Ok guys I have seen different views on this. Would someone explain it to me in speed? I see guys using harder and softer and it get messed up. I am a shouck guy for motorcycles and I wana know what they do. if you use a higher number for compression like 9 is that makeing the shock compress (slower or faster) and on the extension if you use a high number like 9 does the shock extend ( faster or slower). Thanks. Extenssion in real world isnt decribed as soft or hard. Its either faster or slower so the extession according to some the lower number makes the shock extend slower. Some a lower number makes the shock extend faster. Others use I think the word (Hard) for fast and the word (soft) for slow but im not sure. So thanks for the explaining it guys....
GT6 DAMPERS?
- Thread starter Tazz69
- 34 comments
- 9,530 views
- 6,318
- West Virginia
- HBR-Roadhog
- HBR Roadhog
Higher number on extension makes the shock extend faster and with more force. Helps to keep the tires in contact with the road but stiffens the ride.
Hard=Fast Soft=Slow on both directions of shock travel
Also note that harder on the front or rear will make the car drive differently in corners.
If the front is harder than the rear then you will get more understeer on entry and more oversteer on exit
If the rear is harder than the front then more oversteer on entry more understeer on exit.
The balance of these can be quite important in getting a car to drive the way you want it to
Hard=Fast Soft=Slow on both directions of shock travel
Also note that harder on the front or rear will make the car drive differently in corners.
If the front is harder than the rear then you will get more understeer on entry and more oversteer on exit
If the rear is harder than the front then more oversteer on entry more understeer on exit.
The balance of these can be quite important in getting a car to drive the way you want it to
- 864
- NorCal
- oppositelock27
This is not how dampers work, either in real life or in the game. Shocks do not extend the suspension with any sort of significant force, the springs do. Dampers only resist movement. The higher the number, the more resistance and therefore the stiffer the suspension.
- 6,318
- West Virginia
- HBR-Roadhog
- HBR Roadhog
A typical damper will resist being compressed and will try to extend. The stronger the damper the more force it will extend with after having been compressed. This is the way they work in real life.
- 864
- NorCal
- oppositelock27
Most shocks are gas pressurized to keep the oil from foaming. This pressure will cause them to extend when removed from the vehicle. The actual force of this pressure is insignificant, however. You can physically force the piston back in with your bare hands. The effect on vehicle handling is basically nil. What matters is the shock valving, which is what we're adjusting in the game.
OPPOSITELOCK yes you are correct. A real gas shock has no force either way. It is like the shock on your front door it is there to absorb the motion of the spring or resist movement. In real life a higher ext on a shock will keep the SPRING that has been compressed release to fast. And on comp it will help with soft springs from compressing to fast. So here we go agin lol. two different views. If it is in the game like real life than a high number comp will resist compression and let the spring compress slower. And a high number ext will allow the spring to uncompress slower. In real life on my race bikes and cars I run the ext higher than the comp because I run heavy springs and once compressed you dont want them to kick back up. So a higher value ext will stiffen the ride and allow the weight transfer to be slower and slow down the spring from uncompressing. Is this how the game works???
killerjimbag
(Banned)
- 4,018
- The Great White North
- abetterplaya
killerjimbag
(Banned)
- 4,018
- The Great White North
- abetterplaya
- 4,803
- Dearborn, MI
- MotorCtyHamilton
Well, yes and no. Only if it is designed to extend. Many road car struts (name for cheap shocks) do this, but most race car dampers do not. I have friends who work on NASCAR teams. We were in the NASCAR hauler for one of the teams and they showed me the rack of shocks that they bring to the races. For a short track like Bristol, their front shocks actually suck in. I had to put most of my weight onto the shock (no spring) just to get it to push in and then it did not move from there. We had to screw a shock end onto it and all three of us pull to get it to retract. On the other hand they had some shocks that would just sit in whatever position you pushed it to. Some had really easy compression and very hard extension. It was quite eye opening.
- 3,131
- IL, USA
- DigitalBaka
- DigitalBaka587
Essentially we are to think of the damper settings in terms of resistance, either more (higher) or less (lower).
Compression - Less resistance allows for soaking of bumps and allows more body movement. More resistance allows less body movement and is harder over bumps.
Extension - Less resistance allows the suspension to return to normal quickly, tire to return to the road quickly, springs to act more quickly, allow more body movement. More resistance allows less body movement and slows the springs, slows return to normal, slows return of the tire to the road.
Is that correct?
Compression - Less resistance allows for soaking of bumps and allows more body movement. More resistance allows less body movement and is harder over bumps.
