The SIM Dashboard Community Designs Thread

Hey everyone! After a bit of absence from simracing I decided it was high time to fill out the remaining gaps in the Formula Retro roster.

Brabham BT49 for AMS2


First we have the Brabham BT49. I think this car may have been the inspiration for the Generic F-Retro Gen 2 dash, as the RPM dial and speed display are similar (and these are the oldest formula cars in AMS2 that feature digital displays, I think). There's RPM, Speed, Oil Pressure and Oil Temperature - and a Shift Light. But let's be honest, what else do you need throwing these around a race track, right? It's not like there's time to study your instruments going 300 kilometers per hour...

Brabham BT52 for AMS2


Last but not least is the Mad Arrow! Which sadly seems to have a partly broken / incorrect cockpit in AMS2. Only the RPM gauge is functional, the other two analog gauges are non-functional right now, but I decided to keep water and oil temperature (same as the McLaren MP4/1C that I based this on). As for the two lights, one is a shift indicator (right, orange), while the left one (red) is a rain light indicator - this made sense to me as the rain light switch is located on the same side.

However, as you can make out on top of the dashboard, these two lamps are actually fuel (left) and oil (right) warning lights in real life! I hope you don't mind me re-purposing these two, as AMS2 has already done the same thing. Either way, it is a 15-second-fix to remove both of these if you don't want them.


On a side note, I have also looked at working with SimHub... Everything is way more complicated than SIM Dashboard, but the possibilities are almost endless it seems. Unfortunately I can't install the SimHub app on my old Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 for some reason, so I have to use the slow and inefficient browsers version (which is also limited, as most browsers no longer support this old device and android 4.3). (Been toying with the idea of installing a custom ROM, but there's a decent chance it'll brick the tablet, so... I'm holding off for now.)

Either way, if - some day - I am able to afford a new tablet, I might have another look at SimHub, but I'm making no promises yet. Then again, performance just using SIM Dashboard is getting worse by the day on the old tablet, so I might have to upgrade anyway once I can afford it.

 

You have a very large 4K monitor, I think it will not hurt if you use SimHub overlays.
You can run many overlays at the same time, and that means a "complete" overlay or dashboard can be disassembled (DIY) into a group of small overlays spread over the screen.

 

I know, but I don't want anything else on my screen, it ruins the immersion for me (and messes with my concentration), which is why I usually disable the HUD unless I need to check for something specific. And I use TrackIR, so I definitely don't want any on-screen elements moving with my view. (Though technically the tablet also stays in the same position ).
So I'll stick with my ancient tablet for the time being.

By the way, is there any kind of useful documentation for SimHub? It's not exactly self-explaining, and there's a lot that I would like to do (like using custom graphics for LED bars) that doesn't seem to work with the built-in LED feature. For instance, I just figured using an on/off image with different images could work, but I'm not yet sure how I go about defining the conditions for each individual LED (i.e. "if above x% RPM then set to "on").

The possibilities are enticing, but a few things like the lack of documentation (so I don't even know what's possible) and possible scaling issues on different devices (especially with ratios other than 16:9) are still holding me back.

Besides, I haven't even finished my AMS2 project for SIM Dashboard yet.

 

Understood, no comments. (friendly)!

SimHub is a one man project, believe! Kudos here to Wotever, The Man.
That explains some "shortage" of documentation BUT there's a lot of information about SimHub and an active community at Discord. All the basics are here and a lot more on Y2B .
More than this, ALL dashes/overlays are editable by the user for their own needs and a lot shared on Race Department and at SH forum.
Editing is an easy task once familiar, the complexity became when you try to make your dash compatible with various games or by specific needs like "complex" leaderboards and timetebles.

Edit: The new led property since v8.0 (?) is very, very easily programmable in number, position, size, spacings and functions, although limited by only one internal image. Of course you can also define your own led types and formats using the other procedures.

Edit2: If your talking about external physical leds, you can use SH+arduino or other programming I really don't know how but exists.

Edit 3: PM if you want more info or help.

 

Did anyone miss me?

