How would you set up a Skyline for rally?

[Bulldozer]

I guess I ought to start by asking if the Skyline (R34) is a decent car for rally?

I'm relatively new to GT3 - I've completed most of the beginner league, and I'm starting to look into rally. One of the walkthroughs I looked at said something like, " After you get your Altezza, put some dirt tires on it and go win the Smokey Mountain Rally..." HA! I got smoked. Now I'm trying the first Rally series with the Skyline R34.

OK, I know I suck at driving and need more practice, but I'd also appreciate some advice on the settings. I've bought a lot of add-ons - FC transmission, FC suspension, the triple plate clutch, racing flywheel, etc. I've done some engine mods, but I haven't added any turbo yet. I'm at 403HP.

I searched for rally settings and didn't find much to help except for a GT4 thread by Karras85 (thanks Karras!). Here are the settings as I have them now:
Spring rate: 7.0 / 6.0
Ride Ht: 117 / 125
bound: 4 / 4
rebound: 4 / 4
camber: 2.0 / 1.0
toe: 0 / 0
stabilizer: 3 / 3
brake balance: 10 / 12
LSD: I bought the FC differential, but left it at stock settings
gears: auto 24
downforce: (rear) .47
ASM: 3
TCS: 3

Are these reasonable?
What would you recommend changing?
I haven't bought the VCD control yet. Would it help?

I guess I should say that my biggest problem is getting the back end under control at the end of a turn. I think the term I'm looking for is "too much corner exit oversteer."

And if it turns out I can't blame the settings after all, how about some driving technique pointers? Thanks.

 

[Duke]

Actually, if you install the VCD you can bias the power delivery more towards the front wheels, which is a cheap easy fix. You can also crank up the rear downforce if that's adjustable.

Try raising the front rebound to 6 or 8, which will help you get the load onto the back wheels under acceleration for better traction, and so will reducing the rear spring rate a little. Also, stiffening the front stabilizer bar to 5 or so will probably help a little. A little toe in at the rear can help keep a wandering back end planted.

Now, with suspension tuning, all things are a compromise. All of the tips above will generate understeer, and might adversely affect your turn-in and mid-corner behaviour. You'll have to experiment a bit to find a good balance.

On driving tips, the only thing I can say is be gentle on the throttle. Also, consider staying a gear higher than you would normally in order to reduce wheelspin.

If you don't already use them, switch to the analog sticks for both steering and gas/brake. That allows more careful throttle control. Better than that, even is too look at a wheel/pedal set.

Good luck,

 

[Bulldozer]

Controls are definitely an issue - I tried a cheap wheel/pedal set, but there was a dead zone in the steering and the pedals didn't have a good response. I just switched back to the handheld controllers. (I'm not willing to spend the real money for the Logitech wheel and pedals.) But I'll look into using the stick for gas/brakes instead of the buttons. That sounds like it would be a major improvement.

I'll try adjusting those settings next chance I get. Thanks for the help!

 

[KAMKA-Z]

I was thinking softer springs and more ride height maybe too. I won my first rallies with a Skyline too. Some places I really struggled with it mostly because I was new to the game and still figuring out tuning. I used settings from www.gtvault.com as a rough guideline and made adjustments for my style from there. Scaff's tuning guide (available elsewhere at this site) is very helpful in understanding tuning adjustments.

The Skyline I used had adjustable rear downforce only. It will get very airborne (and way out of control) at Smoky Mountain. I give a quick stab at the brakes just before the top of the big rises. That helps keep your "hang time" down and gets you back down where you have traction to turn and such. I haven't run my skyline at a rally in a long time. I'm curious to see just what I was using for settings.

I use an older madcatz mc2 wheel set up in a natural driving position. You can adjust the dead space somewhat. I think there's maybe too much delay between input and response. I'd like to try a logitec but I'm too cheap right now.