Extension - Less resistance allows the suspension to return to normal quickly, tire to return to the road quickly, springs to act more quickly, allow more body movement. More resistance allows less body movement and slows the springs, slows return to normal, slows return of the tire to the road.
Is that correct?
- 140
- Chatham, Kent
- Gentoo64
Yes that's right. How come so many people think a higher value for extension means a faster return? It's the other way round, lower values for extension / compression = more spring like.
Easiest way is to just test yourself with extreme values like 1: 1/1 comp 8/8 ext then 2: 1/1 comp 1/1 ext you'll see the first one will not return quickly at all (dampers being used) and second one car will be bouncy (dampers not being used) of course it's always more noticeable with softer springs.
Jack Napier
(Banned)
- 120
- United States
What you guys might be thinking of is "rebound". This is when you (with spings not installed) compress the damper all the way and let the shock rod rebound out. Most often (but not always) this is set for no rebound however some offroad apliations will call for some rebound usually very minimal.
Think of the shock as a plunger with small holes in it. When you want it to resist comp or ext, increasing the thickness of the shock oil will make it harder for the plunger to go up and down squeezing the oil through the small holes. This can also be adjusted making the small holes on the plunger bigger or smaller. Piggybacks are ussed to add oil volume to stabalize the oil temp keeping the performance more uniform.
So IN GAME
Higher numbers mean higher level of resistance, you can say Slow, while lower numbers a lower level of resistance and therefore you could say Fast.
Think of the shock as a plunger with small holes in it. When you want it to resist comp or ext, increasing the thickness of the shock oil will make it harder for the plunger to go up and down squeezing the oil through the small holes. This can also be adjusted making the small holes on the plunger bigger or smaller. Piggybacks are ussed to add oil volume to stabalize the oil temp keeping the performance more uniform.
So IN GAME
Higher numbers mean higher level of resistance, you can say Slow, while lower numbers a lower level of resistance and therefore you could say Fast.
- 4,803
- Dearborn, MI
- MotorCtyHamilton
I have been pretty unhappy so far with dampers in GT6. It's odd. I am not finding the lap time gains that I could in GT5. When you equip the fully customizable suspension, the dampers come set at 3/3 front and rear. This setting has been the fasted on many cars so far. I have seen some rumblings about dampers being backward in GT6, but come on... can PD really not learn from their GT5 mistakes? Backward or labeled wrong (compression is really extension and visa verse) is just too convenient of an explanation. I could be wrong on that, but maybe it is something else.
My wild hypothesis: Are dampers unfinished in the game? Do they do next to nothing on purpose? Maybe that code has not been uploaded? We were to have a seven post rig in the game for use in tuning dampers. That isn't in the game yet, right? So maybe there is still additional testing going on and additional programming going on in order to make that seven post rig and dampers work. It would be a huge disappointment for their suspension partner, experts in damping, if that part of the game weren't something special. So I am thinking that maybe we will see a future update that makes dampers more lively.
Back to testing. Dampers have me puzzled at the moment, but my tunes are fast without them anyway.
My wild hypothesis: Are dampers unfinished in the game? Do they do next to nothing on purpose? Maybe that code has not been uploaded? We were to have a seven post rig in the game for use in tuning dampers. That isn't in the game yet, right? So maybe there is still additional testing going on and additional programming going on in order to make that seven post rig and dampers work. It would be a huge disappointment for their suspension partner, experts in damping, if that part of the game weren't something special. So I am thinking that maybe we will see a future update that makes dampers more lively.
Back to testing. Dampers have me puzzled at the moment, but my tunes are fast without them anyway.
- 548
- Newport Beach, CA
- TurismoSlayer
What worries me about the 7 post rig is that it will only be applicable to vehicles, mind you real vehicles, equipped with the GPS data visualizer. Go to the real track, data collected, upload data to visualizer in "so called" replay mode, KW rig evaluates collected data, we make adjustments, head back out to track.
I want to believe we can use it for all cars in game replay mode to tune to our hearts content but we will see hopefully sooner than later. I've read the description so many times I don't know what to think.
I want to believe we can use it for all cars in game replay mode to tune to our hearts content but we will see hopefully sooner than later. I've read the description so many times I don't know what to think.
- 140
- Chatham, Kent
- Gentoo64
The dampers are fine, and are even described correctly in the tuning settings description. They also work and are perfectly tunable.
The default setting of 3/3 on both is a decent default as it's responsive and neutral so maybe that's why you think it's fastest, it depends what you usually set them to when you tune. I can assure you you will almost always get a faster lap with other settings than 3/3 as a lot of cars can benefit from over / understeer, and more / less responsiveness, but it depends how you tune, you could be trying to counteract these with spring rates / AR bars but it might not be optimal ie if you have front springs set a lot softer than rear you will get oversteer but a saggy front end, so you may want to increase front AR bar or decrease rear to get a more solid turn-in, which might cause unwanted understeer at a certain point in a bend, in which damper oversteer can turn that into a nice, stable balanced tune.