First off, I want to apologize for the long absence. A *lot* has happened since my last post. For one thing, I almost went blind in one eye. Yikes, that was a scary experience. My (hopefully) final check-up at the eye doctor is coming up next week, and so far things are looking (pun unintended, but I'll take it!) good.

Naturally, I had to stay away from screens for a while. And when I couldn't, I was wearing sunglasses. In a dimly-lit room, sitting in front of a screen with its brightness at minimum setting. Fun times. NOT!

Aside from that, I actually put aside my racing setup for a while since I discovered a really fun, lightweight helicopter simulation (or "sim lite" as most hardcore simmers would probably call it nowadays), called Helicopter Gunship DEX (or simply HGDEX for short). It's still in development (Early Access and all that) but is extremely promising and loads of fun already, so I even dusted off my old Logitech G940 Flight System. The developer is also super active and response, which lends that extra bit of credibility that Early Access games need these days. HGDEX is designed to work with gamepads even, but I never even bothered trying it because using a HOTAS feels just so damn right.

Anyway, I digress! It had actually been two months since I fired up AMS2. I'll be honest, even though the driving experience is second to none in most cars (for me, at least), numerous issues with the AI just turned down my motivation to race or even start AMS2 close to zero.

That being said, it was not just the release of the latest game updates (including the fantastic Formula Inter) that made me come back - it was a mod. Most of you can probably already guess which one it was. Yes, I am talking about the Dallara IR-18 2023. What a car! Just from driving a few laps around the Glen in different conditions and with both dry tire compounds, I can tell that this is, by far, the best mod car to arrive in AMS2 to date.

And in case you are wondering: Yes, I made a dashboard for the Indycar!

Dallara IR18 2023 Mod for AMS2


Please note that this dashboard was modeled after the generic steering wheel that most teams use. Some have logos above or below the screen, but as far as I can see, the only team that actually uses a physically different steering wheel is Penske, and even they use the same LCD screen. The main difference is the alignment of the Flag LEDs, which are arranged in a vertical strip on the Penske wheel.

This design was modeled after my existing Cadillac DPi-VR dash, as it is basically the same thing with a few minor differences. Overall, this one was a quick and dirty job that only took around 2 hours from start to finish.

As a side note, the in-game car has a push-to-pass indicator that shows the remaining activations. I don't think SIM Dashboard has this functionality for AMS2 (yet?), so I left the average fuel calculation widget in. Oh, and the mod car actually uses four different colors for its RPM LEDs; the first one is green in game, but I didn't bother trying to replicate it as that would have meant A LOT more work and fiddling around in SIM Dashboard (the LED widget only supports low, mid and high colors).


I also want to do the F-Inter, as that looked really interesting (and it's a fun car to drive!). But since it is more complicated and has two pages, it'll take much longer so I can't say when I'll be able to work on it.

If you like my take on the Dallara IR-18 (or you don't!), please let me know.

EDIT: F-Inter is done. Should be available tomorrow!

 

Look after yourself @XTRMNTR2K

 

As promised, here is the Fórmula Inter dash that I made yesterday:

Formula Inter for AMS2 Page 1/2


Formula Inter for AMS2 Page2/2


There are a few details I would like to explain, though:

First off, the curved RPM bar is as as close to the one in-game as I could manage. Here both pages have a multi-colored bar though, whereas one of the pages in AMS2 uses only green.

Similar to the Dallara IR-18 2023, the F-Inter uses a four-colored LED bar: Green, Yellow, Red and Blue. Since the widget only supports three colors, and green and yellow are visually very similar (actually hard to tell apart at a glance for people with a certain kind of color blindness) I decided to stick with green, red and blue. Additionally, I changed the color split from 4-4-3-2 to 6-4-3. If you don't like it, it's easy enough to change.

Some of the icons are also missing. The only one missing that is actually functional is the warning sign, which appears to act as an engine temperature warning. It could be added, but I decided not to in order to save space (so you can easily free some extra space in the lower left for extra widgets) and because the design already has oil temperature displayed on both pages.

Fun fact: The graphics used for the custom analog oil temp/pressure dials was actually based on a part that I designed for one of my very first SIM Dashboard designs ever, the MetalMoro AJR for AMS1! It's cool to see that this particular gauge style made a comeback in AMS2 as well.