 

[Duke]

If you buy a Logitec wheel, make sure to get the Driving Force Pro or G25. The Momo and other versions do not work with GT4.

I wasn't paying attention to the ride height, but KAMA-Z is probably right. Rally cars are surprisingly high and soft because they need the suspension travel.

He's also right about the big jump on Smokey Mountain - on the one where you go from paving down over the big jump, you want to brake hard for a bit just before you go off the tarmac so that you don't jump too far and smack the wall at the following turn.

One other place to save big time is at the bottom end of the tarmac preceding that big jump. As you come down the dirt hill to the bottom turn (and the surface change), get the car rotated early so that you stop sliding sideways before you cross onto the paving. If you come onto the tarmac sideways and with the wheels spinning hard, you will lose a lot of time in tire smoke.

 

[Scaff]

Scaff's tuning guide (available elsewhere at this site) is very helpful in understanding tuning adjustments.

Thanks for the praise 👍 . The guides in question can be found here....

https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/showthread.php?t=74244

...and while written specifically for GT4, can be directly applied to GT3 as well.

Any questions about them, don't hesitate to ask.

Regards

Scaff

 

[Parnelli Bone]

Bro, the most obvious thing you're missing is front downforce.

i've actually never driven an R34 in GT3 yet (don't know if i will) but it looks as though you can't adjust the front downforce. Get a car that you can modify this with and it'll work wonders. Keep in mind that in rally races all the AI cars have full-modifyable downforce...it seems silly (but possible) to try attempting rallies in a car that you can't control so much, but that's just me.

Also (as Duke pointed out) the analog sticks are much more flexible than the buttons. I only use buttons when i'm at the Test Course since all you're doing is going full steam ahead.

and welcome to gT3

 

[Bulldozer]

Well, I switched to analog controls. I set the right thumbstick to acceleration (forward) and brake (back). I can see how it's important, but I'm still getting used to the different feel.

"Gentle on the throttle" is probably the most important thing I need to learn. But when the AI car is far ahead it's just so tempting to floor it. I know it's counter-productive.

Scaff, I downloaded your tuning guides and those are amazing! I'll be putting them to good use later on, when I'm driving more consistently and will be able to actually feel the difference. Come to think of it, I probably won't be able to feel tuning differences very well on dirt tracks, 'cause once I start sliding... Maybe I should try adjustments on a paved track first, then see how they translate to unpaved.

Here's a question: after increasing ride height and reducing spring rate, what are the main differences in setting up for dirt vs. pavement?

The prize for Tahiti Maze is a Ford Escort Rally Car, and the prize for Smokey Mountain is the Focus Rally Car. Are those decent cars for the rest of the rally events? Or at least the next 2 or 3?

Thanks for the welcome Parnelli, and thanks to everybody for the help.

 

[Duke]

I never really looked into it, but I imagine camber plays a bigger role on tarmac than it does in the dirt.

And yeas, the Escort and Focus rally cars are both very competent for what you'll be doing with them.

One question I have to ask - have you lightened the Skyline? It's a heavy car, and that's bad on dirt (and in general). Try doing Lightweight 1 and 2 on it (not too much money) and see if that helps. If it's not quite enough, then do LW 3 as well.

 

[Scaff]

Scaff, I downloaded your tuning guides and those are amazing! I'll be putting them to good use later on, when I'm driving more consistently and will be able to actually feel the difference. Come to think of it, I probably won't be able to feel tuning differences very well on dirt tracks, 'cause once I start sliding... Maybe I should try adjustments on a paved track first, then see how they translate to unpaved.

Thanks for the feedback and glad you like the guides, I hope they will prove useful.

In regards to 'feeling' the effect of adjustments, most people do find it easier to begin with on tarmac in comparison to dirt. That said some setting can be very difficult to judge under any circumstances, LSD adjustments being a classic example.

Here's a question: after increasing ride height and reducing spring rate, what are the main differences in setting up for dirt vs. pavement?

