- 1,326
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Pics or it never happened! haha. I think some people just get excited when you tout stats like "I'm getting over 20 pounds at the rim" people just want to know how they can too.
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Fanatec CSW/CSR Elite Modders Thread *UPDATE February 2014*
- Thread starter eKretz
- 3,607 comments
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- Eric_J2358
Yeah I have been getting lots of good help and info from RXX while we communicate through emails too guys. He's got some cool stuff cooking, don't worry, it'll all come out eventually! That cooling jump sounds great, I hope it ends up working out as good as it sounds!
As far as the 20 pounds at the rim, like RXX said, that's easy. My 2 Bühlers accomplish that at the Formula wheelrim @ a bit over 30V now that I got rid of the slip, and RXX's method does the same. All you need is stronger motors or more motors and a better power supply. The only thing you've got to work on is cooling, and it sounds like RXX has had a leap there.
Mr. Holmes may be able to give us a great solution also. In our last email we were discussing neodymium magnets and possible use of brushless motors and how the board is driving the motors right now, so he's looking at all the angles here as well.
As far as the 20 pounds at the rim, like RXX said, that's easy. My 2 Bühlers accomplish that at the Formula wheelrim @ a bit over 30V now that I got rid of the slip, and RXX's method does the same. All you need is stronger motors or more motors and a better power supply. The only thing you've got to work on is cooling, and it sounds like RXX has had a leap there.
Mr. Holmes may be able to give us a great solution also. In our last email we were discussing neodymium magnets and possible use of brushless motors and how the board is driving the motors right now, so he's looking at all the angles here as well.
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- Eric_J2358
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention also: I picked up a used Formula rim from a guy on iRacing for a pretty good price that I'm goin to mod into a nice GT wheel. I'm not a big fan of the BMW rim. I think I'm going to go with a Sparco 270 as my base wheel:
And RXX, I am curious to hear your take on the coreless motors for sure, I found a 38mm dia. 63mm long monster from Faulhaber I think it was that's good for something like 1400 mNm of torque at stall!
And RXX, I am curious to hear your take on the coreless motors for sure, I found a 38mm dia. 63mm long monster from Faulhaber I think it was that's good for something like 1400 mNm of torque at stall!
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- Eric_J2358
That is a very good point. I guess I was asking more or less just to hear your input on the technical aspects of the coreless motor. I'm a curious cat! 
I noticed that the coreless I mentioned has amazing torque levels but rotor inertia is higher than my Bühler motor. I thought they were supposed to be really good in that area.
I noticed that the coreless I mentioned has amazing torque levels but rotor inertia is higher than my Bühler motor. I thought they were supposed to be really good in that area.
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- MarkyParky79
Hi guys I missed a lot of stuff in the thread due to RL. I was just wondering about the motor swap, as it's been mentioned. Could someone with no experience swap out the fanatec one's for a better motor easily enough or are there specialist tools or skills needed?
I assume one could if Fanatec is now sending out replacement motor packs. But are there any worries with using different motors like the Buhlers?
I assume one could if Fanatec is now sending out replacement motor packs. But are there any worries with using different motors like the Buhlers?
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- Eric_J2358
It's no big deal to swap in a new set of stock motors, as long as you're somewhat mechanically inclined and maybe a little electrically (in case you need to swap motor leads for instance). Swapping in Bühler motors or switching to a Four-Buchi setup would require more specialized skills and knowledge though. RXX is an engineer and I am a machinist, and both of these were handy with some of our respective mods. So far there is no really good drop-in solution. We're both trying a lot of things though so who knows what is to come. Keep following the thread and watching for announcements!
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- MarkyParky79
Thanks much appreciated! I'll keep reading, I've probably 18 months or so of my warrenty to go, but it's nice to know the option is there to put in something more reliable. If it was too complicated for myself I'm sure I could find someone local.
I'll look forward to your results guys.
I'll look forward to your results guys.