EDIT:
@Todd Norbury Thank you! I promise I will.

 

Today I present to you one of the last remaining road cars that I hadn't created a dash for yet:

McLaren Senna for AMS2


In terms of features, this is mostly what you expect from a hyper car, nothing more. But the implementation of some of those features, that's a whole different story...

The main attraction here is, without a doubt, the tachometer. The implementation is pretty damn close to the real car, thanks to some clever trickery I employed (once again) using multiple RPM widgets.

The oil and water temperature dials are slightly different though. While I think it should technically be possible, implementing the same radial fill bar effect would be too much of an effort (and possibly impact performance negatively on older devices), IMHO, so I used some artistic liberty in their design instead. The most important thing is that these are easy to read, and I like to think I achieved that.

Aside from those, the rest is fairly unspectacular, I'm afraid. The odometer doesn't really work, sadly. I'm not even sure this kind of information is provided by AMS2 via shared data.


The next car that I would *like* to tackle is the final remaining super car, the Corvette C8 Z06. However, the dashboard of that car is a beast, and getting even half of the design features somewhat right will probably take several days at least, plus it has three distinctly different pages, if I remember correctly. So no promises or ETA yet!

 

It is finally done - I present to ye my Magnum Opus:

Corvette C8 Z06 for AMS2 Page 1/3


Corvette C8 Z06 for AMS2 Page 2/3


Corvette C8 Z06 for AMS2 Page 3/3



Now I realize some of you will say "What? That's it? Doesn't look too spectacular", and I am inclined to agree if we are talking looks alone. The cockpit graphics are looking very bare bones in particular - sorry about that, maybe I'll prettify it one day.

With that being said, the amount of trickery and "hacking" widgets to do what I need them to do but they weren't designed for is greater than in any other dashboard I have done before.

Let's start with the first page: There isn't too much out of the ordinary here. The tire pressure display was improvised because the visual tire pressure widget wouldn't fit. As a consequence the color display doesn't work - it always stays green. I'll have to see if I can fix that some day.

Another thing that is different from most of my other designs is the units of measurements. These will always be correctly displayed depending on your chosen units (metric/imperial). So it'll work with mph, kpi, etc. if SIM Dashboard is set to use those instead.

On to page 2! This page is the same except for the RPM bar. It actually works like its counterpart in AMS2, so each side displays a 2-2-1 split from the outside to the inside (green, yellow, orange), and then completely turns red if RPM increases further. This was done by adding a second RPM widget on top of the first one.

Last but not least, page three: This one is much crazier than it looks (you can see for yourself if you go into edit mode): Oil data and G-Force Meter are pretty much standard, but the RPM dial is anything but. It consists of layers upon layers of highly customized RPM widgets, custom graphics, multiple shift lights and more! The main difference between this RPM gauge and the one in the game is that that the shift rings don't light up one by one, so only a single one is lit at any given time (unless you're at max RPM), but that the lower ones stay on as RPM increases and more of them light up and change color from green to yellow to dark red to all of them flashing bright red. While I think it would have been possible to replicate the exact same behavior of AMS2, I actually think this solution works better, as it is more easily visible from the corner of your eye!

Aside from that, the RPM gauge functions exactly as it does in the sim (minus the semi-transparency of the fill bar, but that's a really minor thing IMHO).

All in all I can say that this was definitely the craziest dashboard I have done so far, especially with regards to page number three. It took me a little more than two days to complete, so if I had to guess I'd say between 6 and 8 hours total.


And with that, the Super Cars category is finally complete! This means that all classes I have worked on are complete for now. A few more AMS2 cars remain to be done though, such as the VW road cars. It's mainly cars I very rarely (if ever) drive, I'm afraid.

Right now I can't say if I'm taking another extended break or not. These days I find myself switching between my Wheel and HOTAS setup more often, which doesn't take too long but is slightly annoying, haha. And since HGDEX just added the Harrier (as a surprising not-April-1st-Joke), I'm getting more use out of my HOTAS for now... Sorry, AMS2!

