Sounds of the ESP Kicking In

[Ronzuki]

get on some hard pack snow, or ice, on a slight up-hill in awd and mash the pedal.....you'll get all kinds of interesting noises and things going on. For yucks, throw some steering input into it then....

(disclaimer: test to be conducted by a professional driver on a closed course)

[SamirD]

Yes, AWD (see sig line)

Yep, saw it after I posted!

[SamirD]

It snowed over the weekend here and I was able to get the Kizzy a bit squirrelly under acceleration (AWD mode). The TCS rarely kicked in which is a bit worrying. I need to experiment some more to become more familiar with the car's limitations. It's "safe" to say the stock tires are crap

With stock tires, the system is useless. Our first foray into snow almost had us hitting a curb at the first turn of the steering wheel. We barely had any grip, and the safety systems didn't even come on. There's a good thread on an owner that crashed their car twice in the same day because the systems didn't come on like you might have expected.

With good snow tires, it comes alive and does it's job. But it seems like if the car detects no traction it's like, "eh, you're going to crash anyways--why bother?" :O

[SamirD]

Mine is AWD...and it is possible I just haven't pushed it enough in the snow to make it kick in to that extent.

Do you have snow tires? You'll need some grip to get it to kick in.

[bootymac]

It snowed over the weekend here and I was able to get the Kizzy a bit squirrelly under acceleration (AWD mode). The TCS rarely kicked in which is a bit worrying. I need to experiment some more to become more familiar with the car's limitations. It's "safe" to say the stock tires are crap

With stock tires, the system is useless. Our first foray into snow almost had us hitting a curb at the first turn of the steering wheel. We barely had any grip, and the safety systems didn't even come on. There's a good thread on an owner that crashed their car twice in the same day because the systems didn't come on like you might have expected.

With good snow tires, it comes alive and does it's job. But it seems like if the car detects no traction it's like, "eh, you're going to crash anyways--why bother?" :O

Wow, that makes no sense to me... Poorly coded system perhaps?

[SamirD]

It snowed over the weekend here and I was able to get the Kizzy a bit squirrelly under acceleration (AWD mode). The TCS rarely kicked in which is a bit worrying. I need to experiment some more to become more familiar with the car's limitations. It's "safe" to say the stock tires are crap

With stock tires, the system is useless. Our first foray into snow almost had us hitting a curb at the first turn of the steering wheel. We barely had any grip, and the safety systems didn't even come on. There's a good thread on an owner that crashed their car twice in the same day because the systems didn't come on like you might have expected.

With good snow tires, it comes alive and does it's job. But it seems like if the car detects no traction it's like, "eh, you're going to crash anyways--why bother?" :O

Wow, that makes no sense to me... Poorly coded system perhaps?

I dunno why it acts that way. It's like it has so little grip that it doesn't even try. But once you have a good set of tires (and tpms active), it's pretty solid.

[~tc~]

If it has so little grip, there is nothing to "sense" - i think you will find all cars suffer this limitation. Proper tires are key.

[Woodie]

What is it that you wanted the car to do when "it had no grip".

[murcod]

If it has so little grip, there is nothing to "sense" - i think you will find all cars suffer this limitation. Proper tires are key.

Perhaps the ESP can sense that situation?

The ESP system has individual wheel speed sensors, steering angle sensor, yaw and G sensors. Rapidly increasing wheel speed and no corresponding G sensor input should pick that situation.

What the software does with that info is another matter!

[Ronzuki]

You really have to be downright aggressive, almost abusive, with your driving for it to work to the point you're going to notice it attempting to help overcome said stupid driving in most cases. Just simply driving in a normal, or even slightly aggressive, fashion doesn't really yield much driver feed-back. I'm talking about really throwing the car around. That's the type of car this is... a hard driver's machine. I'm fortunate to live in an area where there are places and times I can have fun with it, throw it around and experience the wonders of the tech in this car (as opposed to the old 60s and 70s RWD jalopies that had nothing). Of course you're going to need some place 'safe' to test this out.