- 404
- Indianapolis, I
My 290mm Momo Mod 27d arrived a little over a month ago, so I've had plenty of time to get used to it.
Right out of the box, it was a thing of beauty -- I am a former MIL-STD-2000A certified avionics tech, so I can throw a mean soldering iron and do a good enough job for mil-spec certified soldering work.
In comparison, Sam's handiwork on my Momo Mod 27d makes me look like a rank amateur. Seriously -- the craftsmanship that Sam puts into these wheels is incredible, and I was quite impressed from the start.
My wheel came with the carbon fiber plates and carbon fiber shift paddles option -- these are real carbon fiber, and words just can't do them justice. My buddy Todd Bettenhausen has a Sam wheel, and his has the plastic plates, which I thought were nice to begin with, but the carbon fiber takes things to a whole new level in terms of looks. The carbon fiber is a little thinner than the plastic on Todd's wheel, but it's actually a bit stiffer. Todd's wheel felt like a quality item when I first put my hands on it, but the carbon fiber option is even nicer, and well worth the cost, IMO.
The buttons, switches, and knobs are all top quality, some of the nicest that I've seen. The paddle shifters are ingenious, and they're more quiet than the stock T500 paddle shifters, while providing nice, positive feedback.
The paddle shifters really transform the T500RS -- since they move with the wheel, they're much more like the type of paddle shifters that we've all become used to with other wheels, and they're always right where you expect them to be as long as you keep your hands in fixed positions on the wheel.
Oddly enough, though, the paddles required the most effort for me to adapt to -- not because of how they function or where they're placed, but because I have had my T500 for so long now, making that reach to the fixed paddle shifters is second nature, and when I want to downshift or upshift, it feels "right" to make that long-ish reach to grab the fixed shifter, even though my fingers were already sitting on the moving carbon fiber paddle shifters.
This in no way reflects any problem with Sam's design -- the problem was me and the "habits" I had learned while becoming comfortable enough with the fixed shifters that using them was second nature. For me, I had to un-learn this "second nature" instinct to reach for the fixed shifters.
The first time I encountered this little "problem" was actually almost comical -- since the fixed shifters still function with the Sam wheel in place, I have chosen to map my fixed paddle shifters to the "Look Left" / "Look Right" functions. Remembering to use the moving paddles is easy when you're just tooling around, because they're right there under your fingertips at all times (or near your fingertips, depending on how you hold the wheel).
In the heat of the moment, though, I found that instinct kicked-in automatically, and while running side-by-side with someone else in a Star Mazda practice session, I nearly soiled my shorts when I tried to grab a downshift while braking and suddenly found myself looking to the left out my main monitor -- and it took me a moment to realize what had happened: I flicked the fixed paddle shifter, my view went psycho for a moment then shifted back to normal, and I still needed to downshift . . . so I did that "second nature" grab for the fixed shifter again and my view went crazy, but still no downshift.
I'm sure there was some profanity involved (and certainly an obligatory Homer Simspon "DOH!"), but once I figured out what was going on and managed to actually get the car to downshift, the "heat of the battle" had already passed, leaving me behind.
Annoyingly enough, it didn't turn out to be a one-time occurrence -- at random times during my first couple of weeks with the new wheel I'd find myself grabbing the fixed shifter and glancing left or right, usually at the worst possible time.
The frequency of this odd annoyance began to diminish as I spent more time with my Sam wheel, and now I can't recall any occurrence in the past week or so, so hopefully I've re-learned how to use moving paddle shifters properly now (finally!).
Again, though, this is NOT a negative knock against the wheel, but do be aware that no matter how "normal" moving paddle shifters seem, if you've become proficient with the fixed paddle shifters on the T500RS, you may have an interesting re-learning period when you start to use the moving shifters on your Sam wheel.
As nice as it is to have moving paddle shifters again, though, the most transformative aspect of the Sam wheel is its light weight -- I already loved the way the T500 communicated forces through the wheel, but with the Sam wheel in place of the stock GT wheel, the forces were more crisp, more distinct, and the wheel was more communicative overall. It's a subtle shift, but the feedback through the wheel feels significantly more realistic to me now. Words really can't do it justice and if you've never experienced a T500 fited with a Sam wheel, it's hard to describe how much better the T500 feels with the lighter Momo wheel in place, so you're just going to have to take my word for it, or track down someone in your area with a Sam wheel and convince them to let you have a go in their rig.
