Well, I guess I feel a little better knowing I had the slower car(!) Perhaps I was just lucky finishing 4th, I'm not sure. I always take the stable setup if I can, my mantra at the moment is that I'd rather finish the race than push for a high place. I want my online race license to improve from a 'C'.
I do not, I'm an online only driver (albeit I can, and do, drive a car.) Driver61 is fantastic, and I do watch the series.
Correct! Radical and Caterham. They are excellent fun to drive, albeit very twitchy - and yes, progressive driving is a must! I find it's high downforce on the straights, but absolutely no downforce in the low-speed corners...it can make acceleration 'interesting'. I'd be very grateful for any setups that you may have! However, I have just borrowed the low tyre pressure approach and things seem a little easier now.
It would be really cool to understand how you all set your cars up in the game. I'm often at a loss with the number of settings available, I also find it difficult to tell the difference between the tweaks that I make too. I find the in-game 'Engineer' practically useless most of the time.
Incidentally, I love Radical sportscars in real life, and have watched them a number of times - including this weekend just gone in the Radical SR1 Cup. If anyone gets the chance to watch them, I'd highly recommend it. Large grids and excellent amateur-level racing...even if the SR1 cars are a little on the quiet side.
I usually take a fairly straightforward approach.
Objective: I always tune with drivability in mind and never lap times. These tend to get better naturally if you're driving comfortably and confidently.
Step 1 - try out stable vs loose. Do at least 10 laps on each setup and go with the one you like better
Step 2 - anti-roll bars: lighten the front if you're understeering, lighten the rear if you're oversteering
Step 3 - downforce: it usually pays to have high downforce as the top speed penalty (drag) is very low. For example, I have max downforce on my F Renault 3.5
Step 4 - springs: harden the springs if you're bottoming out or the car feels wobbly. Keep in mind that this may affect oversteer / understeer balance. You may have to adjust anti-roll bars again.
Step 5 - adjust LSD. Braking - loosen if you're understeering, tighten if you're oversteering. Accelerating - tighten if the inside wheel is losing traction, loosen if you're spinning on corner exit (RWD) / understeering (FWD).
Step 6 - adjust fast bound and rebound if the car's too sensitive over kerbs or bumps; slow bound and rebound if the car still feels wobbly or twitchy.
Step 7 - fine tuning: patiently tinker with camber, toe and caster, according to tyre temperatures and car balance.
Step 8 - adjust tyre pressure according to tyre compound, recommended hot pressure (there are charts on this) and track temperature.
Step 9 - create track specific setups for optimized performance.
Step 10 - keep tinkering because perfection is impossible to attain
Quite often, the car can get worse when you tune something, so always remember to save.
Note: this is just my own process that I developed naturally over time; any other is also valid of course.
Here's a general recommendation: