Tuner Challenge Championship ~ April McLaren MP4

[Motor City Hami]

As for Aprils Challenge, 0kg will be used at the 0 position.
.

Does anyone other than budious have an issue with this? Rotary seemed to be fine with it. I'm fine with it. One guy doesn't like it so it's out? Balast is an available tune that people can use and it was programmed the way it was, flaw or not. Why would you restrict it here if people can race against our tunes online and use it. Tune with what's in the game. I don't care for the changes to the LSD between GT4 and GT5 and I don't think camber is modeled correctly. Should we ban those?

And as for real world cars, we do use wedge in road racing at some tracks. Not as much as in Nascar, but it is a useful tune. And we do move weight around in cars were we can. Different engine mounts can move front to back, balast can be added to passenger side floors to offset driver weight, batteries get moved, lot's of stuff.

 

[budious]

Good points but still I just find it hard to believe it is intentional, especially with the extent of the handling changes it produces at 0kg. If the changes were not so apparent I would be inclined to agree but I just think it's a load of BS myself and my opinion of it is not going to change.

 

[chukabilly]

On the real race cars I work on, the placement of weights is very carefully thought out. It seems to me that the ability to properly tune the car, although it is in a game setting, would let you adjust that. I'm still not convinced that it's a glitch vs intentional.

 

[Adrenaline]

On the real race cars I work on, the placement of weights is very carefully thought out. It seems to me that the ability to properly tune the car, although it is in a game setting, would let you adjust that. I'm still not convinced that it's a glitch vs intentional.

I don't think this is the thread, but I do agree to a point.

I'm also from a racing backround, where there is plenty of weight in the car, that can't be removed, but can be moved.
Battery Relocation, Engine/tranny position, Drivers seat, where we centered the roll cage, fuel cell position and height and other things of that nature.
All of which can be altered, albeit some only upon initial build, but the point remains. I have to have all of the above in the car, why not put them were it best helps the car?

Based on the above, I 'like' that moving the '0kg' ballast has an effect.
But I am also willing to admit, I have my doubts on whether or not it was intended to be that way by PD. Although, if RJ says it's been there since GT4, I'm inclined to believe that it was on purpose, but I'm unsure as to why they neglected to mention it anywhere.

Moving on... It's up to the tuners if they want to use this for future months. To keep the playing field even, I think we should exclude it for April, as it wasn't brought to our attention until this last week.

 

[Motor City Hami]

Moving on... It's up to the tuners if they want to use this for future months. To keep the playing field even, I think we should exclude it for April, as it wasn't brought to our attention until this last week.

So why is it open for tuners to use in future months, but not for the tune that we've been tuning for two weeks now? The McLaren can benefit from moving balast. The last two cars didn't need it. My McLaren tune is pretty much ready to submit... with balast adjusted.

 

[Adrenaline]

So why is it open for tuners to use in future months, but not for the tune that we've been tuning for two weeks now? The McLaren can benefit from moving balast. The last two cars didn't need it. My McLaren tune is pretty much ready to submit... with balast adjusted.

By 'up to the tuners' I was reinforcing my initial statement that you guys need to talk it over and decide.
Budious says it's a glitch and should be excluded.
RJ says it's been there since GT4.

No one else has even chimed in to give an opinion.

 

[Motor City Hami]

By 'up to the tuners' I was reinforcing my initial statement that you guys need to talk it over and decide.
Budious says it's a glitch and should be excluded.
RJ says it's been there since GT4.

No one else has even chimed in to give an opinion.

I chimed in. I am all for it. It's part of the game. So the current vote is 2 for and 1 against. Do you have any other tuners participating this month?

 

[Adrenaline]

I chimed in. I am all for it. It's part of the game. So the current vote is 2 for and 1 against. Do you have any other tuners participating this month?

I never know until the night of the deadline. Very few, if any, submit early.

 

[budious]

I'll go ahead and submit a ballast position, I'm well aware of where it makes a benefit on my tune. Point being, do you really want to go there? Personally, it just felt too good to be true so I didn't think my car should be pulling 2G corners on minimum aero and race hards but whatever.

