Supercar DLC driving test.

I'm going to go a curb running adventure here once I get out of bed. Lol. Enjoying my Sunday morning CAR-toons.

 

I have a Moza R5, and my FFB issue is not a lack of detail or how light it feels, its detailed enough, it's more of the deadzone I have only with the McLaren and that makes it in my case at least, wander a bit on the straights.

I also didn't have an issue with understeer in it, what I didn't like aside the deadzone, was how unbalanced it felt when trying to get performance out of it, while in the Brabham it felt progressive and controllable, in the McLaren it felt mad and unpredictable. But maybe it's the nature of the beast (havent watch the video posted), that's why I wouldn't call it awful, but definitely "bad" when compared to the Brabham.

 

Interesting, what preset are you using on the Moza software? I run the GT AMS 2 official preset, and I'm not having that deadzone on the same wheel. Although I agree the FFB is numb in general.

 

McLaren:
At first the car feels quite natural to me, in light of the very limited experience I have at driving real road cars a little bit too fast. I do find that I have a few oversteer moments, such as a code brown on lap 2 that gives me the impression that this car needs to be driven smoothly. Not much feeling of edge of grip, I'm relying more on other cues such as motion rig and VR spatial cues to determine if I need to settle the car. After a few laps it feels like I'm overdriving the car, and it's difficult to feel where the tires are happy, and lap times vary a lot from one lap to the next. After a few laps the tires start to get even softer, and I lose control when I try to push extra hard on the final lap, most likely the spin was due to the high rear tire temps surprising me with oversteer where the car was more neutral on previous laps.

Notable moments at 2:33 (code brown) and 16:53 (spin)

Brabham:
More informative FFB than the McLaren - the FFB goes light/dead when I'm over the limit. The Brabham responds quicker to steering input and corrections than the McLaren, both in good and bad ways. I do feel more confident over the edge of grip in the Brabham than in the McLaren, as the car goes into a brief four-wheel-slide and then resettles after I do some minor corrections. The Brabham doesn't feel like it's on road tires, the tirewalls feel both more low-profile and softer than the McLaren. The tires feel a bit cold and nervous at the start (the video doesn't show it except that you can see me doing some very quick minor countersteer corrections), but after a few laps the tires feel more predictable, and I get consistent lap times that improve a little bit on nearly every lap.

Notable moments at 4:35 (nervous) and 12:56 (controllable four-wheel slide off track)

 

1 Holy crap your rig runs VR smoothly!
2. You're driving style is extremely smooth, very interesting because you clearly are getting more out of these cars then I can. I think you're the first person that hasn't melted the rear tires.

 

I use a custom, but mostly stock settings.

 

Oops, I forgot to update my graphics card info in my signature after upgrading from my Pimax 5k+ to the Crystal, it should be a 4080, not a 2070. Also, I run at 50% SteamVR resolution which isn't really visible in the 720p video. Framerate over resolution every time.

Cars were driven on default setup with fuel added for 12 laps. Authentic realism settings except for damage off and automatic gearing due to some EMI issues with my shifter/button box that I need to figure out.

 

What I should do is do a verification on FFB being exactly the same at both installs, and do a back and forth. Difference was quite striking with the Senna, considering that I didn't feel any changes nor found any performance with the Brabham.

 

Gave the Brabham another go and yes, I really like how the car behaves. Heres a video of it, managed 8 laps before the wife interrupted , and yes I use the roof cam, better sense of speed .

 

You are taking a diametrically opposed interpretation of what I (and others) said here. And frankly, this video does nothing but validate (and even pointing an issue with numbers) what I've said, and here is why:

Chris Harris states that the car is limited by the front end, and that the car wants to be pushed and leaned on. My experience (and the one of others in this thread) was completely backwards: the rear end wanted to step out all the time unpredictably, specially on corner entry, and I couldn't push it all, I had to underdrive all the time to get a small string of laps without crashing out. It's quite noticeable on the full lap onboard on the Senna, where he can draw clear arcs with the steering wheel to maximize front end grip and simply wait for the moment to power out and unwind steering cleanly. I cannot do that in game with this car without going into a spin. The only moment he has to make corrections is when braking on a straightline, which I don't if it is because of bumps or something at the front end (brakes, abs, suspension, maybe a bit of all) causing some sort of chattering. Would be weird if it was the rear end, considering that rear wing increases angle when he brakes (something I did not see chasing AIs in game).

And regarding numbers: at the UI on AMS2, the car is stated to have 1380 kg, which means 1295 kg dry weight. Harris states that the Senna is actually under 1200 kg. If both things are true, then the AMS2 version is around 100 kg overweight, and I would bet on all that excess of mass being solely on the rear end of the car.

Does the active aero work inside the game? Honest question, and I'm out for some hours to verify anything for the moment.