Aside from the forces, the wheel itself is everything you'd expect from a suede-covered Momo. I loved how the T500 felt with the stock GT wheel, and I actually found the stock GT wheel to be one of the best sim wheels I've encountered -- the rubberized coating actually felt really good to me, so I had no complaints about the feel or the size or the button placement, which I had grown very used to.
Having had a suede wheel on my old TSW2, I knew how suede can get that matted-down "leather-esque" look over time, and after making the investment in the Sam Maxwell wheel, I decided that driving gloves would be a worthwhile investment. I started out with a nifty pair of black-and-yellow mechanics gloves that matched my black-and-yellow wheel quite nicely, but eventually transitioned to a pair of fingerless bicycle gloves, which allow me to switch from driving to typing (as in post-race chat) without having to remove my gloves.
It didn't take me long to adapt to wearing gloves, but the button layout on the Sam wheel did require a bit of "re-learning." Nothing significant, mind you, but simply moving my "Look Left" / "Look Right" functions from buttons on the wheel itself to the fixed paddle shifters did require a bit of re-learning, as I've described previously.
Once I re-learned where I had everything assigned, though, I found that the button placement on my Sam wheel is much better than the button placement on the T500RS GT wheel. As far as the gloves go, though, I quickly found that full-finger gloves do NOT work well when you need to type, so I ended up switching over to a pair of fingerless bicycling gloves, which work very well while still enabling me to type (which is useful for those post-race congratulations and such, or for typing in setup names when saving setups during Test or Practice sessions).
From the very start, though, I recognized immediately that with the lighter Momo wheel in place, the T500RS Force Feedback system immediately felt more "free" and "unfettered" than it did with the stock wheel -- by this I mean that the feedback still feels strong and smooth, but with the lighter Momo wheel I seem to feel more detailed forces that didn't seem to come through with the heavier stock GT wheel rim in place. The T500 now feels more "lively" to me, and with the paddle shifters right under my fingertips, I feel far more connected than I have with any other wheel.
On the subject of the paddle shifters, I have to say that for me they seem to be perfectly sized, especially with the Mod 27d wheel. Clearance between the moving paddle shifters and the fixed stock paddle shifters on the wheel base is not an issue, even with full-finger gloves. I don't have very long or thick fingers, and I don't think of myself as having large hands, but I can't say that my hands are small, either. Just to give you a better idea of how much clearance there is, I would say that my hands fall more into that "average-sized" category, and in order to find full-finger gloves that fit right, I had to go with a "large" (the medium gloves were too tight, and the extra-large were just too big), so that should give you some idea of what you could expect with Sam's moving paddle shifters with the stock shift paddles still in-place.
The one thing that seemed to be missing for me with the Momo was the lack of the center tape/stripe at the 12 o'clock position on the wheel, but I found a nifty way to easily rectify this "problem" and I added my own centering tape stripe using yellow "rescue tape." Since I went with a yellow-and-black button theme on my Momo (which looks great with the black suede, the carbon fiber, the black metal spokes, and the yellow "MOMO" logo on the wheel, IMO), the yellow centering stripe really makes the wheel look and feel "complete" to me, and it was an inexpensive mod that really helped give my custom wheel an even more personal feel.
Performance-wise, I just can't say enough for how much more "right" the Momo Mod 27d feels -- the wheel probably hasn't made me faster, I'm sure, but it certainly makes me feel like more of a racer. The buttons are top-notch, and the rotary switches are VERY cool. Rather than try to explain my button mappings, I labeled the buttons on one of my wheel photos, just to give you an idea of how they can be mapped:
When it's all said and done, I have to say that even though my Sam Maxwell Momo Mod 27d wheel actually cost more than the T500RS wheel and pedal set itself cost me, I have never regretted the purchase at all, and every time I use the wheel I'm still impressed at how much the Momo wheel makes the T500RS seem like an even better value. Overall, the T500RS wheel coupled with the Sam Maxwell Momo wheel and my own BLC-T500 Load cell Mod makes for a formidable combination, and all of it works together to enhance my overall sim racing experience in a very positive way.
Thanks to Sam for all the innovation and hard work he puts into making his wheels the amazing pieces of functional art that they are! In my opinion, although a Sam Maxwell Momo wheel may seem like a substantial investment, it's one that you will most likely feel good about every time you use it.
