Camber: How to find a baseline

[Aeroron]

How do you find the baseline/initial camber before dialing in per specific track?

 

[drivehard]

I was just wondering about this today. I'd like to know how tuners decide these values as well. I usually just bump it up to 1.5 in the front and 1.0 in the rear. But what I "usually" do is just a guess.

 

[budious]

Generally, I would say do all the tweaking and tuning you can on zero camber. Know the oversteer to understeer ratio, the feel of the car, that you have developed up until that point. Begin tuning the camber to maintain the desired level of front to rear grip ratio.

 

[drivehard]

Generally, I would say do all the tweaking and tuning you can on zero camber. Know the oversteer to understeer ratio, the feel of the car, that you have developed up until that point. Begin tuning the camber to maintain the desired level of front to rear grip ratio.

Sorry, don't know much about tuning, what do you mean by front to rear grip ratio?

Do you reccomend tweaking at zero toe as well?

 

[budious]

Sorry, don't know much about tuning, what do you mean by front to rear grip ratio?

Do you reccomend tweaking at zero toe as well?

I do usually zero toe as a matter of habit front and rear, and few a for exceptions, I don't generally set one at all.

I should clarify that occasionally I will start tuning with the default camber ratio without setting to zero, but if the default was zero, then I start there. I refer to this default camber setting as the default front to rear camber ratio, which translates to amount of oversteer(front camber) to understeer(rear camber). So a default camber of 1.0F/0.5R would be a 2:1 camber ratio, but later I may bump that up to 3:1. In must testing situations, 3:1 camber ratio, up until a certain point produces fairly predictable steering qualities. (ie. 1.5F/0.5R; 1.8F/0.6R; 2.1F/0.7R; 3.0F/1.0R, etc.)

 

[Adrenaline]

One example that... sounded legit at face value was to take the car to Cape Ring. Focus on nothing other than the big downward spiral, and see what camber settings allow you to carry the highest speed through that spiral.

At first it sounded like a pretty smart idea, but then I started wondering, how does that corner apply to every other corner in the game/track?

But, on the other hand, no single camber setting will ever be perfect for every corner, so any 'guess' should be just as good as another. You're likely to get at least 1 corner dialed in, just as any other setting would work for a different corner.

If you're doing track specific tuning, focus on the most important corner.
For example, Trial Mountain, I'd focus on the long sweeping corner after the long straight. It seems to be the best place to focus camber for that track, but I could be completely wrong.

As a general 'guess' I just usually use pretty low camber values, because logically it should reduce tire wear. Whether that is true in game or not, I have absolutely no clue. Flat tracks I usually double my camber ratios, banked tracks, are where I use the low values like 1.0/0.5.
P.S. I am no tuner.

 

[articzap]

As a general 'guess' I just usually use pretty low camber values, because logically it should reduce tire wear. Whether that is true in game or not, I have absolutely no clue.

Toe effects tire wear a lot. Camber effects tire wear very little.

 

[drivehard]

Is it ever advisable to use a 1:2 or 1:3 ratio? Sometimes I see tuners use this on MR cars and wonder what the purpose is. There are only a handful of cars that I have driven that I would attempt combat oversteer with. Yellow bird and Maxi Rally to name two. Is this the main purpose of that type of ratio?

 

[nomis3613]

One example that... sounded legit at face value was to take the car to Cape Ring. Focus on nothing other than the big downward spiral, and see what camber settings allow you to carry the highest speed through that spiral.

At first it sounded like a pretty smart idea, but then I started wondering, how does that corner apply to every other corner in the game/track?

That sounds like a pretty good idea for testing front camber. It's the best we can do in GT5, since GT4's skid pad is missing.

The only thing to keep in mind is that it will give you the best angles for high speed, apparently low speed corners prefer lower camber angles.

Thanks for the tip, I'm gonna give it a try.

 

[Magneto]

I didn't get into hardcore tuning until Forza3. But I try to use the things I learned from there in GT5. And it seems to be working really well. I do pretty much the same as Budious when it comes to toe. I always try to avoid having any amount of toe both front and rear.
When it comes to camber I usually start out with 1.0 front and 0.5 rear unless stock camber is different. And of course running as low camber as possible is what I look for, without it affecting how the car sticks to surface.
One thing I wish we had on GT5 is information on the cars weight distribution. Because if you set the spring rates and dampers according to the weight distibuted on the axles you'll get a much more neutral handling car. Although the manual/booklet that I got with my game tells me to soften the rear if an MR car oversteers, my F40 actually oversteers less now that I stiffened the rear springs, dampers and roll bars..

 

[chuyler1]

Trial Mountain is a good camber tuning track but I don't use the turn mentioned above, I use the following turns...

Left hand sweeper before tunnel 1. The car should be able to maintain full throttle (on racing tires). If tires squeal and it driftsninto the grass camber is probably too high.
Right hand elbow before tunnel 2. The car should be anchored enough for slight lift before turning in and full throttle on exit. If the car runs wide you probably don't have enough camber.

Using these turns and keeping track of lap times I usually settle on a camber of about 0.5-2.0 on most street cars. However, camber is highly dependent on ride height and suspension stiffness so these items need to be factored in as well. And my settings are usually ok for most tracks which means the probably aren't ideal for all of them. For example, the sweeping esses at Suzaka might require an entirely different suspension.

 

[Endless-Wilso]

with most cars (on average) how high would the settings have 2 be b4 u start 2 loose grip

 

[Adrenaline]

with most cars (on average) how high would the settings have 2 be b4 u start 2 loose grip

Way too many variable to even guess an 'average'. There's no possible way to really answer your question accurately.
I'd say never go past 5.0 in the front, but... as always that's just a guess.

 

[budious]

Depends on the camber and the stiffness of the shock and anti-roll bars to determine how much is too much. Mix in the aforementioned variables and higher camber values start to exhibit deficiencies. You also need to consider the track and corner camber you are tuning for; if for general purpose tuning, keeping it under 5.0 is a pretty good rule of thumb. If you are going track specific there are some cases where going higher has benefits.

 

[High On Speed]

LOL.... I just started a thread about this earlier today. I have never used anything above 2 before last night but with an X-Runner on the Seasonal event I wanted to push everything I could out of it. Since I dont believe in Jacking anyones post I will leave it to you to search my posts if interested

 

[E-cobra]

I refer to this default camber setting as the default front to rear camber ratio, which translates to amount of oversteer(front camber) to understeer(rear camber).

Are you saying then that a higher front camber value helps combat oversteer or makes the car more likely to oversteer and vice versa for rear camber?

 

[kayman]

Its usually done by comparing the tyre temperatures across the tyre, what you want is a even temperature across the whole tyre. If the inside is too hot then you need more camber if the outside is too hot then you need to add negative camber. Do a couple of laps and then see how the tyre has heated across the whole tyre, (this can also tell you if the pressures are too high or low, pressures are too low if both the inside and outside are hotter than the middle, and too high if the middle is hotter than the outside and inside)

Since GT5 doesnt have tyre temp or air pressure data you cant do it this way, instead you just have to go by corner exit speed, focus on one point after the exit of the corner, i find the end of a rumble strip works best, and what you want to do is aim for the highest speed. You'd have to do this for every critical corner on the track (the ones leading onto the big straights) and compare each setting.

In my opinion its just another one of the disappointing areas of GT5.

 

[MetroGS]

Are you saying then that a higher front camber value helps combat oversteer or makes the car more likely to oversteer and vice versa for rear camber?

This! I'd like to know aswell