 

[Basilea]

And how many tunes entered this month? When do we get the mail? What about tracks? 1 or 2?

 

[mosstang]

Raybrig NSX Tune - budious v/s Motor City Hami

I had been patiently waiting for this tune competition for a while because I love driving the GT500 NSXs, just not with stock set-ups. I did not run the stock set-up for a full 15 laps because I am already very familiar with this car, but I did go ahead and run it for 8 laps just to re-familiarize myself. I'll also point out that, fair or not, I did not rebuild the engine or chassis, nor did I install chassis stiffening before each tune. My car was already broken in with about 450-miles on it before I started, so the power was at 504-hp, and I like it this way. I figured since this competition was 'officially' canceled anyway, what would it hurt? I also though it would be interesting to see how the tunes performed with a little more power anyway.

I ran both tunes on Tokyo R246. I used a Logitech Driving Force GT wheel with the force-feedback turned up to maximum. My wheel is mounted on my own home-made stand (pictures in my profile if interested). I used TC and ABS set both at 1.

Stock
Well, at stock settings, this car is the worst of the GT500s. It feels like it accelerates very quick, but the car is very easy to swap ends if you are not very patient getting back on the throttle out of turns. I'm a "late braker" as well, so it was easy to spin out entering turns if I did not completely release the brake before diving for the apex. This car is just very annoying to drive without a good tune on it. I didn't post any times for stock, because I simply spun the car out on just about every lap at some point on track. Time to test the tunes...

budious
Aero: 40/65
LSD: 33/27/15
RH: -2 / -2
SR: 13.6 / 14.6
Ext: 4 / 4
Com: 4 / 4
ARB: 2 / 2
Cam: 2.5 / 1.3
Toe: 0.00 / 0.00
Brake Bal: 5 / 5
Transmission:
1st: 3.187
2nd: 2.084
3rd: 1.495
4th: 1.127
5th: 0.893
6th: 0.743
Final: 4.062
MPH: 224

I was a little surprised budious didn't go a little lower on the ride height, but what do I know about tuning anyway Even with cold tires in the first warm up lap, I could feel a great deal of improvement in the stability of the car. By the 3rd and 4th laps I was feeling much bolder entering the turns with much more speed. Exiting the turn was also much easier, but still required a lot of patience getting back on throttle. I had a number of spin-outs coming out of the lower speed turns like at the beginning and end of the long straight. However, if I was patient enough the car really seemed to accelerate very quick coming out of the higher speed turns. One thing I'll also mention on the higher speed turns is that I had to be very careful trying to throttle-steer or I would be rewarded with looking at the direction from which I just came. This happened a few times too often and I believe it affected my consistency with this tune. I could not pull 3 similar laps in a row. I would get a 1:38.xxx, then a 1:40.xxx then a 1:39.xxx and then finally back into the 1:38.xxx. Interestingly, I pulled my fastest lap on lap 3 before the tires seemed fully warmed up.

Three Best Laps
1:37.950
1:38.253
1:38.634

budious Avg: 1:38.279



Motor City Hami
Aero : 40/65
LSD: 10/11/12
RH: -5 / -5
SR: 14.0 / 15.0
Ext: 5 / 6
Com: 4 / 4
ARB: 6 / 5
Cam: 3.0 / 2.5
Toe: -0.10 / 0.10
Brake Bal: 6 / 5
Transmission:
1st: 3.340
2nd: 2.236
3rd: 1.627
4th: 1.242
5th: 0.995
6th: 0.836
Final: 4.062
MPH: 199

Like with the previous tune, this already felt much more stable, even before the tires warmed up. This tune felt like it was a better fit for me as I could more consistently late-brake without paying the spin-out price as I entered the turns. I could just dive into the apex more easily with this set-up. It was also more stable coming out of the lower speed turns since I could get on the gas a little earlier. However, keep in mind this doesn't mean I could stomp the gas out of the turns. I still had to be patient and just ease it down to somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 power before the car was fully straight, then gun it. In budious' tune, I had to wait just a little longer before easing down on the gas. I also found it easier to throttle-steer through the higher speed turns, which seems to prove it's overall better exiting stability. I think this helped with consistency since this gave me the ability to correct less-than-perfect steering by goosing the gas a little early to straighten out a few mistakes here and there.