- 4,803
- Dearborn, MI
- MotorCtyHamilton
My tunes are handling awesome without ever touching the dampers. Then when I change the dampers, the tune gets slower. You are mentioning a lot of other ways to solve a problem. The tune in current state is really good. I am just looking for a bit more corner grip all the way through - a bit more speed. So what now?
- 156
- United Kingdom
Dampers are a black art. They have to absorb the energy of the spring movement, reducing the reaction of the car body to the various different frequencies of bumps in the road and the natural frequencies of the car in ride, roll, and pitch, AND they have a role to play in the balance of the car during transitions. People write their doctorates on optimising damping, it's a massively complex subject.
Add to that the fact that GT6 runs it's physics simulation at 60Hz, which means it can miss out the effect of dampers in certain situations. It won't be 1:1 with real life.
Add to that the fact that there are no units on the tuning screen for dampers. For all we know the actual damper strength might change with spring stiffness, and all we are doing on the tuning screen is making it stiffer/softer from this default.
Add to that the fact that without telemetry we are relying totally on feel, and since this is a sim and not real life, the only feel we get is what the force feedback gives us.
Finally add to that the fact that tweaking the dampers will only get you a tiny improvement in lap times but getting them wrong will lose you lots of time.
Considering all that, IMHO you're better off just leaving them on default - at least until we get some decent suspension telemetry.
Add to that the fact that GT6 runs it's physics simulation at 60Hz, which means it can miss out the effect of dampers in certain situations. It won't be 1:1 with real life.
Add to that the fact that there are no units on the tuning screen for dampers. For all we know the actual damper strength might change with spring stiffness, and all we are doing on the tuning screen is making it stiffer/softer from this default.
Add to that the fact that without telemetry we are relying totally on feel, and since this is a sim and not real life, the only feel we get is what the force feedback gives us.
Finally add to that the fact that tweaking the dampers will only get you a tiny improvement in lap times but getting them wrong will lose you lots of time.
Considering all that, IMHO you're better off just leaving them on default - at least until we get some decent suspension telemetry.
- 757
- Paris
- BlueShift
There's no problems with dampers in the game...
It's been working like this in GT from GT1.
1 comp = soft comp = fast comp, 10 comp = hard comp = slow comp
1 ext = soft ext = slow ext, 10 ext = hard ext = fast ext.
Or, 1 = soft, 10 = hard.
You have to think a little with push/pull exemples in your head when translating into speeds.
For exemple, jumping on a spring mattress for 1 comp, or on a concrete floor for 10 comp, being punched in the face by a child for 1 ext or Mike Tyson for 10 ext.
You also can see like this : for ext > comp, Mike Tyson is punching a spring mattress, the car can be more violent to the road (top speeds stability), for comp > ext, a child is punching concrete, the road can be more violent to the car (agility stability).
Cars that top speed also have high ammount of aero, so I'm thinking that you still can get comp>ext on those cars but it a matter of personal driving tastes.
etc, etc, this debate is endless. Both tuning schools gets results anyway. There's one that forbid weigth transfer (comp>ext) and one that come along and redirect it (ext > comp). That's a matter of the tuner perception and driving tastes.
Nothing is "backward". Mike Tyson punching a spring mattress works and child punching concrete works too but you don't drive the two car the same way.
People just can't understand the way how the other half tune and call them backward, that is all.
Every tuner should try the tunes of the "other school" to enhance their comprehension of the physics.
In GT5, comp>ext tunes here were 10-20% of the tuners and had excellent results in tuning competitions so the school you defend is not really the one "truth". I'm used to be "the dumb guy" anyway. When people try my cars, they must say I'm a lucky dumb guy
Well, now... A third, obscure school exist, known as the "dark school"..., ie cross front comp > ext and rear ext > comp or the opposite. That works, if you want to drift or oppose to a drifting RR, go on. That really work, but it's highly undocumented.
And a fourth one, a comp = ext, Spring/RH/AR/Camber leaded which PD use by default, this, are real undocumented secrets (well I have my ideas)
It's been working like this in GT from GT1.
1 comp = soft comp = fast comp, 10 comp = hard comp = slow comp
1 ext = soft ext = slow ext, 10 ext = hard ext = fast ext.
Or, 1 = soft, 10 = hard.
You have to think a little with push/pull exemples in your head when translating into speeds.