 

Oh man I can't believe it, but it appears I forgot something really important! Turns out I had totally missed creating a dashboard for everyone's favorite car class. These are, without a doubt, the most popular cars in all of AMS2 - really, who needs Senna's legendary F1 cars when you can drive the Volkswagen TSI Cup cars?!

VW Polo / Virtus for AMS2 (TSI Cup)


VW Polo / Virtus GTS for AMS2 (TSI Cup)


All joking aside, these are still solid cars in AMS2 - I just think they are a very, very bad choice for the demo. Give players one of the modern stock cars, or one of the many generic Formula cars and I'm sure many more players who tried the demo would be hooked in an instant. I'm also not sure but I think it is super outdated as well?

Anyway, I digress! These dashboards are pretty damn close to the in-game cars as I once again used a screenshot of their dash as base for the design. Functionality is the same, although the clock displays the real-world time instead of the local in-game time. I also added a few indicators above the (non-working) odometer: Headlights, Engine Warning, ABS and Handbrake. A very solid, authentic and straightforward design overall. So if you ever find yourself driving one of these cars, be sure to give it a try!

The next design I am going to work on is the ARC Camaro. Shouldn't be too demanding, although I can't say when I am going to start working on it. And from what I can see, this is also the final car class that is missing from Reiza's AMS2 content. (Some vehicles like the Copa Fusca, Copa Classic and Hot Cars will have to make do with the generic Copa Classic and Opala Stock dashboards, as they are mostly the same with very minor differences. But please let me know if there are any cars for which these dashboards don't suffice and I'll look into it.)

Once that is done I will most likely have a look at some of the car mods that have been released so far. The Panoz Esperante GTR1 fits in well with the rest of the GT1 content so that's definitely a probable candidate... But we'll see what else comes up!

 

When I first set out to create SIM Dashboard designs for AMS2, I had no idea that, at least at one point, my designs would cover every car and class in AMS2 (with a few exceptions that would feel redundant). Today is that day as I present to you my dash for the ARC Camaro:

ARC Camaro for AMS2


I'll be the first to admit that these fun little cars don't get enough love, but that's true for many of AMS2 (more obscure) cars.

Disregard the weird dot pattern in the background, by the way. The preview does this with some of the in-app backgrounds for some reason, but it looks perfectly fine in the app.

The dashboard itself is simple but easy to read, which I like. No flashy features here, just RPM, water temperature and oil temperature. Not even a fuel gauge, but that's probably not an issue with the type of racing these cars see.

Having published 170 SIM Dashboard designs to date, most of which were specifically designed for AMS2, I think I'm gonna slow down for a while. Maybe do a few mod car dashboards whenever I feel like it. That is, of course, until Reiza release more cars for the sim. And if nothing else, I may even go back to some older designs and find something to improve.

As always, I am also for suggestions and requests. That being said, I encourage every SIM Dashboard user to dive into the android app and browser-based studio app, because nothing beats creating your own custom-made dashboard perfect for your own needs!

 

A few days ago I had a closer look at the (mod) Panoz Esperante GTR-1. As it turns out, the wheel is almost identical to the F-USA Gen 3. This meant I already had something to base it on, which drastically cut down the amount of work needed for this 3-page design:

Panoz Esperante GTR-1 Page 1/3


Panoz Esperante GTR-1 Page 2/3


Panoz Esperante GTR-1 Page 3/3


Functionality is identical to the in-game car with one small exception related to the RPM LEDs; these are supposed to light up green-orange-red from the outside to the inside, and only turn all red once the RPM increases further. Unfortunately this is still not possible in SIM Dashboard, so the LEDs immediately turn red once all of them light up. Additionally, the LEDs will start to flash after 1.5 seconds if you remain near max RPM - it's a consequence of the workaround I am using to have them change color.

I have to say that I really like this style of wheel display; it is easy to read and provides the essentials and nothing more. From what I remember, one of the GT1 Murciélago R-GT cars in GTR2 also had a very similar style of wheel, and that was one of my favorite cars in the sim. (Needless to say I very much enjoy the Lamborghini Murciélago R-SV in ThunderFlashs mod package as well!)