The very rough differences between tarmac and dirt tracks are that tarmac will generally allow you to run the car lower and stiffer. As Duke mentioned camber is one area in which dirt set-ups are generally lower. One of the biggest ones (outside of a general raising of ride height and softening of springs is that of damper settings.

The issue on dirt tracks is that you are at some point going to leave the ground (and on most tarmac tracks this is not a factor we need to account for), so bound and rebound need to be looked at.

Now keep in mind that dampers have almost no control over how much the wheel will travel when hitting a bump, landing, etc. That's the job of the springs. However the dampers play a role in how quickly the car will react to the force of the impact. So we need to rebound slightly higher than bound, this ensures that after the car lands its not immediately launched skywards again as the springs expand.

I did put together a write-up for GT4 that may be of interest, it was a back to back tarmac and gravel set-up for a Clio V6. Now I know the car is different (as is the game), but it will allow you to compare the two different approaches.

https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/showpost.php?p=2092981&postcount=420

The link above will take you to the write-up and pictures and the settings can be found in the .pdf file linked at the very bottom of the post.


Regards

Scaff

 

[Bulldozer]

Just wanted to check in and say that I won the first Rally series and got the Celica Rally Car. First car I've won that has any after-market performance parts. Nice.

I had a question about the anti-sway bars for Rally. Scaff, I noticed that you recommend setting them very low. I'm guessing that's because
1) The really sharp turns are done sliding, so there's less side-to-side weight transfer to worry about, and
2) They add stiffness to the springs (at least during a turn) , and we want low spring rates to go with our high ride heights.

Is that right?

Scaff, your guide cleared up something about brake tuning for me too. I was setting my brake balance to something like 15/10, because I thought that only the ratio mattered. Now I understand that I probably need to change that to 6/4 or even 3/2 to keep from locking up my brakes all the time. (or at least causing my ABS to activate.)

Duke, to answer your question I bought just about everything I could for the Skyline, except for the turbo stages and the VCD. I have at least LW 2. If I use the Skyline any more I'll invest in LW3 and the VCD.

 

[Parnelli Bone]

You're right about the sway bars. You gotta set them lower on dirt than tarmac. In fact, i set my sways low at Seattle, Rome, and some other tracks (and raise the ride, too) so i can get over the red & white grids without too much bouncing and get an edge on the Ai. When you go over a bump that's more prominent on the right side of the car for instance, a low sway bar will not transfer that bump to the left side...the suspension remains truely independent. But if the sway bar is set too high, it's like taking that bump and making the entire suspension react instead of just one side.

Brake settings of 15/10 are fine. I would say that those lower settings (3/2 or whatever) wouldn't be effective enough. I mean, you could use lower settings, but it would make your brake distances longer. It all depends on the car you're driving and your personal driving style.

I've noticed that cars without brake work can't go as far into a turn compared to cars that have had work. So yeah....15/10 sounds reasonable. And then (sometimes) if the brakes are higher than 20, they start to seriously lose effectiveness especially when you're turning & braking at the same time because they are trying to lock up. GT4 got this down more realistically.

The Focus Rally car is great but beware of that snap-oversteer! You wouldn't think the Focus would be prone to this since its' a hatch with minimal rear-overhang, but that was my experience. I found i could push my Lancer RC a lot harder in dirt (with max front LSD settings). I could literally drive the Lancer sideways like a crab at Tahiti Maze. The Focus was a bit more tempermental....i could win races with it but i was a bit more "worried" about how it would react at times.

 

[Scaff]

Just wanted to check in and say that I won the first Rally series and got the Celica Rally Car. First car I've won that has any after-market performance parts. Nice.

Its a good little car and should serve you well the Celica. 👍

I had a question about the anti-sway bars for Rally. Scaff, I noticed that you recommend setting them very low. I'm guessing that's because
1) The really sharp turns are done sliding, so there's less side-to-side weight transfer to worry about, and
2) They add stiffness to the springs (at least during a turn) , and we want low spring rates to go with our high ride heights.