For exemple, jumping on a spring mattress for 1 comp, or on a concrete floor for 10 comp, being punched in the face by a child for 1 ext or Mike Tyson for 10 ext.
You also can see like this : for ext > comp, Mike Tyson is punching a spring mattress, the car can be more violent to the road (top speeds stability), for comp > ext, a child is punching concrete, the road can be more violent to the car (agility stability).
Cars that top speed also have high ammount of aero, so I'm thinking that you still can get comp>ext on those cars but it a matter of personal driving tastes.
etc, etc, this debate is endless. Both tuning schools gets results anyway. There's one that forbid weigth transfer (comp>ext) and one that come along and redirect it (ext > comp). That's a matter of the tuner perception and driving tastes.
Nothing is "backward". Mike Tyson punching a spring mattress works and child punching concrete works too but you don't drive the two car the same way.
People just can't understand the way how the other half tune and call them backward, that is all.
Every tuner should try the tunes of the "other school" to enhance their comprehension of the physics.
In GT5, comp>ext tunes here were 10-20% of the tuners and had excellent results in tuning competitions so the school you defend is not really the one "truth". I'm used to be "the dumb guy" anyway. When people try my cars, they must say I'm a lucky dumb guy
Well, now... A third, obscure school exist, known as the "dark school"...
, ie cross front comp > ext and rear ext > comp or the opposite. That works, if you want to drift or oppose to a drifting RR, go on. That really work, but it's highly undocumented.And a fourth one, a comp = ext, Spring/RH/AR/Camber leaded which PD use by default, this, are real undocumented secrets
(well I have my ideas)
Last edited:
- 140
- Chatham, Kent
- Gentoo64
You still have it wrong. 1 = least resistance 10 = most resistance
This isn't even hard to test it takes 1 minute to test a car at 1 then 10. You have compression right but extension the wrong way round.
For compression and extension, 1 is the equivalent of a spring (fast) 10 is the equivalent of a gas lift computer chair (slow)
Go on nordschleife (lots of nice damper happy sweepers) put compression at 1/1 extension at 1/1 you will find the car springy, as the dampers bounce right back quickly as they have no resistance.
Then try compression 1/1 extension 10/10 you will find going round the bends the car will lean on one side and feel floaty, because the weight is being kept down by the slow (high number) extension.
This is why if you set extension too high you can't change from left / right and vice versa quickly as you have to wait for the damper to come back up and make the car feel very unresponsive.
Lower extension numbers make the car feel more agile, but can cause sudden loss of grip if it extends too quickly. This is why a lot of people find the default values driveable as 3/3 compression is neutral and quite low stiffness and 3/3 extension is pretty quick extension but not too quick.
3/3 compression and 5/5 extension will make the car feel less agile, and understeer more but have more grip around bends
3/3 compression and 1/1 extension will make the car more agile and oversteer more but have less grip
If I tune my dampers for oversteer on extension, and use something like 2/2 compression 6/5 extension I would test it and if it oversteers later than I wanted it to, I would just change the extension to 5/4 and try that, or 4/3 etc until it oversteers at the time I want it to.
This isn't even hard to test it takes 1 minute to test a car at 1 then 10. You have compression right but extension the wrong way round.
For compression and extension, 1 is the equivalent of a spring (fast) 10 is the equivalent of a gas lift computer chair (slow)
Go on nordschleife (lots of nice damper happy sweepers) put compression at 1/1 extension at 1/1 you will find the car springy, as the dampers bounce right back quickly as they have no resistance.
Then try compression 1/1 extension 10/10 you will find going round the bends the car will lean on one side and feel floaty, because the weight is being kept down by the slow (high number) extension.
This is why if you set extension too high you can't change from left / right and vice versa quickly as you have to wait for the damper to come back up and make the car feel very unresponsive.
Lower extension numbers make the car feel more agile, but can cause sudden loss of grip if it extends too quickly. This is why a lot of people find the default values driveable as 3/3 compression is neutral and quite low stiffness and 3/3 extension is pretty quick extension but not too quick.
3/3 compression and 5/5 extension will make the car feel less agile, and understeer more but have more grip around bends
3/3 compression and 1/1 extension will make the car more agile and oversteer more but have less grip
If I tune my dampers for oversteer on extension, and use something like 2/2 compression 6/5 extension I would test it and if it oversteers later than I wanted it to, I would just change the extension to 5/4 and try that, or 4/3 etc until it oversteers at the time I want it to.
Last edited:
Jack Napier
(Banned)
- 120
- United States
- 757
- Paris
- BlueShift
A child is punching a spring mattress, yup, that's springy.
