Tuned Smart Car goes drifting in Japan

Smart cars are not typically used for drifting. They are small economic vehicles that satisfy your typical green requirements; quiet, small, good gas mileage, and trendy. The drifting Smart car used below is loud, eats gas, features a wide body kit, and is very trendy amongst performance minded individuals. This Smart car has been fitted with the 1300cc Suzuki Hayabusa engine swap. The Smart car is the ideal vehicle for the motorcycle engine swap thanks to it's factory rear wheel drive and trunk that can be converted into an engine bay.


Some Smart car swaps place the engine directly over the rear axle similar to a mid engine style, while others place it in the passenger seat similar to a rear wheel drive longitudinal setup. For drifting, the best setup is placing the engine directly over the rear axle for optimal balance. This emulates the factory style setup but with a much larger engine, taking advantage of OEM implied balancing.

Drifting a stock Smart car is possible but it is very hard and not as entertaining as drifting the Hayabusa swapped version. The wide body kit is used to provide the needed stability of driving sideways, as well as a larger tire surface area to help induce the drift. Other modifications of this vehicle include racing seats, some weight reduction, upgraded rims and tires, and a performance steering wheel. These are typical upgrades you can find on any drifting vehicle but applied to the Smart car chassis. Drifting a Smart car looks like great fun, enjoy the following footage.

Video content: Smart car drifting

Related articles:

• The perfect drift
• Toyota Speedway drifting with YouDrift.net
• Honda S2000 touge setup
• Toyota FT-86 review and test drive
• Mazda Miata MX-5 Nurburgring
• 150 mph golf cart

Source: Tampa Sports Car Examiner