- 1,326
- SC
@racerxx, I can't help but feel like I am one of the "posers" in this thread because I don't contribute technically to the discussion. I do however try any keep my coments brief and lighthearted so I am sorry if you feel like some are whining at you, that was never MY intention. I am very interested in your work because I have yet to even take the plunge on a CSW, but when I do I hope there are lots of motor and cooling mods that others like yourself help blazed a trail to become reality for us less technically inclined (like myself). Please ignore some people who dont have proper forum maners and like most people get impatient when they see something they want in the experimental phase and dont want to wait till the big reveal to see behind the curtain. Its so easy in a chat forum to forget that people take things personally when you make critcal comments, so keep up the good work and ignore the negativity - a lot of people are watching that simply cant contribute at the level you and ekretz are.
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- MadRR
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention also: I picked up a used Formula rim from a guy on iRacing for a pretty good price that I'm goin to mod into a nice GT wheel. I'm not a big fan of the BMW rim. I think I'm going to go with a Sparco 270 as my base wheel:
Awesome. I posted pics a couple pages back of the one guy off the iracing forums that made his own wheel like that. I would like to do one myself. Please post pics once you get done as I would like to see how it turns out.
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- Eric_J2358
No one has told me you were sending bad PMs. In fact no one has even mentioned you at all. We're not gossip mongers, haha. When I email back and forth with RXX it's usually because I'm asking him for advice on electronics stuff, he knows his stuff pretty good, and I'm still learning about the electronic circuitry side of things.
Edit: well, hmm. I'm not real sure what happened there.
Yeah, that one inspired me to take the same approach, since you need to have the wheel electronics for the base to function right with it. I didn't think I would ever see a formula rim come up for a decent price though and then one jumped up right under my nose. I'll be sure and post up when it's finished. It may be a while with all the other stuff on the burner though. On top of that I'm sick again and feeling like crap for the last few days. Sucks to have a woman who works with the public all day sometimes, heh.
We're not gossip mongers, haha. When I email back and forth with RXX it's usually because I'm asking him for advice on electronics stuff, he knows his stuff pretty good, and I'm still learning about the electronic circuitry side of things.Edit: well, hmm. I'm not real sure what happened there.
Yeah, that one inspired me to take the same approach, since you need to have the wheel electronics for the base to function right with it. I didn't think I would ever see a formula rim come up for a decent price though and then one jumped up right under my nose. I'll be sure and post up when it's finished. It may be a while with all the other stuff on the burner though. On top of that I'm sick again and feeling like crap for the last few days. Sucks to have a woman who works with the public all day sometimes, heh.
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- MadRR
That's cool just whenever you get it done. I would like to try and do one myself at some point to make a oval wheel. I saw that rim on the iracing forums Im pretty sure and thought about picking it up too but it will probably be a little while before I take on that kind of project so figured I'd hold off.
- 1,326
- SC
I'm sure that is often the case! The young and restless can simply start creating their own mods in the mean time. ALL of us can create, not just a few people. Just do it as Nike says. I'm looking forward to seeing detailed sim mod photos and videos and posts from some of the whiners lol. But I won't be holding my breath.
Okay for some that have been lurking for all of this time, how about seeing some of your ideas?
Take one part:
And some paper:
Then add some sweat:
Finally, post it in this here thread darn it lol:
You were asked to do this precisely and acting like a child about it by ignoring me. Ridiculous behavior.
- 2,858
- Australia
It would be nice if I could have assistance in making this my last Dr. Phil-esque post in this thread.
It makes a big difference when dealing with something that is "your thing". By that I mean that while I love the idea of messing with and improving my sim gear, it is nowhere near related to a) my line of work, and b) what I excel at. If I have a great idea in the sim gear department, I will be completely transparent. However, trying to source ground breaking sound production ideas from me? Good luck!
Surely it is not too much to ask to at least allow someone to present things in what they believe to be a completed state? Many if not most innovators have an obsessive character, a trait that can marry very uncomfortably with a premature, inaccurately received, or flawed reveal of the results of their "blood, sweat and tears".
It makes a big difference when dealing with something that is "your thing". By that I mean that while I love the idea of messing with and improving my sim gear, it is nowhere near related to a) my line of work, and b) what I excel at. If I have a great idea in the sim gear department, I will be completely transparent. However, trying to source ground breaking sound production ideas from me? Good luck!
Surely it is not too much to ask to at least allow someone to present things in what they believe to be a completed state? Many if not most innovators have an obsessive character, a trait that can marry very uncomfortably with a premature, inaccurately received, or flawed reveal of the results of their "blood, sweat and tears".
