Observations on suspension settings

[Basilea]

Just say yes, as probably noone would even find out, whether it is "fixed" or not

 

[TT3AZ]

Okay, so I have a question.

For maximum weight transfer to the rear wheels (drag racing), I and many other use these settings:

Ride height: F (lowest possible), R (highest possible)
Spring rate: F ( lowest possible), R (lowest possible)
Extension: F (1), R (10)
Compression: F (10), R (1)
Anti roll: F (default), R (default)
Toe: F (0.0), R (0.0)
Camber: F (0.0), R (0.0)

These settings make the suspension as soft as possible, beeing able to transfer weight easily to the rear wheels.

But for 4wd cars, do you have any tip for good suspension settings? Because as far as i know, you dont want that much of a weight transfer to the rear wheels, that causes the front wheels to spinn out (if you have torque distribution 50/50).

Share your experiances with 4wd cars, that are tuned for straight line performance, and ultimate traction/launch.

TT3

 

[dr_slump]

Are you sure with your toe settings?
I've seen a couple guys running way more toe....

 

[f_399]

tt, i am going to try those suspension settings out

i ran you a couple days back, this is aj071082. i think we ran enzo's

 

[TT3AZ]

Are you sure with your toe settings?
I've seen a couple guys running way more toe....

Well, you can put toe to 0.02, or 0.05, because that increase straight line stabilty, how ever, 0.0 on both camber och toe gives the ultimate contact with the suface if im not wrong.

 

[OwensRacing]

For drags you want sone bound and spring in the rear. Weight transfer is important. However to soft will absorb the "hit" you are giving the tires.

Also the toe thing. More toe usually means better straight line traction on track. However I like 0 or a small negative on both ends to help get it to track straight.

Also tune AWD traction via camber. get it close and if it seems a lil boggy out the hole. Add camber to reduce traction. Giving wheel speed giving rpm more power once out and moving.

I miss drags. Just got tired of being jumped aka red lighters. Got to be fewer and fewer races where both cars leave even or close. Got to where it was someone jumping all the time.

Sorry lil OT

Gonna check the ride ht on my fwd league racer and see if it still steers well with rear rake. Haha

 

[No_OBsT33R]

Just got tired of being jumped aka red lighters. Got to be fewer and fewer races where both cars leave even or close. Got to where it was someone jumping all the time.

That's one of the reasons I quit Street Racing (others being how stupid and dangerous it is), arguing over who won when it was close. It gets old real fast with money on the line & you get tired of do-overs. With a slip at the Track there is no arguing. It's also a controlled environment.

I haven't done much Drag in GT5. I did a bit of Top Speed Tuning in GT4 & camber was great for reducing resistance, and gaining a few mph faster.

 

[TT3AZ]

For drags you want sone bound and spring in the rear. Weight transfer is important. However to soft will absorb the "hit" you are giving the tires.

Also the toe thing. More toe usually means better straight line traction on track. However I like 0 or a small negative on both ends to help get it to track straight.

Also tune AWD traction via camber. get it close and if it seems a lil boggy out the hole. Add camber to reduce traction. Giving wheel speed giving rpm more power once out and moving.

I miss drags. Just got tired of being jumped aka red lighters. Got to be fewer and fewer races where both cars leave even or close. Got to where it was someone jumping all the time.

Sorry lil OT

Gonna check the ride ht on my fwd league racer and see if it still steers well with rear rake. Haha

Well, that is right, to soft, will absorb the "hit", never thaught about it before. But then again, people claim that suspension in gt5 is to stiff to simulate drag suspension.

Yes, thats what i meant by tuning camber and toe, you some times want the tires to spin, and it depends on how you tune your car. Regarding suspension for 4wd cars, i havent come up with a theory yet. My rwd settings works well though...