Three Best Laps:
1:37.245
1:37.540
1:37.756

Motor City Hami Avg:1:37.514

Summary
Both were great tunes and exponentially better than the stock tune. Even though there was quite a difference in the LSD and transmission set-ups, there was less than a second difference between lap time averages between these two tunes. I think I still have a lot to learn on the Tokyo track, but I think my comparison is fair because I was still trying to hit the same marks with both tunes, but one was just more consistent for me and and my wheel.

 

[Adrenaline]

And how many tunes entered this month? When do we get the mail? What about tracks? 1 or 2?

2 tunes...
I think it's time for me to pass the torch to someone who can take the challenge in a direction that better attracts competition.

 

[budious]

Raybrig NSX Tune - budious v/s Motor City Hami

Thanks for taking the time to review. I must admit that since that competition was abandoned I kind of half-assed that one. I had better sets of dampers and stabilizers for the tune but they were kind of wonky on some tracks where on others they did ok so in the end I just ended up bumping them down a bit which probably was a bad decision and just made the car slower on every track.

2 tunes...
I think it's time for me to pass the torch to someone who can take the challenge in a direction that better attracts competition.

It may have just been this car, it can be a real head ache.

Also, the tuning forum is not particularly active overall, though we have shown an influx of new tuners lately, they need some time to find their tuning method before they may be comfortable entering. I don't think there is anything wrong with how you are running the competition, it's just the activity level of the board overall which seems to be diminishing.

 

[chukabilly]

I don't know what I can do to help, but I'm willing to try. As budious says, I'm one of the tuners trying to refine my tuning method, and I just discovered your thread in the last week or so. I haven't submitted any tunes because I haven't made any that would qualify, but I can make it a point to do so. I can also be a driver if you need one, and find others if you need them. I drive with a DFGT on a custom cockpit with all aids off except ABS on 1. As for other tuners, I can work on finding some of them, too.
It took me a while to read it all, but I think you are doing a great job with the competition. The idea of comparing tunes through neutral drivers is a good one. I've also been reading budious' formulas towards tuning and look forward to comparing his philosophy to mine. This competition seems the perfect venue to do that. So, I would say to keep going and let's see what happens! 👍

 

[Motor City Hami]

I'm out for now. Just didn't like how things were done on the Xanai testing. Since you had a shortage of drivers, you had just two drivers run a number of more tracks. That skews the data to tunes that fit two driver's style. My tune dropped from fighting for the lead to fighting for the bottom. The two drivers who ran the most tunes probably don't match my driving style or even use similar controllers. With ten drivers, you had a good sample of different driving styles that would allow for you to find the best "all around tune." Last month, you found the tunes best for just two people, with seemingly similar styles. All tunes were within 2% of each other.

How many drivers do you have this month?

My McLaren tune is posted in my garage if anyone wants to give it a try.

 

[Basilea]

2 tunes...
I think it's time for me to pass the torch to someone who can take the challenge in a direction that better attracts competition.

I really think you are doing a great job! It takes a lot of time and effort to keep this running. Maybe we all together (tuners and drivers) should work out how it goes on with it and find out why or what happened, that there were less and less tunes entering every month. The first month (Subaru Impreza) was really great! Maybe even too many tunes The second month was still very good, at least the Xanavi Z, but then it went down... I believe this is because it was the "same" car again (Super GT).


Here are some ideas that I have in mind and I like to know what you think about:

Something that maybe keeps tuners from entering is the car choice, so instead of just opening a poll with a already chosen car class it might be better to first ask what kind of car the tuners would like to tune right at the moment? And then open a poll depending on the tuners choices.

I posted some time ago, where some agreed on, that if we try dealing with 2 tunes in 1 month, the cars should be different. I gets boring diving and tuning the same kind of car for a whole month. For example in the first half ot the month a hothatch and the second half a Group C car... you get the point.

