Trucks: Underrated Drift Missiles

05 Apr 2016

The general requirements for a drift car are RWD and manual. Most people drift BMW coupes or a Nissan S Chassis, but perhaps people should look into RWD trucks. Here are some reasons a truck makes a great drift mobile.

ONE Most driftworthy trucks on the market are cheap.
Look on Craigslist and you can find a Datsun mini truck for 2 grand or even cheaper. You can even find other full sized trucks for the same price. Drift cars WILL be thrashed so you might as well get a cheap one.

TWO Trucks for sale in many places aren’t hard to find
A lot of us, even those who live outside of the USA see trucks out on the road on a daily basis. Compared with S13’s or an E36 coupe they’re a dime a dozen. The internet is full of drift ready trucks that are waiting for your purchase, from sea to shining sea.

THREE Ideal weight distribution.
When I say ideal weight distribution, I mean for drifting. Drifting is all about breaking the traction of the rear wheels and RWD trucks have a lot of their weight over the front axle, which means drifting is easier. One other benefit is that there’s less snap oversteer compared to a rear engined car or a 50/50 car. This can help drifting noobs crash less, so they can spend more time drifting.

FOUR Trucks are durable
Many of the vehicles that reach 200,000 miles or more on the odometer are trucks, not sports cars. Trucks have to deal with towing and hauling while sports cars are pampered in comparison. Using that knowledge, it can be assumed that a truck would last longer as a drift car compared to a Miata. Don’t discount trucks just yet, they may have some use to them.

This content was originally posted by a Car Throttle user on our Community platform and was not commissioned or created by the CT editorial team.

Comments

Coming from experience, if you want to drift a truck, do it in the dirt if not you’ll flip. And trucks do not have an ideal weight distribution. There is always more weight up front and no weight in the back. I flipped my first truck because i tried to drift it. You can drift them, but you need to be skilled enough and be brave when doing so. They’re cheap, but it’ll take a lot of work to turn them into great drift cars. Im not saying they cant, but its more challenging and harder.

What kind of truck did you flip? A lowered rwd truck probably won’t flip

I have a volkswagen amarok is that easy to flip it if you try to drift?

I used to drift my Jeep all the time. How I didn’t roll it over once I do not know.

I drift my Jeep in snow and mud, never had any issues!

I know someone who had a drift Nissan 720.

He sold it.

We got a truck at home, a Mitsubishi L200, I always take it drifting when it snows. We got a lot of little dirt roads round the fields, so I put it in RWD mode and off we go! And if we go off the street, 4WD, difflock if needed and were out! Great fun that thing!

Utes from down under gotcha covered mate ;)

And plus it looks H E K T I K asf 😤

My friend is in the process of making his daily a drift truck. Its been lowered so low we had to remove the fenders. He is trying to find a good handbrake right now, it has a weird stock handbrake that most mechanics dont know how to use on it right now.