The Land Rover Defender V8 Has Drift Mode
The 2021 Land Rover Defender can ford rivers, climb mountains, and launch itself into the sky. But it can't really drift. The soft suspension and tall design make it a little too roll-happy, necessitating an always-active stability control system that'll cut power if you're overcooking it. Now that the company is offering a 518-hp supercharged V-8 in the Defender, though, engineers knew loose-surface sliding had to be on the menu.
Land Rover's answer is a new "Dynamic" mode for the car's terrain response system. That drive mode stiffens the dampers, sharpens throttle response, and holds gears longer. More importantly, though, it changes the behavior of the car's stability and yaw control systems. The stability control setting allows more slip angle without intervention, standard behavior in sport-focused driving modes. The yaw control is the more fascinating part: It actively encourages slides.
Tying together the Defender V8's brake-based torque-vectoring, adaptive suspension, and electronic rear differential, the yaw control will soften the dampers as you attempt to slide in order to encourage a more predictable transition from the car's natural slight understeer to on-power oversteer. As you slide, it will shuffle power distribution with the e-diff and use its torque-vectoring capability to nip individual brakes in order to slowly increase rotation. Traction control will also intervene to keep power delivery smooth, preventing you from overpowering the tires and launching into a full spin. As you exit the corner and unwind the wheel, yaw control will stiffen the suspension, lock up the differential, and use the brakes to pull you back straight.
All of this should make drifting the Defender easy on paved roads and effortlessly simple on loose surfaces. Plus, the Defender V8's stability control will be fully defeatable, a first for the model. Roll stabilization stays on always, but its threshold for intervention is far higher when stability control is disabled. Basically, unless you're actually sticking a wheel in the air or cornering beyond 1g—a figure you're unlikely to achieve in an SUV on street tires—the system will let you have fun unencumbered.
"And what that means is that in Dynamic mode with the stability control off, you can effectively do anything you want to do with the V8. It's almost impossible to trigger the remaining roll stability control calibration," Land Rover chassis and motion control systems senior manager Adam Southgate told Road & Track.
We like the sound of that.
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