I've had my 02 ap1 with 40k miles on it for a month now. I've driven it a total of about 500 miles in this month and they've been great miles ... except tonight.

My car humbled me. completely. I've driven a lot of cars from FWD to RWD to AWD from 80 hp diesels to 350hp audis. This is the first time in my life that i've completely lost control of a car while moving in a straight line.

Before tonight I'd never floored my car in 1st gear. Story goes something like this I'm at a redlight in the left lane of a 3 lane street and do not launch ... i get up to 3 or 4k and floor it. I shift at 8500 rpm from 1 to 2 and my rear slides out to the left and i tried to countersteer so as to not do a 180 and face traffic and i slide right across two lanes of traffic at the next intersection and onto the cross street. So all the way from the left lane across two lanes and now it's as if i've made a right turn at the next intersection. Problem is i went straight over the curb with what I think was my passenger's side front and rear tire. I park the car on the side of the road after pulling over and do a 360. No broken body panels, no shredded tire, not even a MARK on the tires from where i jumped the curb and slammed down on the other side. Nothing to show for the near catastrophe. I don't have low ramps yet (i plan on getting them tomorrow) so I haven't been able to check out the underbelly of the car. It drove perfectly after this, doesn't pull, the wheels don't have a scuff mark on them. I'm completely floored. It's as if it didn't happen, what do you guys suggest I do to make sure everything is ok? I made a couple of pulls in 2nd and 3rd gear and everything sounded and felt fine.

Anyhow, I don't want it to happen EVER again. Am I missing something about the s2k? I've never ever lost the rear like that in a straight line, i'm almost afraid to drive my car into vtec now. I'm still freaked out.

 

What do your tires look like, wear-wise? Also, were they cold?

 

The thing about rwd is the rear wheels are always trying to get out front. What tires do you have, what widths, was it cold out, wet, debris on the road, manhole cover, etc...

A hard 1-2 shift can break traction, which is what sounds like started your spin. You should shift smoother if you don't know the road conditions - esp at night in the city.

 

[QUOTE=TB,Jan 6 2008, 07:55 PM] What do your tires look like, wear-wise?

 

so you bought the car used at somewhere around 38K miles?
usually this is not a concern on many vehicles but did you have an alignment done on it?

from your story it sounds like the tail got loose when you shifted to 2nd and over corrected.
the S is known to be tail happy for some people.

 

I bought it with 40,500 on it and now it has 41,000 i've driven it for about 500 miles. i have not had it aligned because it drove very straight, but the previous owner told me he had the front wheels adjusted for more camber than spec for better handling. I was going to realign it in the summer once i got new tires (do you think camber can do this?) that doesn't make sense to me.

I did shift very quickly between the gears and not smoothly ... a lot like how you shift driving down the drag strip ... perhaps that was a bit overzealous of me ... but i was going ... in ... a ... straight ... line. i'm still shakin' in my boots.

 

should be a wiggle if tire pressure even for both rear tires when shifting 1-2. uneven rear tire pressure might have caused the left slide. what kind of tires?

 

will check that, thanks for the input! Two weeks ago it was 34 psi in the left and 34 psi in the right.

edit - on the topic of things i should check that may have been damaged ... miraculously my front bumper doesn't have a scratch on it ... i'm worried that i may have messed something up that I can not visualize.

 

Too cold. If you were to look at some graphs showing tire traction as it relates to temperature you would see that traction falls off dramatically outside the ideal operating temps of the tire compound.

More front camber is good thing on this car unless you always drive straight. The only reason there isn't more from the factory is 1) braking distance and 2) tire wear. The front camber had nothing to do with your accident though.

 

Never WOT 1st to 2nd your asking for it lol but in the warm weather it's ok to. The winter is not the best time to drive the S unless the conditions are nice.