Adjustable power distribution, despite what Ford may want you to think, is far from a new technology. For those unaware, the new Ford Focus RS has a driving mode called "Drift" mode. According to Ford engineers, Drift Mode channels up to 70 percent of the vehicles power to the rear wheels and 100 percent of that power, then, to either wheel. This gives the AWD vehicle a rear wheel, possibly one wheel bias, thus making it easier to "drift", although anyone with a true FR layout car will argue that point to a great extent.
The adjustable power bias everyone is making so much hype over, is perhaps most notably seen in another sedan associated with hooning and tuning (hey, I rhymed!) the infamous Subaru WRX STI. The car featured an adjustable center differential whose trickery was excellently summed up in an article from 2005 by Car and Drivers, Larry Webster. While comparing the then current Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution and Subaru WRX STI, Webster wrote "65 percent of the engine power is routed to the rear wheels, with the remaining 35 to the front (a 35/65 front-to-rear split). The car's engine computer adjusts that center-diff clutch, based on information from the yaw-rate and throttle-position sensors, and can send as much as 50 percent of the engine torque to the front wheels. So the Subaru varies the torque split between 50/50 and 35/65. The driver can also manually select the torque split via a center-console switch."
That last part is the key takeaway from the summary. The driver, through a switch in the console (pictured below) could manually split the torque up to 65 percent to the rear. Sound familiar? The power adjustment levels are almost identical to that of the new RS. Anyone who has had the chance to really push their STI, could likely tell you how you could use this bias to essentially make it "drift", although again, that is really not the correct term. In essence it is just a rear-biased, 4 wheel power slide, but that's neither here nor there.
So, regardless of what type of slide you want to call it, their really is no innovation to be found in what is really just a marketing gimmick designed to draw in Millennials and the tuner crowd. Multiple YouTube reviewers have already began to break down this Drift Mode and note how it doesn't really work as advertised, and essentially, is just a gimmick to use once in an abandoned parking lot and then forget about.
On an interesting side note, despite Ford saying they organically came up with the idea, has anyone else made the connection between Subaru, Ford, and Ken Block? Just saying.
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