Doesn't really work like that in real life. Especially off-road you can stop a car much quicker by locking the wheels up, since it'll gather a pile of dirt on front of the wheels. On top of that, offroad, ABS is usually clueless as far as I've heard, yet if you can drive well, you can brake hard without locking up the brakes on dirt, which is still faster than what the ABS would do... And I *think* if you're really good you can even stop a car on tarmac quicker without abs than with abs, since even with ABS, you keep locking-then-unlocking the tires. Yet without abs, you can, again, brake it to the very limit and keep it there without ever locking the brakes up... I think that is the case because people usually turn ABS off when they go racing with a streetcar, because it's faster for a track...
Yes, that's true. I think it's called threshold braking. You apply the brakes just before the lock point, so the wheels have the maximum grip.
I'm sorry but I'm gonna have to bust this myth ABS never ever allow full lock. As the matter of fact, it works thanks to distinct point on friction coefficient/wheel slip curve where the FC suddenly stops raising. It causes quick change in wheel deceleration etc. The point is that ABS keeps wheel slip oscillating around peak FC and does it so well and independently for each wheel that no human can beat it on paved surface. You know, without ABS even for a godlike driver every little bump, weight transfer or surface change means either lock or deficient braking torque. It is true ABS can't recognize and utilize FC raise near 100% WS on loose surface, though. One more detail, when I was playing RBR I learned to intentionally lock wheels when I lost control and didn't want my car to change the direction it was moving. Saved my a*s many times, including IRL on an icy road Little advantage of not having ABS.
ABS keeps the wheels from locking up( locking up takes tread off tires and shortens the life of the brakes).
But offroading there isn't such friction to wear the thread, and he was saying that on tarmac you threshold brake.
I'm well aware that ABS is there to stop the wheels from locking up... However, you're wrong if you think ABS is there to save your tires or your brakes, because it isn't, at all. It's there to save your life, since the braking distance is much longer when the wheels are locked up. @Gouranga: Alright, I wasn't sure about being able to stop faster without ABS on tarmac. What is the deal with trackday drivers wanting to turn ABS off then on a track? I remember Top Gear used to get all pissed when they couldn't turn ABS off... If ABS has no disadvantages on tarmac, surely you'd never want to turn it off? Also, Wikipedia seems to say that it is possible for an experienced driver to improve braking distance without ABS on paved tarmac, although it would be difficult...? Either way, my main point was that it's not simply a case of "A car without abs will be hard to stop", because it isn't that simple... In fact, I found it much more difficult to steer-while-braking in a car with ABS on a skid-pad, than when my own car nearly slid into a lamppost on an icy road last winter. If I had ABS, I would've never stopped in time, and the wheels had so little traction that I couldn't steer at all anyway(even after slowly steering into the turn, which I learned on the skid-pad, it still went dead straight). Locking up the brakes actually made me realise I could steer it using the handbrake, so I let the back end come passed and basically slid it through the turn.
Some of you are correct and some of you are dead wrong. lol. While ABS will usually stop a car faster on a paved surface then a car without ABS. that is not what abs was intended for. the point of stopping the tires from totally locking up is to keep the car tracking in a strait line and the driver in control of the steering. As for the D15 with abs on just the rear. a typical truck from that area would have a speed sensor on both front wheels and one in the tail housing of the transmission for the rear. So both front tires would have independent ABS and the rear tires would have one single abs. I'm an ASE certified mechanic and work on/ diagnose things like this on a daily basis.
In a perfect world, with perfectly designed and executed ABS, yeah, there's no way a human could do better. However, most of the vehicles we all drive on the road today have a very crap abs system. I removed it in the last 2 cars I've had, because it sucks. ABS sensors fail, dirt can cause issues with the sensors reading the trigger wheels, wires can get damaged, and it adds more weight. Plus, most factory ABS systems on cars makes it damn hard to trail-brake into a corner. From what I've experienced anyways....
This couldn't be further from the truth.. Modern ABS systems along with yaw sensors and other computers are used to avoid everything from roll overs to oversteer and understeer conditions. Some cars can even monitor how fast you remove your foot from the gas and pre pressurize the break system before your foot even touches the breaks. decreasing stopping times in a panic situation and possibly saving your life or the life of someone your about to run down.
Every time I see a video of people crashing on Icy road curves, I shout in my head "Drift thru it you idiot, Drift!!" From my very limited knowledge about cars & that I read/seen (I think I've seen it in Nat Geo one time) about this fact somewhere, I can agree.
Some of you are wrong, some of you are right. Just watch this video, it explains a lot. Anyway, it'd be great if we're allowed to turn ABS on/off so we can see the diffrence that it makes.
Cool, I wasn't talking about "some" cars, I'm talking the majority of cars everyone drives. Not everyone can afford 40k+ dollar Lexus' or Bimmers.
I can't speak for all car manufactures as i work for Volvo. We have had some of that tech on our cars since the late 90s. While a new volvo could easily cost 40k if you package it that way. theres no shortage of $2500 wagons out there.