- 2,858
- Australia
For something that is somewhat on topic: RXX, as a current Fanatec GT3 and future CSW owner I am interested to know how much you feel you got out of your CSR vs say... the stock Elite. Basically, I am wondering if I should be looking at my GT3 as a sacrificial lamb of sorts that I risk ruining in the process of delving into stuff I have no experience with (cooling, motor, drag reduction mods), or could the GT3 (very similar to CSR) achieve a fairly high level of performance?
Significantly improved GT3 = cautiously start soon. Not so improved = wait to get CSW and not be quite so scared to plunder the GT3 as a test case.
Your opinion on a subjective feel comparison would be greatly appreciated.
Significantly improved GT3 = cautiously start soon. Not so improved = wait to get CSW and not be quite so scared to plunder the GT3 as a test case.
Your opinion on a subjective feel comparison would be greatly appreciated.
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This is how I look at it, as an experienced amateur racer, and as an Engineer.
Sim racing is fun as hell. However it has a way to go compared to actual car racing. It can get the rust off you for real racing and online you can have really great battles.
I ran some CSRs for a bit, and modded one of them. Went to an Elite and found it more refined and smoother/nicer. I think the CSW/Elites are the wheels to get if you love modding. The platform is very, Very, VERY mod friendly. And as eK and I have shown, you can lightly mod the CSW/Elite electronics to allow more motor drive capacity. The CSR and Porsche wheels are much more limited in that regard. This is because there is little room in the motor zone, and the circuitry is pretty amperage limited. The plastic frame is what it is and it is hard to change, partly due to being on an angle. The CSW/Elite has the bits all out in the open and without the angle. They add back that angle via that sheet metal thing bolted to the bottom of the CSW/Elite base. CSRs can take more voltage however and I used to run my modded CSR at around 30 volts. This gave it about 25% more power / wheel speed.
Let's talk about immersion versus setting good track times. You can have a lot of each or mostly one or the other. The present state of FFB helps subjective "immersion". The impression that you are driving a real car. Cockpits, three monitor rigs and tactile transducers also help immersion. And FFB can give you car control clues which you can use to help your driving. Mostly it is about immersion though.
This is pretty eye opening. Try driving your wheel with in-game FFB totally off, but in-wheel Dri set maybe 3-5 on an Elite or maybe 4-5 on a CSR…FFB at 100%, spring and damp off. Basically set it so that you are getting no FFB but simply countersteer speed benefits. No road feel, no jars at the wheel if you hit a wall, nothing. Many of my very best time splits on some favorite tracks are done doing that or similar. The ultraquick countersteer or correction capability (from using Dri to slash drag) combined with no FFB to hurt a driving line entering a turn can help you find speed. Combine that with steering set on the sensitive side and you can find lap time.
A week or so back we were talking about wheel speed. More feels livelier. But that is mostly during FFB events and so a bit less relevant. I will mess with different wheel speeds over time looking for lap time. In which case it will help countersteer and corrections mostly. But will it show up on a stop watch?
From my limited experience over the last few months back to sim racing shows me that I found speed in three ways. Steering et like above for zero FFB, pedals set firmer and with my Quick Release brake mod in place, and with ACL and paddle shifting. Of those three things, only the 2nd also helps feel / immersion.
So…if I am driving for a time I run LESS FFB. Typically ZERO. And for fun I run more FFB using my motor mods. Over time I expect to find a better balance but doubt I'll be able to set my fastest times using the highest FFB settings. I had a little fall off my bicycle the other day and slightly sprained my right wrist. I absolutely could not run high FFB with my wrist under the weather like that. A modded CSW/Elite can run lots more wheel speed and torque than stock. It can feel brutal compared to stock. Hit something during a rally and have 9-10-13 amps of current changing into torque along with more wheel speed (from voltage bumps) and you'll notice. So cool.
So back to your question. Try setting up your wheel for zero FFB but as much Dri as you can stand and check your time splits over portions of a lap on a course you have run alot. I would not be surprised to see you report time benefits compared to laps run with heavy FFB. Add high effort / short travel brakes such as load cell units and you'll find time. Add the Quick Release / Zero Rebound mod and gain more time and immersion. Make sure you have Sens and Lin set towards speedy. You should be able to run times comparable to an Elite. A CSR is only a pound or so weaker at the rim than an Elite BTW. However the steering is a bit less precise due to being measured at the motor shaft after first passing through two belts.
