HICAS or not

[LaYzIeNoY]

i've never driven a 240sx with HICAS

i posted on it a little while back

I just wanted to ask you guys your opinions on it, i have heard many good and bads but not too many explainations on the reasoning

i know dirfitng its bad because it will mess with the rear wheels, do you all have any impressions on its uses in autocrossing?

do you guys know the correct speeds that it kicks in I've heard above 50mph, 40 - 60mph, and "higher speeds" ??, and lastly that it has super HICAS which is claimed to turn in one direction at lower speds and differently at higher speeds

oh ya lastly, are there any tell tale signs that its messed up without just using the light on the dash, how would it feel if you could tell me that, I might be buying a nother 240sx with HICAS why I ask

[R.W.240]

it works above 40mph IIRC

240SX Hicas is shitty compared to the Hicas on the GTR

The Point behind Hicas was to make retards feel like they are driving faster than they really are by making the rear step out.

[LaYzIeNoY]

well does it make you any faster

or are you just better off with the normal one

[Hit_N_Run-player]

id say stick with the normal one, alot of times people dont know when its active or not, plus you always have the problem of something breaking.

[slideways...]

it works above 20mph. it kind of works in stages. at low speeds, it turns the rear wheels in the opposite direction of your fronts, then quickly turns them in the same direction. at faster speeds, this initial opposite steer gets shorter and shorter, and at highway speeds or so it doesnt happen at all. there is also less of the initial steer the faster you turn the wheel no matter how fast you are going. this is a clever way of helping to reduce oversteer without increasing understeer and it works quite well, but it is the reason for the complaints of quirkiness from people who cant get used to it.



oh and to answer all the "lemme put hicas in my nonhicas car" questions, it can be done but it is SOOOO much work. there are 2 extra ps lines from the hicas pump to the hicas control valve to a rear hydraulically operated steering "rack". its not really a rack because it doesnt work on a pinion but it uses hydraulic pressure to steer the tie rods. this is an electric system in that it has an ecu that controls the hydraulic steering based on speed, steering angle, ect.

so yes its possible to swap it but too hard to be worth it at all/

[D-Bo]

i don't feel like breaking apart slideways' post so i'll tell you what i know. it works between 40 and 65mph. not at lower speeds because then that would only benefit turning radius (wow you're pulling 0.2gs at 18mpg). and it won't work at higher speeds because the ass end will completely lose itself very quickly (not to be confused with drifting, this would spin the whole car out uncontrolably).
what happens is the rear wheels are turned 1 degree the opposite way of the front wheels. the pump is told how much horizontal toe pressure is being put on the wheels and turns the wheels accordingly. if your hicas light is ON, that doesn't mean its working. that means the opposite.

i love hicas simply because i'm not a drifter. i love taking fast corners. off ramps and winding roads are my friends and i'll walk all over almost any civic/integra/whatnot because of the combination of hicas/new suspension. i'll have to tell you that a 240 with any aftermarket suspension will outcorner a montecarlo ss because i've done it. and my suspension is by no means anything special. even without the suspension, a hicas 240 pulls a higher g force than the ss on a pad. if you're not gonna drift then find something with hicas cause its a hell of a lot of fun.

add: test drive one with hicas (take it hard around a turn at about 50mph) and compare it to a non hicas 240. just don't let the placebo effect change your perception

[240SXSlideStar]

How can the rear wheels turn in the same direction as the fronts? The car woul dend up going sideways.... They only turn in the opposite direction.

[slideways...]

i took all this from a textbook from my tech school. it fully explains honda, nissan, and toyota's 4WS systems. (mitsu's VR4 is almost the same as HICAS)

[D-Bo]

you may have missed something. the rear wheels turn the opposite way of the front
think about it

/ /
/ /

or

/ /
\ \

which one will turn the car better?

(obviously the wheels don't turn at that kind of angle, but you get the idea)

[Hit_N_Run-player]

Originally Posted by D-Bo

/ /
/ /

or

/ /
\ \

which one will turn the car better?

The first would make for some trippy high speed drifts.lol.

[slideways...]

i didnt miss anything
they had diagrams and everything
im just taking all this info from there

[slideways...]

[relix_oner]

Fuck HICAS up it's ass... It weighs a shit ton

[-The Stig-]

Originally Posted by relix_oner

Fuck HICAS up it's ass... It weighs a shit ton

Thanks for that highly intelligent post. I feel that my IQ has actually gone backwards with it.

[LaYzIeNoY]

what he described up there with the wheels steering the same then different happens in the GTR, but after looking around on the internet doesn't on the 240sx i think


its because the GTR has a newer more refined system then the one on the 240sx

i have heard of three models HICAS, HICAS II, and Super HICAS

the GTR has the newest Super HICAS and supposedly I hear that the 240sx only has the HICAS II

i'm going to test drive the car still, but i think that i might just stick with getting a normal SE fastback again