Much OT: Well, its only jumping in drag rooms, and people dont want to run trees, quite strange to me really :/. I only run tree/ghost, clean racing, no bs

 

[KoAStR]

I have heard this before, a few weeks ago I believe, where someone claimed that moving only the ballast position, changed their PP by 1. I haven't seen it for myself, so I can't confirm nor deny. But honestly I think it's a nice feature. Consider running 2 cars, with the same weight and power, but one car has a 50/50 weight distribution, and the other with a 30/70 (Let's say a Rear Engine Car). Clearly you wouldn't expect them to both handle as well, so in my head, it makes sense. But I definitely didn't expect GT5 to have taken that into account.
Has anyone compared the PP of their Yellow Bird, to a car with the same power/weight specs? I'd be curious.

Either way, it really doesn't change anything. You're always going to want to put the ballast in the position that gives the best handling, because that will have far more benefits than the 1PP you could cut by putting it somewhere else.

I was confident GT5 takes weight distribution into account, even before I saw a PP change when moving ballast around (which I can confirm does happen)

GT5 obviously considers grip factors other than downforce (tyre width and chassis track width) into the PP system because there are many cars in the game with the same BHP/weight etc that result in different PP's. Thus the only difference can be the amount of traction. You needn't look further than the arcade garage for examples of this. Makes sense right.

So surely the same must apply in weight distribution as this factor equally contributes to the available traction at each axle and thus overall effictive grip.

As you've eluded to already, consider the extreme case where weight distribution approaches 0-100, the effective grip at one axle also approaches zero (no matter how good the tyres are!), the car cannot corner at all, so the PP must be lowered!

So really not surprising ballast position and weight distribution should affect the PP.


A bit OT now;
Pity that the drivetrain mods don't also affect PP as they clearly affect engine/acceleration performance.

Alternatively, a nice feature would be a lobby regulations screen that mimicked the settings/upgrades screen where you can add a cross to restricted modifications in addition to any BHP/weight/PP restrictions. Would be great for limiting allowable suspension mods which would be tricky to link into the PP system - I mean I wouldn't want to be adjusting my power limiter or ballast everytime I make changes to my suspension tune...

I would also like to see drivetrain (i.e. 4WD / FR / FF), year of manufacture restrictions (i.e. pre 1970, or 2000-2010 etc), ABS regulation settings, and a force cockpit view setting for online lobby's

 

[Adrenaline]

Then my question would be, is there any car in the game, where moving bias to the front adds PP? Because so far, I've only seen/read/heard about PP going up when moved backwards. Meaning GT5 doesn't care about weight distribution in relation to balance, just penalizing you for adding it to the rear.
I suppose the Yellowbird would be the best test object.
Does moving the ballast forward add PP? Obviously that's the beneficial way to help the car, so decreasing PP by doing it, makes it a joke.

The Enzo is another car, that I've already tested, where the game knows 50/50 isn't optimal, because PP goes up, the further you add weight to the rear, even though you're getting further away from 50/50.

Meaning
A: The game doesn't care about balance, rear weight always adds PP.
B: The game takes into account each car's needs as far as ballast and benefits, and changes PP accordingly.

I find A much more believable but also more disappointing.

 

[shirakawaa]

I was under the impression that only weight is taken into account in PP calculation, not its distribution.

 

[Adrenaline]

I was under the impression that only weight is taken into account in PP calculation, not its distribution.

Then I'm under the impression you didn't read a single post of the last page. Sorry, not trying to be rude, but... it still is.

 

[shirakawaa]

I was referring to the ballast weight, or in other words, that no matter if it improves the weight distribution, adding weight decreases performance points.

 

[Adrenaline]

And we're talking about how based on where you put the weight, you can increase or decrease PP, from a new base anyways.

In other words, yes, adding weight decreased performance points, but where you add it, will determine how far it decreases.

 

[shirakawaa]

A quick test made right now just for you with a '95 Daihatsu Move CX shows absolutely no difference in PP decrease with ballast position. Only its amount counts.

 

[Adrenaline]

A quick test made right now just for you with a '95 Daihatsu Move CX shows absolutely no difference in PP decrease with ballast position. Only its amount counts.

I'm not going to continue arguing with you on this.
It's already been proven and confirmed by a handful of people.
Try a few other cars. Bye.

 

[Highlandor]

A quick test made right now just for you with a '95 Daihatsu Move CX shows absolutely no difference in PP decrease with ballast position. Only its amount counts.

