tell the hotheads exactly the same, but I was dismissed as irrelevant. But of course you are right. When looking at scales you always have to consider the number of dimensions involved.

And I will say it again so even Neon_guy can understand it: A scale model is NOT and can never be a true scale model in every sense whether we talk about scale rc models or simple scale models. You can not scale materials. That is very simple.

Whatever. I know we can't do an exact scale. As I said before, an RC isn't a shrunken version of a full size car. The only thing REMOTELY to scale IS the size. And why are you getting all huffy and sensitive. Noone else took anything personally and me and Foxy went DIRECTLY at each other. How were we supposed to know you were a Maritime Engineer. Not that really means anything cuz I've never heard of it. I will give you points for the "engineer" part of your title though. HOOOOOOOOOOOOOWEVER, there is some bit of relativity. Regardless of all that, we need to stay focused on the main point. I was right. I mean, when it comes down to it, what else counts?

Furthermore, the hp/weight relation would be FAR better on an RC because the parts aren't scaled. So, it still proves my point either way you slice it. And in the end, that's what really matters. And I also said your point sounded confusing. Flyojumper types better in non-engineer terms.

This was what made me huffy and sensitive

But most of all, I got angry at myself because I couldn't get my message through. I am not used to discuss these things in english with non-engineering people.

The funny thing is that I think we agree when it comes to rc vs. real-scale, we just express it from two very different angles.

yeah. we do agree. I mean, I didn't mean it to come off as a personal attack. Sorry about that. No hard feelings.