👍
Right out of the box, it was a thing of beauty -- I am a former MIL-STD-2000A certified avionics tech, so I can throw a mean soldering iron and do a good enough job for mil-spec certified soldering work.
In comparison, Sam's handiwork on my Momo Mod 27d makes me look like a rank amateur. Seriously -- the craftsmanship that Sam puts into these wheels is incredible, and I was quite impressed from the start.
My wheel came with the carbon fiber plates and carbon fiber shift paddles option -- these are real carbon fiber, and words just can't do them justice. My buddy Todd Bettenhausen has a Sam wheel, and his has the plastic plates, which I thought were nice to begin with, but the carbon fiber takes things to a whole new level in terms of looks. The carbon fiber is a little thinner than the plastic on Todd's wheel, but it's actually a bit stiffer. Todd's wheel felt like a quality item when I first put my hands on it, but the carbon fiber option is even nicer, and well worth the cost, IMO.
The buttons, switches, and knobs are all top quality, some of the nicest that I've seen. The paddle shifters are ingenious, and they're more quiet than the stock T500 paddle shifters, while providing nice, positive feedback.
The paddle shifters really transform the T500RS -- since they move with the wheel, they're much more like the type of paddle shifters that we've all become used to with other wheels, and they're always right where you expect them to be as long as you keep your hands in fixed positions on the wheel.
Oddly enough, though, the paddles required the most effort for me to adapt to -- not because of how they function or where they're placed, but because I have had my T500 for so long now, making that reach to the fixed paddle shifters is second nature, and when I want to downshift or upshift, it feels "right" to make that long-ish reach to grab the fixed shifter, even though my fingers were already sitting on the moving carbon fiber paddle shifters.
This in no way reflects any problem with Sam's design -- the problem was me and the "habits" I had learned while becoming comfortable enough with the fixed shifters that using them was second nature. For me, I had to un-learn this "second nature" instinct to reach for the fixed shifters.
The first time I encountered this little "problem" was actually almost comical -- since the fixed shifters still function with the Sam wheel in place, I have chosen to map my fixed paddle shifters to the "Look Left" / "Look Right" functions. Remembering to use the moving paddles is easy when you're just tooling around, because they're right there under your fingertips at all times (or near your fingertips, depending on how you hold the wheel).
In the heat of the moment, though, I found that instinct kicked-in automatically, and while running side-by-side with someone else in a Star Mazda practice session, I nearly soiled my shorts when I tried to grab a downshift while braking and suddenly found myself looking to the left out my main monitor -- and it took me a moment to realize what had happened: I flicked the fixed paddle shifter, my view went psycho for a moment then shifted back to normal, and I still needed to downshift . . . so I did that "second nature" grab for the fixed shifter again and my view went crazy, but still no downshift.
I'm sure there was some profanity involved (and certainly an obligatory Homer Simspon "DOH!"), but once I figured out what was going on and managed to actually get the car to downshift, the "heat of the battle" had already passed, leaving me behind.
Annoyingly enough, it didn't turn out to be a one-time occurrence -- at random times during my first couple of weeks with the new wheel I'd find myself grabbing the fixed shifter and glancing left or right, usually at the worst possible time.
The frequency of this odd annoyance began to diminish as I spent more time with my Sam wheel, and now I can't recall any occurrence in the past week or so, so hopefully I've re-learned how to use moving paddle shifters properly now (finally!).
Again, though, this is NOT a negative knock against the wheel, but do be aware that no matter how "normal" moving paddle shifters seem, if you've become proficient with the fixed paddle shifters on the T500RS, you may have an interesting re-learning period when you start to use the moving shifters on your Sam wheel.
As nice as it is to have moving paddle shifters again, though, the most transformative aspect of the Sam wheel is its light weight -- I already loved the way the T500 communicated forces through the wheel, but with the Sam wheel in place of the stock GT wheel, the forces were more crisp, more distinct, and the wheel was more communicative overall. It's a subtle shift, but the feedback through the wheel feels significantly more realistic to me now. Words really can't do it justice and if you've never experienced a T500 fited with a Sam wheel, it's hard to describe how much better the T500 feels with the lighter Momo wheel in place, so you're just going to have to take my word for it, or track down someone in your area with a Sam wheel and convince them to let you have a go in their rig.