I agree - I use ballast positioning only on quite a few cars, it's never affected the PP once.

Just done a random test on 5 cars:

Scuderia
Option Stream
Schwimwagon
Impreza Super touring
RUF RGT

None of these car's PP figure was changed at all when ballast positionin ONLY was moved both + and - 50.

Ballast amount was 0 at all times.

I'm not going to continue arguing with you on this.
It's already been proven and confirmed by a handful of people.
Try a few other cars. Bye.

OK then, not arguing with you, just curious - what cars did this happen on then??

 

[shirakawaa]

To be fair, I've just tried with a RUF BTR with Stage 2 lightweight modification, and moving around 200 Kg of ballast changes up/down PP by just 2 units (relatively to the penalty applied due to the added weight, though), increasing if placed on the rear axle (in practical terms: 515 PP with 200 Kg on the front axle, 517 PP on the rear one, with a resulting 34:66 weight distribution). It's however the only car that does so among the dozen or so that I tested of each drivetrain type, which makes me think of some sort of bug affecting certain cars.

 

[chuyler1]

That's kind of odd. So the PP is higher for ballast in the rear (which is actually worse for that car considering it is already rear biased).

So I had everyone in my same make/model online lobby messing with ride height last night. Everyone was in agreement that the best way to get rid of understeer in the Premium Lancia Delta was to run higher front and lower rear. Spring rates and rollbars (of which you would kind of expect to have more impact) couldn't address the issue as easily as dropping the rear ride height a few clicks. I ended up running 0/-10 the entire evening and got the pole on every race and won 2 races.

 

[Motor City Hami]

That's kind of odd. So the PP is higher for ballast in the rear (which is actually worse for that car considering it is already rear biased).

So I had everyone in my same make/model online lobby messing with ride height last night. Everyone was in agreement that the best way to get rid of understeer in the Premium Lancia Delta was to run higher front and lower rear. Spring rates and rollbars (of which you would kind of expect to have more impact) couldn't address the issue as easily as dropping the rear ride height a few clicks. I ended up running 0/-10 the entire evening and got the pole on every race and won 2 races.

Let us know when you do these one make online lobbies. Wouldn't mind participating.

 

[Adrenaline]

I know the Enzo also has a PP variation based on where the weight goes.
Following suit, it increased when placed to the rear, regardless of the fact that it further UNbalances the car, but does increase handling characteristics.

That's kind of odd. So the PP is higher for ballast in the rear (which is actually worse for that car considering it is already rear biased).

So I had everyone in my same make/model online lobby messing with ride height last night. Everyone was in agreement that the best way to get rid of understeer in the Premium Lancia Delta was to run higher front and lower rear. Spring rates and rollbars (of which you would kind of expect to have more impact) couldn't address the issue as easily as dropping the rear ride height a few clicks. I ended up running 0/-10 the entire evening and got the pole on every race and won 2 races.

I'd actually like someone to explain to me, why they think lowering the rear end, should NOT add oversteer. Everyone keeps using it as an example of 'backward inputs' but no one (to my knowledge) has ever actually explained why they feel that way. Of what I understand about real life tuning, based on my knowledge and experience, this is actually correct, not backwards. So I'd sincerely be curious to hear someone explain the physics or theory of their stand point, to educate myself.

 

[nomis3613]

Hi Adrenaline,
Allow me to try to explain.

I'd actually like someone to explain to me, why they think lowering the rear end, should NOT add oversteer.

Very simplisticly, lower height = less lateral weight transfer for that axle = more grip.

Here are some IRL examples of lowering the rear causing understeer (or vice-versa):
http://forum.miata.net/vb/showthread.php?t=236018
http://www.s2000.org/articles/suspension/ (search for ride height)
http://www.rexnet.com.au/forum/inde...eight-its-effect-on-oversteerundersteer-bias/

As for the detailed theory behind it, I really struggled to find anything definitive to reference (which I found very surprising, because AFAIK the theory is a fundamental to suspension design in many forms of motorsport). The best I could do is:
http://www.toymods.org.au/forums/showthread.php?45257-The-Effects-of-Rear-Roll-Centre-Height
https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/showthread.php?t=55745 (sukerkin's post)

I dunno if these are the actual reasons for it, but I am certain of the end result: most real life suspension experts will tell you that lowering the rear should increase understeer, unlike GT5.