I don't disagree with the physical aspect, but I don't understand what you want to explain.
1/1 10/10 mean nobody can test this accuratly. You just made a catapult when braking, of course your weigth is all messed up.
Comp will compress fast then a 10x strength will put back to fully extended.
You say no problems since that strength is slow, I say maybe the ext works slow, I say it's not 10x slower but it's 10x more strength allready, so it's faster to get back than 1/1 1/1.
I'll try that anyway. That's interesting.
No, that's because the comp is lower than ext. meaning you have to wait for the weigth to travel before turning.
You have turn 1, blam compression then turning, turn 2, blam compression then turning.
That's what I'm calling redirection / weigth come along. You don't figth it, you want it coming so after it came you can turn.
It's typically slower to wait for it coming than to find an figthing equilibrium before it came because you can allready turn, by figthing it, there will be no "blam".
Turning under a "blam" will make you loose grip, there "sudden loss of grip" doesn't belong to one school in particuliar.
Not at all. People finds them drivable because of the stupid 0.2 rear toe, remove it, the car become either bricks or soaps, especially without camber. All even/even setups 0/0 camber will have corner entry or exit problems (not speaking about the low pp cars kind), that's not really what I call good road adaptation.
Under your model, the "child" is faster than mike tyson (so let's use a "fat guy" instead), under mine tyson is faster, do we agree ?
Imho is you want to compare honestly, try c3-3 e5-5 vs c5-5 e3-3 or c3-3 e1-1 vs c1-1 e3-3 whatever you set your SR/RH but you will see the grip in curve is out of the question. You should compare corner entry or corner exit instead, that's what you call "agile". Now compare the speeds in apex before loosing grip. You said comp > exp car loose grip in apex... Yeah, sure they really do... They are just faster in apex, speed greed just helped that.
That one's just easy to find and prove. High speed ring last curve, or the ring in Cape Ring. You won't have the same speeds. c3/3 e5/5 will typically be slower than c5/5 e3/3, c5/5 e3/3 will loose grip at way higher speeds than c3/3 e5/5, that's a garanty.
- 156
- United Kingdom
They absorb the energy of the tuner too, fine tuning them + RH/SR is the most difficult part of the car imho.
Apart for your conclusion, I'm in perfect harmony
Maybe I should qualify my conclusion with "If you have fists of ham like me, it's not worth playing with them"
While I remember I'll post this link up that talks about how to change your car's balance during transitions via dampers:
http://www.ozebiz.com.au/racetech/theory/shocktune1.html
The table of adjustments halfway down is really useful.
- 14
- whitepanther65
- 2,643
- Finland
- OdeFinn
Ext 3/3 resist less body roll on cornering and your car mass tends to go over(inner side of car will rise more, more weight movement toward outer side), pushing outer wheels more till braking traction and oversteer starts. BUT this depends on your front vs.rear spring ratio and anti-roll bar setup, if ratio/arb direct mass more to front you'll get more understeer, and if mass is directed to rear you'll get understeer.
So you have see whole package before making any bigger conclusions.
Even with camber/toe setup or aero you can "trigger" traction loss on other end than springs/dampers/etc are otherwise directing it.
Edit: back to your example, it can also work opposite way i.e. Running with camber and stiff springs traction will be increased on inner wheel by dynamic camber change and outer side has enough stiffness to carry bigger load. No simple answer available
Or one simple answer, it's all about balance..
Last edited:
- 14
- whitepanther65
- 2,643
- Finland
- OdeFinn
Soft compress works on outer side, soft extend inner side.
Outer= how much it compress, side goes closer to ground.
Inner= how much it extends, side rises higher from ground.
You can "clue" sides together with ARB
- 14
- whitepanther65
Edit: back to your example, it can also work opposite way i.e. Running with camber and stiff springs traction will be increased on inner wheel by dynamic camber change and outer side has enough stiffness to carry bigger load. No simple answer available
Or one simple answer, it's all about balance..
Sorry, I don't understand. Dynamic camber increases traction on inner wheel IF springs are stiff? And if they're soft? Maybe the outer side can be stiff enough, but what's the conclusion?
This I understand
. Overall, I'm going nuts with GT6 setup....
- 2,643
- Finland
- OdeFinn
Stiffness is needed on outer side to carry increasing weight load, soft damper extension allows inner suspension extend and installed camber value changes dynamically closer to zero camber (or even switching to positive camber) maintaining better/bigger traction pad on ground, so increasing grip there.
Edit: try to visualise force vector in your mind, where mass tries to travel, stiff dampers and vector points more straight outward, slightly down and up, softer dampers and vectors are more up-out and down-out on sides.
Last edited:
