difference between FWD and RWD

[ChrisA]

Because all I own are Z cars and I live in Nebraska!!

Actually I have a 240SX also and it is very good in the snow and ice. I bought a set of Bridgestone Blizzak tires for it for winter. Very grippy.

FWIW

Chris

[dwinthrup]

i think it ones preference between the to rwd is fun as hell but bites in the winter unless you have a lot of experience. i like rwd cause its fun i have owned more rwd's than fwd's but i hate the fight of steering fwd on accel.

owned for first to last

1984 ford tempo fwd

1986 ford tuarus 4cyl fwd

1989 mercury cougar 3.8 rwd

1978 cutlass supreme 283 rwd

1998 chevy s-10 2wd

1977 cutlass supreme 350 rwd

i love rwd fun piece of a pain in the a$$ but i think it is better for conering with practice and i don't have the steering wheel pull of fwd

[Bruce Palmer]

One of the best evaluations about the shortcomings of FWD looked at it this way. FWD requires the front 2 corners the carry the majority of the vehicle weight, do the majority of the braking, put the power to the ground, AND do the steering while the back 2 corners keep the back of the vehicle from dragging on the ground.

They are also finding that in bulding performance vehicles, FWD can only handle so much power without being evil to drive. All the new high performance cars are going back to RWD.

FWD cars are cheap to build and really fool bad drivers into thinking they have something going in the way of control. The buying public really got this FWD concept stuck in their ear big time.

[Zrush]

Didn't alot of the US automakers start using the FWD in the 80's? My husband had an 85 (?) Olds Frienza "The Beater" that was FWD. I always though they did this to economize the cars. The engine was sideways, no drive shaft so no loss of power (what power) to the front wheels. Are todays FWD cars simular to this set up?

Vicky

[Inf]

...no drive shaft so no loss of power (what power) to the front wheels...

Vicky

Now I don't know about that. An FWD vehicle isn't going to differ in that regard to a RWD setup. I see no reason other than friction in the u-joints (that wouldn't even be that significant anyway when compared to similar frictions found between moving parts in a FWD drivetrain) that power would be dissipated in a RWD setup more than an FWD if each were setup properly.

The main reason I have heard for the FWD trend is it is just easier to manufacture, they can drop the whole drivetrain in on one assembly line step pretty much

Then of course I have heard stories of people losing a connecting rod bolt in an FWD motor pushing a lot of power and have it shoot through the block and have fragments come through the firewall, right into the passenger cabin. This wouldn't be an issue with a standard RWD setup like in the Z

[mperdue]

Hello everyone! I'd like to preface this post with a big 'shout-out' and thanks to the illustrious admin of this beloved site, without whom this discussion wouldn't even be possible. I think we should each take a few moments each day to turn our thoughts to the guy behind the curtain as they say, the one who makes it happen, the MAN WITH THE PLAN - of course I'm referring to Mike - the PHP wizard of classiczcars.com. Again thanks Mike for making this all happen for us members and the thousands of guests whose lives are geared up a notch each time they visit this place that some of us may even call home.

Well there is some power used to get the driveshaft rotating. It may be negligable though, I don't really know percentages or anything. It would depend on the weight, diameter and distribution of weight in the shaft. I think there is a post somewhere where we discussed the effect of using a lighter driveshaft such as the aluminum ones offered by MSA. Lighter is better - no driveshaft at all is best.

michael