Swedish skid device crosses the Atlantic
By: Dan Keegan
Date: 1993-06-09
This article originally appeared in Volume 3, Number 2 of Driver/Education, in June 1993.
This Swedish device that can turn any car into a skid classroom and any parking lot into a skid pan must be used properly, says North American distributor Dane Pitarresi.
In Dane Pitarresi's view, the Swedish "Skid Car" device is a technology that can overcome many drivers' aversion to being out of control in a powerful automobile. Its main appeal for Pitarresi, a race car driver and owner of a performance driving school in Portland, Oregon, is the fact that it can produce a full range of real skid experiences, in a real car, but at speeds as low as 10 to 15 mph (16 to 24 kph).
Pitaressi was one of the first to import the device to North America and now is the North American distributor for the Cedergrens brothers, who invented the device several years ago in Sweden. It was the realism of the skid experiences it provided that caught his imagination.
"It's not a simulator," he says, "it's the real thing." Drivers are in a real car and they get themselves into trouble by the way they handle it. What gives it such a huge advantage for training, he feels, is the fact that skid exercises can be carried out at very low speeds. So, not only is the device safe for student drivers, it doesn't need much space, and it completely eliminates the need for specially prepared areas or the use of chemicals to reduce friction. Any reasonably smooth paved area will do.
Basically, the device is a metal frame with castor wheels at four corners. It can be attached to any car (versions are available for trucks also) with a minimum of adaptation. Then, as the car is driven around, it takes the frame with it and the castor wheels just follow the movement.
The feature of the device that provides the skid practice capability is a hydraulic system that operates from a pump carried in the trunk of the car. The system shifts the weight of the car to the frame and the castoring wheels, leaving the wheels of the car with less grip on the road surface. The weight can be shifted to such an extent that the wheels of the car are just barely touching the pavement, and that simulates the kind of friction conditions that would exist on black ice.
The device is an attention-grabber wherever it operates, and Pitarresi has a bunch of television video clips and newspaper clippings to prove it. It's also gained a considerable degree of support in Pitaressi's home state of Oregon, where local government, department of education and police agencies have sent employees to take instruction at his Portland International Raceway-based school.
In 1991, Toyota decided to support a pilot program which brought the Skid Car to hundreds of students in Portland public schools. Toyota is also supporting a follow-up study to determine the effects of the Skid Car experience on the students' driving records. Using three Toyota Camrys equipped with Skid Car, a total of 600 students will get skid instruction as part of their driver education. So far, 300 have completed the program and the Oregon Department of Motor Vehicles is analyzing the results.
A transit agency is also conducting a study, says Pitarresi. They've sent about 150 newly-hired drivers to the Skid Car program and are also trying it on an advanced program they provide for their experienced drivers. "We don't have hard numbers yet," he says, but results look good. Results of the study should be available later this year.
The Skid Car package is currently priced at $29, 950 U.S. This includes the frame, with all ancillary equipment, installation of the equipment on the car of your choice and four full days of training for the instructor who will use it. Pitarresi feels strongly about the importance of the training part. "I don't feel comfortable with everyday driver training companies using this thing," he says. "You can scare people with speed and poor tactics."
The truth of this statement was borne out by this writer's bizarre experience in the Skid Car in Ireland last year. On an oval go-cart track near Dublin, the instructor, who admitted to having no special training with the device, started off a two-hour, $125 U.S. program with high-traction skids on dry pavement that created violent lateral forces that could have been dangerous.
Instruction was quite bizarre also, including an exotic mix of techniques that were, at best, of doubtful value. They included, at one stage, a skid recovery technique that consisted of pumping the clutch (yes, the clutch!) and "nudging" the steering wheel to bring the car back on track. (This technique is unknown to any of the skid control experts this writer questioned about it).
Pitarresi's approach to teaching collision avoidance and skid recovery is simple. His program is low speed and skills-based, concentrating on how drivers use their eyes.
"We take a proactive stance," he says. "We've thrown 'defensive' and 'reaction' in response right out of our vocabulary ... when you respond to react to something that's happened to you, you're already behind. You have to use your eyes. The sooner you see or acknowledge a potential problem, the less you have to do as a driver."
Further information about the Skid Car can be obtained from http://www.skidcar.com.
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