I have ASR on my 1.8T Octavia estate, and I find that on a certain roundabout, if I give the car a tiny bit too much power, I can very easily get the front wheels to slide out, and last night I swear that all 4 wheels drifted and the car went slightly sideways for a second, until I let off the power a touch.

In a straight line, if I give the car a lot of power in 2nd or 3rd, then I feel the ASR come on, light flashes, and you can feel the power going on and off on both the front left and right wheels. Feels a bit wonky but you can feel it working.

My question is: should ASR be preventing me sliding the wheels out on a greasy roundabout? I don't think I even see the light come on when I do this.

Many thanks,

B

ASR reduces wheel spin not understeer.

ASR controls wheel spin - you are describing a sideways movement which will not be responded too.

it will kick in if you apply power when the fronts slide away into understeer... well mine does anyway cause the fronts spin up and it cuts in... makes the whole thing feel very uneasy though and the ASR makes the understeer unpredictable.

Ok, sounds about right. I guess it's the more advanced EPC/EBD (?) type of control that would be preferable to ASR then.

I wasn't sure if ASR was a braking distribution system or just a non-spin thing. Seems the latter.

Thanks,

B

Ok' date=' sounds about right. I guess it's the more advanced EPC/EBD (?) type of control that would be preferable to ASR then.

I wasn't sure if ASR was a braking distribution system or just a non-spin thing. Seems the latter.

Thanks,

B[/quote']

Yeah it's just a no spin thing - ESP does the braking distribution.

I turn mine off as soon as I start the car as it makes the handling more unpredictable.

I'm new to the ASR on the Octavia, but my previous car had ESP.

ESP was fairly non-intrusive, albeit conservative. I've noticed a bit of front-end 'chatter' when turning sharply on wet roads -I assume that this is the ASR acting. If so, then it has a fairly coarse control effect.

i assumed that ASR was a lower end version of ESP

i have a courtesy car with ESP (55plate golf) at the moment and i find it much better behaved than my octy vRS

adam

Don't forget what it says in the manual (or the brochure), ESP/ASR and ABS cannot change the rules of physics. If you try to turn a corner/roundabout too fast or stop in too short a distance, you will lose grip and go sideways or hit the bloke in front (respectively) despite all the juddering and electronics. I learnt the stopping thing in the summer on a dry day on that light brown grippy stuff they paint at roundabouts, etc. Thought ABS could save me, but couldn't. Still, didn't cause any damage to either party other than frayed nerves so a good learning experience.