Furthermore, I still think we should test on 1 specific track, this was how it was in the first month and it worked out the best. It's almost the only way to compare laptimes in a accurate way. I know the idea behind random track testing is to get an allround tune for the car and that more drivers participate. Maybe we just decide about the track after the tunes are done and sent to Adrenaline? Or the tuners should get a set of 4-5 tracks before they start tuning and on that the driving will be done and then after the tunes are sent in, the drivers decide on which one of the 4-5 tracks the testing is done?

An other thing is the overall leaderboard, I think this isn't necessary and maybe stops some tuners from entering because they think they have to take part every month. Also if you miss a round you are out of the competition because someone entering everytime has an advantage just because he sends in a "tune". And someone that likes to start now has almost no chance to catch up with the top places. So only have a tune depending leaderboard.

The discussion we had about the tuning restriction was, what should be allowed and what not. There should only be agreed on nonremovable parts, the rest should be open to the tuners, if one thinks the car is better without a turbo or with a single clutch the why should he be forced to add it? And the drivers can easily change it and it doesn't cost a fortune.


That's it from my side for the moment and I hope some (dis)agree with me and/or give further opinions and ideas! Please, don't let this tuner challenge die like this! It's great and deserves its place in the GTPlanet community 👍

I'm out for now. Just didn't like how things were done on the Xanai testing. Since you had a shortage of drivers, you had just two drivers run a number of more tracks. That skews the data to tunes that fit two driver's style. My tune dropped from fighting for the lead to fighting for the bottom. The two drivers who ran the most tunes probably don't match my driving style or even use similar controllers. With ten drivers, you had a good sample of different driving styles that would allow for you to find the best "all around tune." Last month, you found the tunes best for just two people, with seemingly similar styles. All tunes were within 2% of each other.

Just to make this clear, you were that high with Xanavi because I did test on more than one track and you were 1st, 2nd and 3rd in my runs! It was maybe not very good that in the end some were testing on more than one track and others didn't. But there was just very little data, so it turned out like it did. That's also a thing why I would like to have all drivers test on the same track!

 

[mosstang]

I don't know what I can do to help, but I'm willing to try. As budious says, I'm one of the tuners trying to refine my tuning method, and I just discovered your thread in the last week or so. I haven't submitted any tunes because I haven't made any that would qualify, but I can make it a point to do so.

Do so. I'm not a great driver either, but I'll put my numbers up there anyway. Go ahead and turn in whatever tune you come up with. It'll just help you learn, and it's fun. It's not like anybody's winning an all-expense paid trip to Hawaii or something. It's just for kicks!

On a bigger note: Too bad we can't do anything at the moment with the PSN servers down, BOOOOOOOO!

 

[mosstang]

I'm out for now. Just didn't like how things were done on the Xanai testing. Since you had a shortage of drivers, you had just two drivers run a number of more tracks. That skews the data to tunes that fit two driver's style. My tune dropped from fighting for the lead to fighting for the bottom.

Noooo, dude. Your Raybrig NSX tunes and Xanavi NISMO Z tunes were bad-azz. Seem to fit my driving style pretty good and I can usually make a small tweak to the LSD to make them perfect - for me

I do agree that picking a kind of 'overall' track for everybody to test is a good idea. One set of results from each driver. Tokyo, Suzuka Grand Valley, Deep Forest are all good tracks for a good overall tune. Then when people use them for personal use on tracks like Nurburgring or Tsukuba, they can make their own tweaks...

 

[budious]

An other thing is the overall leaderboard, I think this isn't necessary and maybe stops some tuners from entering because they think they have to take part every month. Also if you miss a round you are out of the competition because someone entering everytime has an advantage just because he sends in a "tune". And someone that likes to start now has almost no chance to catch up with the top places. So only have a tune depending leaderboard.

I agree. I think we only need to have a simple listing of winners for the past months and do away with accumulating season points. The competition becomes too focused on regular participation and the run-off two-way tuning competition is just extra punishment for the two who finished 1st and 2nd. If the competition grows then we could go back to that format but at the moment it doesn't contribute anything worthwhile to the cause.

