Does anybody still like the F-Extreme?

I'm loving this race car at the moment. Next to the Vee it's the toughest to master, which can be frustrating.But when you hook it up it's pure satisfaction. I found a set up over on Race Department and haven't looked back.What a truly great sim AMS is,thank you Reiza.

 

Love these cars to pieces, as much as the F-Reiza and the V-12, wouldn't say they are any harder to drive once you come to terms with your setup.

 

Formula Vee is super fun. Most of my experience with it is at Londrina (non-long) and it's a blast. It's easy to get into issues during braking and entry of turn 1 but don't let the potential difficult of that corner turn you off. Very nice car-track combo

 

P.S. (to my post above - darn 5 minute edit time)

Red Bull has been famous for their higher-than-most/all-other-teams' rake-angle for quite a few years now. Since at-least sometime during the early years of the 2009-2013 era (possibly before but I'm not sure). So, no, Red Bull didn't start using a relatively high amount of rake because of the 2014 regs (massive increase in engine torque - about 4x from what I heard). Maybe it happens to help because of the 2014 cars' characteristics - sure - but Red Bull has been "famous" for this relatively high amount of rake well before 2014....well before.

 

Yes, RBR has been running high rake since 2011 or so, but not as high as it is now ... and Mclaren/force india are running a huge rake also, possibly the highest in modern f1 history. There is definetely some relationship between the regulations change and the increase in rake, my guess is that they want to run softer rears due to increased torque (around 600 Nm). Even mercedes rake which is considered "normal" is higher than what RBR was running during 2013 season.

 

McLaren snatched one of Red Bull's main aerodynamicists/engineers: Peter Prodromou; he brought ideas over from Red Bull so it's no surprise to see the McLaren now having their car designed around the high rake concept. That only leaves Force India. So I don't see a relationship. Well, yes, maybe the high rake idea works for these cars too and helps out in other ways because of the 2014+ regs but I bet McLaren would have used the Red Bull high-rake angle regardless of the new regs because Red Bull has been using it well before the new regs and, again, because they took Peter Prodromou onboard.

 

(continuation of my post above)

I thought you guys would like this:

"CHASING A HIGHER RAKE ANGLE

McLaren still runs a high rake angle on its MP4-31 with the front end much lower than the back of the car. Chief engineer Peter Prodromou thus carries on treading the path he started to walk when he was working at Red Bull. By raising the rear ride-height, aerodynamicists look to increase the diffuser’s volume, and by extension its efficiency. The thing is, the higher the diffuser gets, the more exposed it also is: turbulences – mostly coming off the rotating front wheels – enter the low-pressure area laterally, which might end up hampering the diffuser’s effectiveness. This is the reason why aerodynamicists try to generate a series of vortices to seal the diffuser’s edges as much as possible.

By further embracing the ‘rake’ philosophy (also seen at Force India) engineers at Woking show they are confident they have overcome any splitter friction issues and protected the diffuser’s edges really well." - A closer look at the McLaren-Honda MP4-31 - Page 3 of 5 - F1i.com

 

I find this car extremely challenging, myself. The Vee was tricky to learn but, once I got it down, it started to feel very natural and I can push it quite hard with a reasonably degree of confidence.

I'm having a much harder time getting to the same point with the F-Extreme. At a given AI % level, I'm able to clobber the AI in both the Vee and F3, but I switch to the F-Extreme (keeping AI % the same) and I'm a good second+ off the pace!!!

My struggle sounds very similar to what others have said in that I really lose time in the slow corners - the car is reluctant to turn-in and feels very floaty/unplanted through mid-corner. Of course then accelerating out must be done with extreme care (though I tend to think this is quite true-to-life).

In high/mid speed corners this thing is on rails, so that makes me think this is probably a downforce thing - perhaps these cars just don't produce much in the way of mechanical grip in real life?

 

i personally think this is what CPM almost has fixed in the rf1-2 engine.. I've always had issues with low downforce grip situations in both gsc rf2 and ams. (although ams seems better pre-CPM).

Ive driven a f2 taatus (trackday) and low speed grip isn't floaty, if anything it feels rather heavy/sludgy (as your slowly turning sticky tyres on grippy tarmac) thru the wheel. i remember being shocked when, what i expected from sim racing didn't happen in real life. I had much more confidence IRL in slow corners than i do in any sim. (probably also due to more senses being available than on a pc sim)

 

No mechanical grip on this car? Please...

It would help if you upload a video showing your driving, because it has good low speed for me (tricky out of corners, but it has almost 900hp and tons of torque...).

 

The extremes have become a real beast to master. In GSC they felt the same as F/Reiza.
The new ones however require total commitment and your reflexes need to be those of a cobra. Everything happens at double speed (So it seems. LOL).
Great cars, but not so easy to drive on the edge.

 

I put that down to the fact that in simming we rely on FFB a lot and low speed forces tend to be lower on the wheel and when we have nothing to make up for it like a sense of Gees we're basically effed.

This is why I'm a big fan of FFB that goes beyond reality to make up for this. Realism is not realism if you're not actually getting all the information which I think Reiza does a good job of doing - making a good compromise with a slightly more informative FFB.


Really though I find it very easy to drive the F Extreme after the most recent update. Its just always hard to drive it at the limit and was much worse when I first posted this thread. Whats become better with AMS from GSCE is that low speed while the confidence to know when things are going haywire is still not great when it goes its way easier to have confidence correcting the car, more so than in any other sim except for rF2 which still has the best FFB I think. I was on the fence til I drove the Howston Dissenter and on my first lap I could countersteer that beast and feel in control even if I was panicked. I dunno what ISI is doing with rF2 but its definitely got something that nobody else has.

 

So you are fan of FFB that goes beyond reality to compensate lack of feel but your best pick is a game that has pure steering forces

 

Niels himself commented that he feels that their FFB probably gives more information than in reality.

 

i only wish there was a min force setting,, and I'm no sure if its me or my wheel but i can't tell much difference between 300mhz and 180?!

 

Just to give my feeling on this, I really do not enjoy much the F Extreme. It feels too twitchy, and difficult to rotate using the real life gear selection for each corner. I always find myself selecting a lower gear just to avoid the understeer.

I don't know. Some cars I definitely connect more (V12, Retro, Classic). This one, I just cannot.

 

Yes, AMS provides a lot of fulfilling driving, but alas the Extremes are not part of that. They are too unpredictable and almost impossible to recover from the slightest misjudgement.

 

I like Extreme and never had problems with rotate ? turn may be ? I just change steering lock to 23-25 deg

 

I've stepped away from the F-Extreme for a bit. I still love AMS, but something seems fishy about this particular car - it has a really different feel than the other formula-style cars in the sim.

 

Yeah, I kind of have that feeling too. It feels just different. Like stiffer suspension, or harder tyre compounds. The other car that gives me a similar feeling is the Metalmoro also. Just not a fun of these, although I still drive them both on ocassion.