ESP?

wesley · 2 Apr 2006 at 12:11

hi guys

a friend of mine is looking at brand new Fiesta ST at the moment, he asked me if its worth to pay extra £625 (i think) for ESP

i dont know anything about ESP, what do they do? how do they work? is it worth to pay £625 on top of Fiesta ST?

cheers

Mic · 2 Apr 2006 at 12:14

.........it would help seeing the future all right. Good price too

What a horrible addition to this thread

PMKeates · 2 Apr 2006 at 12:16

ESP is short for Electronic Stability Program. It's an advanced stability control system for the car that integrates with the ABS and standard traction control systems, adding at least yaw management. It's a very good and capable system that will help a driver keep control of the car in adverse conditions and where under or oversteering.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Stability_Control

http://www.euroncap.com/content/safety_ratings/recommendation.php

The EuroNCAP website has videos to demonstrate the effects. If you click "See Stability Control in action" and then open the larger of the red Audi's videos, you will see and hear a demonstration. While the BMW video also demonstrates the effectiveness of ESP, it does so on a rear wheel drive car. As the Fiesta ST is front wheel drive, the Audi is a better indication.

Hope that helps

masterk · 2 Apr 2006 at 12:16

Ouch £625! I suppose ESP must be ok, its kept me alive up until now :eek:

Dangerous · 2 Apr 2006 at 12:17

I'd say yes it helped me totalling my car on the ring

rpstewart · 2 Apr 2006 at 12:19

wesley said:
hi guys

a friend of mine is looking at brand new Fiesta ST at the moment, he asked me if its worth to pay extra £625 (i think) for ESP

i dont know anything about ESP, what do they do? how do they work? is it worth to pay £625 on top of Fiesta ST?

cheers

If you turn it off you can't tell what your passengers are thinking

No seriously it's traction control - Electronic Stability Program - it'll mess with the ABS and possibly the throttle to *attempt* to sort out any traction related issues. Attempt is the important word there - it can't change the laws of physics (Jim

).

Whether it's worth it is another question. On my Mk4 Golf I think I set it off about 3 times, all coming out of junctions with loose stuff under the wheels.

Firestar_3x · 2 Apr 2006 at 12:22

rpstewart said:
Whether it's worth it is another question. On my Mk4 Golf I think I set it off about 3 times, all coming out of junctions with loose stuff under the wheels.

Thats just traction control not ESP.

If the car gets into a sideways skid ESP will apply the brakes on various wheels to bring the car back into line and stop it spinning, tiff did a great review using an X type on an icy lake.

wesley · 2 Apr 2006 at 12:25

whoa fab replies

will email the url of this thread to my friend

thank you

wesley · 2 Apr 2006 at 12:29

one more question

is Fiesta ST a good car? i think Tiff said its only 1 second slower then Focus RS on track in 5th gear ages ago. correct?

PMKeates · 2 Apr 2006 at 12:48

I wouldn't have thought so, unless the track was very short!

panthro · 2 Apr 2006 at 16:21

I wouldnt pay £625 for ESP. In fact I can live without it quite easily. I dont know about others, but imo you can find your cars limit much easier without ESP.

Firestar_3x · 2 Apr 2006 at 16:21

PMKeates said:
I wouldn't have thought so, unless the track was very short!

Its true, it was only one second a lap slower, might have been less but its a twisty track if it had more straights then the RS would build more of a lead.

cymatty · 2 Apr 2006 at 16:23

Firestar_3x said:
Its true, it was only one second a lap slower, might have been less but its a twisty track if it had more straights then the RS would build more of a lead.

Isn't the lap like 50seconds long or something, so not much chanvce on a twisty track to make use of all the extra power.

Firestar_3x · 2 Apr 2006 at 16:26

cymatty said:
Isn't the lap like 50seconds long or something, so not much chanvce on a twisty track to make use of all the extra power.

Yea something like that, not really a fair all round test tbh, amost looks like a go-kart track its that tight.

Demon · 2 Apr 2006 at 18:01

ESP is a damn good idea, and defo worth having.. Autoexpress did a bit of an article on the lack of awareness of ESP, and they where saying a lot of lives would be saved if all cars had it fitted as standard..

Depending on the Manufacturer, it's abilities and intervention vary..

I've thrown my Zafira around with ESP, and purposefully thrown it sideways to see when/how it intervenes, and it seems spot on, it doesn't intervene until the car really lets go, but it is quick, and smooth.

But you should never rely on it.. the problem I suppose is knowing it will help to sort out impending doom may make people push their cars to the limit more often with some possible false sense of security, it can only sort out a slide if their is road left to sort it out on, and no oncoming cars in the way!!!

You can usually turn it 'off' although in my case, it will still catch large slides, in mine it'll goto about 20 degrees or so before catching it, so some fun could be had in the right car (The Zafira is not a car most people would want to 'chuck' about)..

Amps · 2 Apr 2006 at 21:07

When i got my 307 XSI (2.0L with ESP) i really didn’t like it but you get used to it and now that i am its great.

In some situations it really does wonder but sometimes it can be a bit of a pain.

For instance if its wet and you give it a quick left turn to pull off a round about you’ll feel it really kick in and the light will flash like mad even if you have your foot flat on the floor you’ll get no power until you have straightened the wheel.

In some conditions the light wont turn off if you are really pushing it in the wet even when you aren’t touching the throttle.

When its coming on in the dry when turning you know your pushing to hard

I would get ESP again.

On my car you cant turn it off.

NickXX · 2 Apr 2006 at 21:23

ESP/DSC is a vital tool that should be fitted to all new cars.

As an inexperienced driver, it has on many occasions saved my ****, particularly in the wet. In all cases of it kicking in, it has reacted quicker than me at correcting a mistake and has done so with the minimal of fuss.

Experienced drivers who insist they don't need it are wrong. ESP/DSC will be able to perform operations which the driver cannot - such as individually braking wheels. There is absolutely no reason for why a road car should not be fitted with these driver aids other than cost.

Firestar_3x · 2 Apr 2006 at 21:28

NickXX said:
ESP/DSC is a vital tool that should be fitted to all new cars.

Its a nice tool on RWD cars in the wet, but the only reason ESP should kick in is if you have to do an emergency maneuver, if you get the system kicking in your driving technique isn't very good and you need to learn to adapt your habbits to the given road condition.

NickXX · 2 Apr 2006 at 21:42

Firestar_3x said:
Its a nice tool on RWD cars in the wet, but the only reason ESP should kick in is if you have to do an emergency maneuver, if you get the system kicking in your driving technique isn't very good and you need to learn to adapt your habbits to the given road condition.

I'll admit that my driving technique is far from perfect, which is why ESP is such an essential tool. The vast majority of drivers will be hopeless on the limits, which is why ESP is needed as a babysitter.

Freefaller · 2 Apr 2006 at 21:50

In the 6 cars I've owned I've never had ESP, only ever TC - I wouldn't exclusively ask for it, but if it came with it I would welcome it. However I don't know if I'd want to spend £625. However I guess it's only about 5% of the cost of the car if he's buying it brand new, so may well be worth it. It can be switched off at any rate if he wanted to.