THE TRIBE

This is the bit right here for the power users of MOTOR. See, most think you win a year’s free subscription for penning Letter of the Month. Not so. You get 12 free editions of the world’s most exciting performance car magazine for directing a story about your worst in-car dining experience to the email address up there. Get to it!

- 

STABLE MANNERS

Hi, I’m having a bit of difficulty figuring out something technical (not a first for me). While I understand the basic principle of how electronic stability control works, namely that it can brake individual wheels to apply a yawing effect, what I can’t quite get my head round is how this happens while the car is braking?

Nine times out of 10, surely you’d lose control of the car while on the picks, so does anyone there know how this black magic works? Many thanks! Allan Boniface, via Email

Great question, Allan and I think it’d be one that would stump even those who purported to know a thing or two about vehicle dynamics. Remember that stability control isn’t just about braking. It also incorporates steering and engine torque into its arsenal of available strategies. Part of the ESC architecture is a brake boost controller that can instantly bring braking force up to and down from threshold, something that human drivers can’t do. So even under braking, the ESC usually has some operating window in which to activate the outside front brake in the event of oversteer or the inside rear brake during an understeer moment. - Ed

ONE TRACK MIND

Hi, great work on the Track Guides in the magazine. I’d been waiting for someone to publish something like this for the longest time. Just wondering what the plans are for the series and whether you would consider branching out into international circuits too? Callum Harris , via Email