Is that right?

No and yes, but allow me to explain each in turn.

1) Load transfer is going to occur no matter what the spring, damper or anti-roll bar settings, its a basic rule of physics you can't change it at all. What these suspension settings will however help to do is determine how that load is distributed between the tyres at any given end. Keep in mind that any time a car is turning you have load being moved from the rear to the front (if braking and turning) or from the front to the rear (if accelerating and turning). Even the most steady cornering is going to involve some element of front/rear load transfer. While this is occurring the load has to be shared between the tyres at any given end and the suspension settings will be a major factor in determining how it is shared. All sliding indicates is that we have exceeded the tyres grip levels.

2)Absolutely right, anti-roll bars effectively increase the spring rate under lateral load transfer (side to side), as such if we are softening the springs we should also soften the anti-rolls bars. However PB is also correct in that we also soften them on bumpy tracks (and you can't get much bumpier in GT than the rally stages) because they tie the suspension systems at a given end of the car together, so the stiffer they are set the more we will see an increase in how a bump effecting one side of the car also has an effect on the other side. As PB says, we need each corner of the car to be as independent as possible (although despite the term, no car can ever have fully independent suspension, after all the suspension is always attached to the car in some way).

Scaff, your guide cleared up something about brake tuning for me too. I was setting my brake balance to something like 15/10, because I thought that only the ratio mattered. Now I understand that I probably need to change that to 6/4 or even 3/2 to keep from locking up my brakes all the time. (or at least causing my ABS to activate.)

Ah no, my bad on this one. I totally forgot to mention that in GT3 the brake bias setting is purely a ratio, the overall values have little or no effect on the actual level of brake force applied.

One thing I would add to what PB has said (even if this is strictly GT4 related), is that while he is right that too low a value can be a problem, in GT4 I would avoid high settings on tarmac (unless using racing tyres) and gravel. As the higher GT4 values can trigger the ABS too early (actual lock-up is not well modelled in any of the GT series, mores the pity) and sometimes cause as much of a problem or more of one than a lower setting. Tyre slip limits on gravel are far lower than on tarmac and as such lower brake force levels will have the same overall effect.

Again while not specific to GT3, I have done a lot of testing in this area on GT4 and a quite massive thread dedicated to just that subject can be found here....

https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/showthread.php?t=58993

...which may be of interest.

Regards

Scaff

 

[breakpoint]

Pretty much everything that everyone has said has been spot on:tup:
Listen to Parnelli especially becuase he is crazy about settings and statistics, just look at the ninja's webpage! I used the R34 in rally also. Its not a bad car for it if you raise the height and soften the shocks a bit. Only other thing i did on mine was mess around with the gear ratio's. I did tracks over and over even if i had already beat them to get the best gear ratio's for that track. Keeping the power more front bias is also a good thing in gt3 rally. Other than that i can't tell you anything that anyone else hasn't already. The Ford Escort is also a great one for drifting:tup: Doubt that? Check out some of my videos because that guy is always the one to nail the 360 into drift everytime. Perfect response from it

 

[Bulldozer]

Ah no, my bad on this one. I totally forgot to mention that in GT3 the brake bias setting is purely a ratio, the overall values have little or no effect on the actual level of brake force applied.

One thing I would add to what PB has said (even if this is strictly GT4 related), is that while he is right that too low a value can be a problem, in GT4 I would avoid high settings on tarmac (unless using racing tyres) and gravel. As the higher GT4 values can trigger the ABS too early...

No, my fault. I know your guide was for GT4, it's just that most of the settings work the same way in GT3. I guess that's one that doesn't.

 

[Scaff]

No, my fault. I know your guide was for GT4, it's just that most of the settings work the same way in GT3. I guess that's one that doesn't.

Its the only one that differs significantly.

👍

Scaff