 

As the development of AMS2 continues and the range if its content expands, so does my selection of SIM Dashboard designs!

Today we've got one update and addition to an existing car, as well as a brand new one.


Formula Ultimate Gen 2 for AMS2


Formula Ultimate Gen 2 for AMS2 Page 2


First up is the Formula Ultimate Generation 2, which recently saw the addition of a second LCD page. While I was working on the new page I also noticed a few minor but long-standing issues with the first page, so I took the opportunity to fix those as well. Take note that the fuel delta display might show different values than the in-game dashboard; the calculation is different, at least for solo practice days. The widget is set to take both the current and previous laps into account, but you can easily change that if you want.

As with all updates, you'll have to manually download the new version if you were already using the old one prior to the update.

Formula USA 2023 for AMS2


At this point I don't think the Formula USA 2023 needs much of an introduction. It's a beast of an open-wheeler and much more fun than should be legal.

My take on the wheel display is fairly true to the in-game design, with a few additional features such as oil and water pressure data and a brake bias pop-up.

For this car I also decided to use different widgets for the RPM LED bar, which allowed me to exactly replicate the behavior of the in-game car (outside to inside green-yellow-red and then turning blue when approaching max RPM). The downside is that the LEDs look rather flat because there is no glow or glare effect anymore. If you want to change these for one of the other widgets however, it is fairly easy (you can even copy the widget style in the browser-based SIM Dashboard Studio).

There is also a good chance this car will receive another update soon, as some changes from the latest Beta as well as a second page supposedly didn't make it into the official release yet. (At least when I checked a few minutes ago I could not see any difference to the RC version.)


The next car I am going to work on right away is the Formula Junior - once that is done, I'm once again at 100% car coverage for all AMS2 stock and DLC content.


P.S.: If you *really* enjoy my work and want to say thank you, I don't accept donations... But you can gift me any AMS2 DLC I am still missing (currently missing only the Barcelona Track Pack), which would be greatly appreciated! My current financial situation is such that even something as small as a DLC is really a non-trivial expense for me right now. Living in a first world country but having only around 6 bucks per day to spend on anything - food, gasoline, clothing - sucks big time.

Don't mean to complain though - after all, I got a roof on my head and that's more than a lot of people can say. Just wanted to be honest about my current situation, that's all.

Until the next update!


P.P.S.: Come to think of it... Does this thread actually belong in the Modding sub-forum? At least I think that would be a more well-suited place for this kind of thing.

 

Can I use the dashes with Simhub?

 

No, I'm afraid not. These are made with the SIM Dashboard app and can only be used with the same android app.

 

Well damn. I use Simhub and an IPhone so no chance for me. Do you know if there are similar dashboards in Simhub?

 

No idea. Is there any central place where community-made Simhub designs are being shared? If so, that would be the best place to look.

That's one of the things I like about SIM Dashboard - there is an official website for sharing community designs:
Community Designs - SIM Dashboard

 

No, unfortunetly BUT there are a lot of SimHub Dashboards at Race Department, including those made by our mate in this forum @2ndLastjedy. And just follow the link at his signature.

 

Just whipped this up yesterday before the start of the 24h of Le Mans:

Formula Junior for AMS2


Aaand we're at 100% car/class coverage again.

(I know could work on dozens of mod cars and I'd love to, but I feel that is a very deep rabbit hole to go down...)

 

As stated before, the F-USA 2023 received an update shortly after moving from the RC to the main branch, changing some of its characteristics as well as adding a second page. My design is now updated to reflect these changes:

Formula USA 2023 for AMS2


Formula USA 2023 for AMS2 Page 2


Since the behavior of the RPM LEDs has also been changed, I removed my custom "hacked" version in favor of a better-looking LED widget. The old one was more of a proof-of-concept, anyway.

The design is still a fairly accurate representation of the AMS2 car, with the added bonus of a brake bias popup (which appears as a temporary overlay in place of the current lap time and delta).

Keep in mind SIM Dashboard does not feature a percentage display for ERS/KERS/P2P in AMS2 at this time, which is why I chose the one bar widget (out of two available) that would actually fit into the design in terms of space.