 

It's a really cool car. Like a GT3, but actually fun to drive, which sounds like a contradiction lol

 

I do think the Senna needs to be gone through again, but I wonder how much of this behavor is down to the tires that are simulated vs the tires on the real car Harris drove.

 

Going out again, I tried my best to copy McRip's drivng style, and I found the Senna to be very much more controllable. I'm almost certain now, these unique tires are what's causing the instablity. As the car heats up the rears with agreesive driving, it becomes less and less predictable until the car is basically useless in slow turns.

Also Marc, The feeling on the curbs is extreamely dampened. When breezing up onto those small sausage curbs I didn't really notice a difference from normal track, but intentionally attacking them leads to a very viloent leap into the air. (As I would expect) Even so, the wheel doesn't jerk into my heads or anything like that.

Also, At Gabrel, I'm not seeing the wing move at all during these AI races, so I assume the active areo is not functional.

 

Tyres definitely suit the Brabham better, but if active aero is not working, we have an extra problem, as the car is designed to have an amount of downforce on the rear end since braking until powering out completely out of a corner, that's not available.

 

I am a 100% sure the McLaren rear wing moves on acceleration and braking, maybe it's not visually showing on the AI cars, but on the player it's working.

 

Will look again after the indycar race.

 

Can confirm, just isn't working for the AI

 

Came here to say the same, it works with a certain amount of brake input. Can also confirm that the car sounds MUCH better from the outside that on the inside.

Also, found the culprit on why the car felt much more controllable in Beta: I had the wrong custom FFB file on my public installation, meaning that I've been hampering myself for some time, dammit! Good thing I have yet to kick off the final bout of Group C testing!

 

Senna:

Harris is very clear that the tires, especially the fronts, are limiting the car's performance. The tires are both street legal (meaning much harder and lower grip than slicks) and not very wide, which leads to understeer, especially if you overdrive the car.

A skilled driver (like Harris or @Roar McRipHelmet) will figure this out quickly and use the throttle to help steer the car. This characteristic is why TC is a great aid to prevent rear tire spin in corners, which helps reduce the overheating issue. But the tires will still overheat if you push the car harder than it is designed to be pushed.

Harris also made it clear that, like most high performance road cars, the Senna can only do a couple of hot laps at a a time before running into issues. It's not a race car. The tires will be an issue, and possibly other components as well, though he liked the very powerful brakes, which are usually the other factor (overheating) that prevents extended runs. To be honest, we don't have a point-to-point track in the game that would be well suited to these types of vehicles, so it's no surprise that we try it on tracks and get disappointed. Just imagine if you shelled out for the real one! In fact Harris ends with the comment that you could buy the actual GT3 version and have enough money left over for track days. It's a status symbol car for people who want and can afford ridiculous performance...but use the car to go the golf club or out to dinner with their significant other.

Curbs and FFB:

I was originally asking for some feedback because I suspected that those who were complaining about a dead zone on the Senna would also experience a lack of appropriate feedback from the big sausage curbs at Jerez.

I know people don't like to hear this, but if you have a lack of very realistic and distinct feedback from the sausage curbs, as in they will almost rip the wheel out of your hand--even in the overall light FFB Senna, then your FFB is set wrong and you are missing a bunch of other things, too, and experiencing too-dull FFB around centre. As reported, the Senna is a bit on the numb side and light side compared to most vehicles in the game. This is exactly as it should be, given the characteristics of the real vehicles. Nevertheless, when I encounter a sausage curb, the FFB reacts as it would in real life to such a big object shaped like that--VERY SHARPLY and will shake you out of any slumber.

I have posted about 150 times on the FFB topic, but the key message is to not make the mistake that the in-game damping is some evil setting designed for people with Logi gear-driven wheels. It and the other settings must be used judiciously even with DD wheels to get the proper FFB. Only the LFB would be minimized on a DD wheel, but even then, probably some amount higher than expected is better.

The second part of the FFB sermon is to never adjust wheel control panel settings off neutral or default until after you have dialed-in the FFB to a satisfactory level. Most of those myriad of settings serve only to distort and not improve the FFB. They are "flavour" additions, sort of like after buying a $20,000 audio system and playing only the best engineered recordings and you decide that you just have to have 5% more mid-level punch. You don't want to distort every professional recording you listen to unless you are extremely sure that your equipment as situated in your listening environment warrants this global change. No sim dev is ever going to engineer their FFB for anything but a default environment--for no other reason than how would they even know what people are choosing to use out there?

A simple, but effective test of FFB optimization in AMS 2 is exactly the sausage curbs at Jerez if the Senna. It is one of the softest/lightest cars to start with, but the flatter curbing should be easily detected, though softer than in almost any other vehicle in the game. The sausage curb should feel exactly as you would expect them to if you really look at how big they are compared to the height of the car. Imagine the reaction of the steering wheel in your hand in your own car if you drove into something that huge. The game FFB will do just that when adjusted properly.

 

Never mind, guess I was wrong on my settings

Holy **** what a difference that makes!