Aside from the forces, the wheel itself is everything you'd expect from a suede-covered Momo. I loved how the T500 felt with the stock GT wheel, and I actually found the stock GT wheel to be one of the best sim wheels I've encountered -- the rubberized coating actually felt really good to me, so I had no complaints about the feel or the size or the button placement, which I had grown very used to.
Having had a suede wheel on my old TSW2, I knew how suede can get that matted-down "leather-esque" look over time, and after making the investment in the Sam Maxwell wheel, I decided that driving gloves would be a worthwhile investment. I started out with a nifty pair of black-and-yellow mechanics gloves that matched my black-and-yellow wheel quite nicely, but eventually transitioned to a pair of fingerless bicycle gloves, which allow me to switch from driving to typing (as in post-race chat) without having to remove my gloves.
It didn't take me long to adapt to wearing gloves, but the button layout on the Sam wheel did require a bit of "re-learning." Nothing significant, mind you, but simply moving my "Look Left" / "Look Right" functions from buttons on the wheel itself to the fixed paddle shifters did require a bit of re-learning, as I've described previously.
Once I re-learned where I had everything assigned, though, I found that the button placement on my Sam wheel is much better than the button placement on the T500RS GT wheel. As far as the gloves go, though, I quickly found that full-finger gloves do NOT work well when you need to type, so I ended up switching over to a pair of fingerless bicycling gloves, which work very well while still enabling me to type (which is useful for those post-race congratulations and such, or for typing in setup names when saving setups during Test or Practice sessions).
From the very start, though, I recognized immediately that with the lighter Momo wheel in place, the T500RS Force Feedback system immediately felt more "free" and "unfettered" than it did with the stock wheel -- by this I mean that the feedback still feels strong and smooth, but with the lighter Momo wheel I seem to feel more detailed forces that didn't seem to come through with the heavier stock GT wheel rim in place. The T500 now feels more "lively" to me, and with the paddle shifters right under my fingertips, I feel far more connected than I have with any other wheel.
On the subject of the paddle shifters, I have to say that for me they seem to be perfectly sized, especially with the Mod 27d wheel. Clearance between the moving paddle shifters and the fixed stock paddle shifters on the wheel base is not an issue, even with full-finger gloves. I don't have very long or thick fingers, and I don't think of myself as having large hands, but I can't say that my hands are small, either. Just to give you a better idea of how much clearance there is, I would say that my hands fall more into that "average-sized" category, and in order to find full-finger gloves that fit right, I had to go with a "large" (the medium gloves were too tight, and the extra-large were just too big), so that should give you some idea of what you could expect with Sam's moving paddle shifters with the stock shift paddles still in-place.
The one thing that seemed to be missing for me with the Momo was the lack of the center tape/stripe at the 12 o'clock position on the wheel, but I found a nifty way to easily rectify this "problem" and I added my own centering tape stripe using yellow "rescue tape." Since I went with a yellow-and-black button theme on my Momo (which looks great with the black suede, the carbon fiber, the black metal spokes, and the yellow "MOMO" logo on the wheel, IMO), the yellow centering stripe really makes the wheel look and feel "complete" to me, and it was an inexpensive mod that really helped give my custom wheel an even more personal feel.
Performance-wise, I just can't say enough for how much more "right" the Momo Mod 27d feels -- the wheel probably hasn't made me faster, I'm sure, but it certainly makes me feel like more of a racer. The buttons are top-notch, and the rotary switches are VERY cool. Rather than try to explain my button mappings, I labeled the buttons on one of my wheel photos, just to give you an idea of how they can be mapped:
When it's all said and done, I have to say that even though my Sam Maxwell Momo Mod 27d wheel actually cost more than the T500RS wheel and pedal set itself cost me, I have never regretted the purchase at all, and every time I use the wheel I'm still impressed at how much the Momo wheel makes the T500RS seem like an even better value. Overall, the T500RS wheel coupled with the Sam Maxwell Momo wheel and my own BLC-T500 Load cell Mod makes for a formidable combination, and all of it works together to enhance my overall sim racing experience in a very positive way.
Thanks to Sam for all the innovation and hard work he puts into making his wheels the amazing pieces of functional art that they are! In my opinion, although a Sam Maxwell Momo wheel may seem like a substantial investment, it's one that you will most likely feel good about every time you use it.
👍
