Help me out here if you can. On asphalt, the braking on my X is flawless.

But I rallycross the car and on dirt they seem terrible. If I use anything more than moderate pedal pressure, I get a rock hard pedal and the braking distance goes on forever. Almost like I have no brakes. I can reproduce this in any of the three ACD modes and with or without ASC. The car is a bone stock MR.

Some of the Evo racers I've talked to say there's such a thing as "ice-mode" which behaves like this, but it doesn't usually misbehave on unmodified cars.

Or is this just the ABS at work? If so I'm REALLY not impressed. BTW, another forum member rallycrosses his X and hasn't seen the problem. But his is a GSR. We live across country from each other so can't really compare the cars directly.

I'm open to additional tests, or other ideas. Thanx, Bill

 

Do you have rally cross tires? I can reproduce the same symptom with summer tires on snowy roads.

 

Gravel roads, same thing here (GSR) with street tires. The other guy is likely able to modulate the power a bit more...

What ASC mode are you in? That seems to make a difference with the ABS kicking in (if at all).

And what FLK said, what tires are you on?

 

Well there really aren't rallycross or rally tires in 18" sizes. I first noticed the behavior with the original Advans, but now am running BFG g-Force all seasons. Still not very aggresive. Braking behavior on dirt was identical.

I'm not familiar yet with all the ASC modes, but I do know the car performs very poorly with ASC on. I use a simple touch on the button to turn the ASC off. I guess I'd get something else if I held the button down, but haven't tried that yet.

I've tested many times, but only competed once. The car is prettymuch superior to anything else out there and won by a large margin. But I did have an "off" the first time I discovered the brake problem. Fortunately I didn't hit anything and was able to recover. I now have a mini test track in the desert that's just fast enough to bring on this "failure mode". And it includes a run-off zone for when I can't make the corner at the end of the straight. It gets used a lot.

BTW, I run a different series than my counterpart. He's allowed to use snow tires in stock class and runs Blizzak run-flats. I however am required to use "street tires". So my tires probably slip a lot more in hard braking than his.

 

holding the asc button will turn traction control all the way off. You'll be on your own.

You might try a skinnier tire (like on snow, a skinny tire helps cut in and get grip). The blizzaks will offer about 900 times more rip in snow and dirt than street tires.

 

As opposed to what? In vehicle performance terms, what's the difference between ASC off and traction control off? And does any of this effect braking, if so how exactly?

 

1 second push = Power cut turned off

5 second push = Power cut and braking assist turned off

Autocrossing without power cut was absolutely necessary to be able to drive the car through slower turns, turning off the brake assist had mixxed results depending on what you are trying to do. Running the car on the road course at Watkins Glen seemed fine with just the power cut turned off, the brake assist seemed to assist with turn in when I had my hands full entering a turn a little hot.

 

As HiBoost explained, one quick press turns off the power cut used for traction control. The long press turns off the braking component of the AYC system. There is a lot of misunderstanding of this and a lot of guys seem to turn this off under the theory that all of the electronics are bad and that they are smarter than the computer. I have done extensive testing with all combinations and for me handicapping the AYC by turning off its ability to use the brakes to set the slip angle was both slower and a lot less controllable.

 

I agree with both JWA and Hiboost... for me having the brake control off is a LOT harder to be fast at an autocross and on the track.

However, OP is asking about at the Rallycross, which I don't think many of us can relate much to My gravel road excursions are pretty weak compared to a dirt track!

 

I can... I'm the other RallyCross guy that WAM was referring to.

 

I said many

You have any vids? I'd love to see the X in the dirt!

 

While I haven't been running this car as long as JWA, gutting the AYC seems the last thing I'd want to do. I'm guessing that's what makes the car a competent rallycrosser.

I just did a comparison braking test of my two cars. The other is a modified-class early Rabbit. On the same exact piece of dirt road, it stopped in nearly half the distance from 40mph, first try. That's compared to the best of maybe ten Evo tests trying everything I could think of to get better stopping. Granted, the rabbit weighs half the Evo and is running rally tires...but still. This thing ought to come with an anchor as standard equipment.

 

its the tires man...

 

Gonna find out. I have a set of Blizzaks mounted up and ready to test. Problem is can't run California stock class with them. But if the difference is huge, maybe I'll just run the car (stock) in Modified where I can use snows.

 

And the answer is...Nope. Only minor improvement with the Blizzaks. This thing is just never going to be a braking star on dirt. Too bad, it does everything else so well.

Can't say yet if mine is uniquely bad or if I'd find them all this way. Maybe another X will show up at an event and we can do a comparison. If it is a problem on my car, don't know what I can do about it. It's fine on the street -- I can't see a dealer coming to my rescue.