Setting up a drift gyro without hating the gyro

A gyro in an RC drift car is a steering assistant. It senses rotation in yaw and adds corrective steering input faster than your thumb can. Set correctly it makes a twitchy car drivable. Set wrong it makes every car feel like it is on ice.

What gain does

Gain is how much corrective input the gyro applies per degree of rotation it detects. High gain = more correction = a car that feels planted but lazy to initiate. Low gain = less correction = a car that is agile but prone to spinning.

Direction

Set the gyro so that when you rotate the car nose-left, the gyro counter-steers the wheels to the right. If it steers into the slide, flip the direction switch. Every gyro has one; most have it on top.

Remote dial

If your transmitter has a rotary dial you can assign to a channel, assign it to the gyro gain. You will want to reduce gain for tight sections and increase it for fast runs. Driving with a remote dial is a skill in itself and is where the good drivers separate from the rest.

A starting-point recipe

Mid-range gyro, gain at 40%, direction correct, steering endpoint at 100%, transmitter steering EPA at 100%. Drive for ten minutes. Then move the gain dial up or down until the car stops either over-rotating or understeering in the middle of a corner.