There are too many variables, even the distance of of chassis condition becomes a factor at some point. I noticed with my McLaren tune while my settings were doing well my first nights of testing, when I tried to confirm them last night it was almost like they had taken on a new instability. At this point in my testing the car had now accumulated around 745 miles of driving so I think there was some threshold crossed around 700 miles that my tune destabilized (slightly) if a chassis maintenance wasn't performed on the car. Tighter control conditions might help but also restrict the competition, so damned if you do and damned if you don't.

I was going to announce that I was losing interest in the game and had other responsibilities and probably wasn't going to participate regularly unless the particular car was one of interest but MCH had to show me up.

 

[Rotary Junkie]

I'd lean towards throwing the entire setup out. Go back to the old way of subjective judging with some time measurements, separate drivetrain classes, and a free-for-all on car choice so long as it's a road car and slots under whatever extra requirements there are (power cap, weight minimum, PP cap, etc).

But that's just me.

Edit: Of course this turns it into a very long process which gives people more time to do a car (as it is needed), more time for judges to make time to drive each class, etc etc. They get big quick when you have 3 drivetrain classes and 10+ tuners in each.

 

[Motor City Hami]

I like what Arenaline has done in the tuning forums. Props for the efforts. The tuner championship is an enormous thing to organize and keep tuners and drivers participating. Because of that, I think it just might be the wrong format.

I hope that Adrenaline will continue to help make it easy to find everyone's tunes (like with his HUGE undertaking to link to every tune on the forum). Also, I really appreciate when he does the tune reviews. What I like about the tune reviews over the competition is that you learn more from his comments then from seeing a list of lap times and a scored winner. People need to be able to take any tuning garage tune and know what to do in order to make it match their driving style.

Also, the way Mosstang laid out his feedback is great too. Describes what he liked about the tune, how it reacted in the corners and adjustments that he made or was planning to make to improve it for his style. These are helpful for everyone.

 

[Motor City Hami]

Noooo, dude. QUOTE]

I'm not done tuning. I'll post every car that I tune, whether I throw a quick 5 min tune on it or spend hours with it.

 

[Adrenaline]

Ok, I'll get the e-mail out to the drivers later tonight.
For now, here'e the link to the tunes(3): https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc...WmdCeE4wZnpUMDZILV9rcmc&hl=en&authkey=CJ-H9C8

 

[Rotary Junkie]

Someone dun stole my gearing and go-to brake balance.

 

[budious]

Well now you have me confused, I thought my 3.600 final gear was the default also. I was only trying to make the distinction of use the defaults at top speed slider position over use the factory transmission... but I lent my copy of GT5 out for the weekend so I can't check that at the moment. Adrenaline confusing the masses ftw!

RJ, were you just trying to throw off the competition by claiming you weren't going to enter?

 

[Rotary Junkie]

My PS3 is broken... I could've tuned it before it broke but didn't.

And I wouldn't be running default 2nd-6th.

 

[budious]

My PS3 is broken... I could've tuned it before it broke but didn't.

And I wouldn't be running default 2nd-6th.

I'm more worried about mine being categorized as a light aircraft than the gearing to be honest. Have fun at cape ring, lol.

 

[Rotary Junkie]

I'm more worried about mine being categorized as a light aircraft than the gearing to be honest. Have fun at cape ring, lol.

I drove it months ago when looking for a new 535PP car to fool with and yeah it was just... Strange. Hardly remember anything that stood out about it aside from it feeling like trash to drive.

 

[Adrenaline]

Well now you have me confused, I thought my 3.600 final gear was the default also. Adrenaline confusing the masses ftw!

It might be... I just knew that you included it in your email, so I wrote it down on the spread sheet. Tune B didn't have transmission gearing included, so I wrote it all as default.

 

[budious]

I only listed them out to differentiate that custom transmission set auto to 267mph was very different gearing from the factory transmission also with a top speed of 267mph. I just didn't want people to get the two mixed up as I have said to use the factory transmission in the past on the Subaru tune; but for this one, custom transmission set to auto 267mph's generated defaults... even then the differences are still small so it's not really a problem if they do get the two confused, which I have probably now achieved!