So…do you want mostly immersion? Or mostly lap times? The latter is cheaper to achieve! Both? We might not be there yet. Perhaps the three time savers I noted above are a bit of an artificial advantage. "The Unfair Advantage" as Mark Donuhue wrote in his book? You can kind of see intellectually that ACL can be like that. Try about any car on a drag strip and then use ACL and chop a few tenths of a second off your best times.
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Great work eKretz! It's nice to see some actual progress. 👍
However...
This image and accompanying text bother me. While you surely do not intend anything bad to happen... You have a power supply there (DCS 60-18E) capable of outputting 60 volts at 18 amps. And your child apparently has unsupervised access to this piece of hardware. This is extremely dangerous.
Maybe I am just being a caution mother. However, you should be very careful. Many people do not understand the dangers of low voltage.
However...
As you can see, the dervish in question just loves to push buttons and twiddle knobs. To make a long story short, he tweaked my power supply voltage up when I wasn't looking and next thing I knew, my wheel was being run at 52V. Luckily, the damaged component is pretty low cost, all told we're looking at about $1 plus shipping and a little bit of soldering. Lesson learned. I had my overvoltage protection set but had tweaked it up to work on something else and forgot to set it to 40V again. I guess I'm going to need to make covers for the adjusting knobs.
This image and accompanying text bother me. While you surely do not intend anything bad to happen... You have a power supply there (DCS 60-18E) capable of outputting 60 volts at 18 amps. And your child apparently has unsupervised access to this piece of hardware. This is extremely dangerous.
Maybe I am just being a caution mother. However, you should be very careful. Many people do not understand the dangers of low voltage.
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- Eric_J2358
No, I don't mind, trust me. That little guy is the most valuable thing in the world to me! The outputs are in the rear of this unit, completely out of his reach and covered with a nonconductive box. He only has access to the adjusting knobs, and even those I now have covered. There are no exposed connections that could harm him and I keep it unplugged when not in use.
Thanks for your concern though!
Thanks for your concern though!
- 2,858
- Australia
Thank you for such an in depth response. For me it is immersion all the way, with lap times being more of a competition against myself with same setup. The problem at the moment is that the "grit" in the GT3 is bothering me. I am assuming that it is a case of toothed belt vs v-belt? Also, I actually end up turning ffb down to IMPROVE immersion because I find the somewhat "notchy" feel with subtle resistance distracting. My settings have evolved a lot over time, I never expected to touch the linearity setting but I am having fun experimenting with lin/sen offsets. I like the idea of the wheel only being "alive" when it should be. Watching a video of a beastly (Bodnar?) wheel, the driver seems to have trouble controlling the thing just driving a straight line. Not sure if that's realism in reality, but it's not realism as an extension of my reality, and my experience of real life driving. Either way, that's not what I am seeking.
It really looks like the CSW is for me since it seems to be the smoothest option to start from. Once procured I might brave mutating my GT3 as a training procedure. Ultimately what I would like is to have something that gets brutal when the virtual vehicle is subjected to brutal lateral forces, but would not be trying to tear me to shreds at every moment.
For the most part I have so far been mucking around with my CSP. Inverted them, threw on an rc damper, which was really easy for anyone else with CSP v1s . It is even possible to add damper without drilling into anything using a 120mm damper stretching between the top pivot point available on the brake and the grub screw for the load cell. As it turns out the screws I received with the damper threaded perfectly to replace the grub, and aside from a nut and bolt everything I needed came with the dampers. Another small thing was changing the accelerator spring so that full travel is when the spring is fully compressed rather than when the rod hits it's furthest point (feels good to me). Rods are also very easy to replace with different lengths. All one needs to do is buy the correct bolt and cut it to size. I did this before I realised that I wanted my travel distance to be determined by the spring instead. For another neanderthal tech thing I am going to work on something to damper where the heel of the pedals meet the base, as that "clack" sound is not pleasant or realistic in my view.
Maybe I should start a neanderthal mods thread?
Hopefully there are others that are trying to make small improvements without really having training or experience to draw upon though.