 

[Adrenaline]

Why do you feel that Less weight transfer = more grip?
And more importantly, how do you explain any drag car in the world, with this theory?

 

[chuyler1]

Most drag cars have higher rear ends right? Don't they appear raked at stand still?

I don't follow drag racing so if that's true, the reason is possibly that they need to balance out the weight transfer under acceleration. If too much weight transfers to the rear the car's front end ends up in the air. Essentially, they raise the rear to keep weight balanced when the car is heavily accelerating and the rear end is squatting.

In our game, we are lowering the rear to get weight off our rear tires under braking and put weight on our front tires under acceleration. So I think drag racing just further proves the point that GT5 is backwards.

 

[budious]

Drag racing cars are not a good example for rake explanations. That's due mostly to the large rear tires and when they put on the gas the front end snaps up off the ground putting all the weight on the rear axle; the angle doesn't matter if the front tires aren't touching the ground, everything is going to the rear anyways.

 

[JackWilson]

PP is affected by using ballast because as you add more weight your pp will decrease, same as if you buy weight reductions in the tuning shop pp will increase.
Anyway that is not why i came here, am i right in believing that the 'reverse settings' have now been fixed after the new patch?
Ive tested it on my Audi RS6 and believe it is how it should be (lower front end=tendency to oversteer,,lower rear end=tendency to understeer and vice versa).
Or is it just my imagination?

 

[chuyler1]

I think it's your imagination...however I have been noticing that some of my cars have gone from balanced to tail-happy without any changes to tuning. I can't quite put my finger on what has changed, but it has affected my driving style a little.

 

[nomis3613]

Why do you feel that Less weight transfer = more grip?
And more importantly, how do you explain any drag car in the world, with this theory?

+1 to what budious said.

Also, we're talking about lateral weight transfer here (yeah, I've made a ninja edit to my previous post ). Drag tuning of rearward weight transfer is a different kettle of fish.

Lateral weight transfer is about losing more grip on the inside wheel than you gain on the outside (the law of static friction does not work for tyres), this is one of the fundamentals of cornering dynamics IRL.

 

[OwensRacing]

There is more to tuning a drag car other then tranfering weight.

While it is less physics involved then road racing. There is a science and it works off CG.

You will see the fastest cars barely lift the tires.

As well most traction comes from suspension relative to wind up from the rear axle. This why straight axle cars are best for drags.


Working CG is key to any race car. It sets roll centers, transfers the whole shebang.

 

[Will27]

I'd actually like someone to explain to me, why they think lowering the rear end, should NOT add oversteer. Everyone keeps using it as an example of 'backward inputs' but no one (to my knowledge) has ever actually explained why they feel that way. Of what I understand about real life tuning, based on my knowledge and experience, this is actually correct, not backwards. So I'd sincerely be curious to hear someone explain the physics or theory of their stand point, to educate myself.

This is the best I can find to explain things. I know it’s for a RC car (not my one, but it helped set mine up)

www.teamxray.com/teamxray/showfile.php?file_id=6143 - PDF file 5.42mb
Just ignore the stuff not in GT5... about half of it.

It explains a lot of (rc) car setup including roll center, CG and ride height.

Basicly lower ride height = more roll because the roll center is lowered further in proportion to the CG.
More roll= more grip but less responsive, and less grip at the beginning of the corner.
Therefore strangely enough, higher ride height=more responsive, more initial grip early in corner.

This seems to match some testing I’ve done this morning. Lowering the nose of my BMW V12 LMR solved the mid to late corner understeer, but made the steering less responsive, and solved the very slight initial oversteer into corners.
Lifting the nose of a car will do the exact opposite, giving more entry steering, thanks to a higher roll center, and a more responsive front end.


Disclaimer: All in theory of course. I don't know if its 100%. I've got to include an escape clause somewhere