From GTPlanet Game Guides

For some of us (you know who you are) the intricate workings of automobiles come naturally. For others, however (like myself), tuning and tweaking can be a daunting challenge. If you're the latter, this is for you. Print it off, take it to your PS, and start fine-tuning your favorite ride! Good luck!

How to begin

You should consider your priority, what do you want, speed or handling? If you want to tune for handling then you should consider what track you will be using. Different track will need different tuning. If you want to tune for speed then the best place to start is 0-1000m. 0.5 second improvement in 0-1000 usually end up as more than 1 second improvement in track lap time!

Individual tuning

SPRING RATE

Adjust the hardness of the springs. Stiffer springs will make the faster and more responsive cars. However, over-stiffening the springs can make the car very unstable on rough roads. On smooth road however, you can use stiffer springs. You can use damper too smooth the car movement when using stiff spring, use lower damper if you use stiffer spring and finding your car have jerky behaviour.

You can also use spring rate to balance the car. If you use small spring difference, using stiffer front will create more understeer. If you use big spring difference, using stiffer front will create more oversteer.

There is optimum spring rate on every car. When you use the optimum spring rate, you will have the best top speed and acceleration spring rate can provide. Usually the value is around 12.0, on few car it can be 20.0.

PAL and NTSC version have noticably different maximum spring stiffness. PAL version have a lot stiffer spring rate compared to NTSC 1.2 version. If you use PAL version use less than medium spring rate.

RIDE HEIGHT

Adjust the height of the car. Lowering the car's height lowers its center of gravity and makes it more stable on the road. However, over-lowering the car causes it to bottom out, which means you can completely go out of control following a jump or particularly vicious bump. This can be balanced by increasing the spring ratio and damper ratio -- race the track continually while adjusting to ensure maximum balance for each particular track. Again, the smoother the track, the lower you can adjust the car.

You can use ride height to balance the car. Using higher rear will create more oversteer, and using lower rear will create more understeer.

DAMPER

Adjust the decreasing strength (dampening ratio) of the damper. The lower the dampers, the less the car reacts to bumps in the road, the looser they are. The higher they are, the more the car reacts to bumps in the road, the snappier and tighter they are. You should use lower value if you use stiff spring or high ride height. Overall use damper value as high as possible where you can still drive with ease. You can use damper to balance the car. If you use small damper difference, using lower front will create more oversteer. If you use big damper difference, using lower front will create more understeer.

CAMBER

Adjust the negative camber angle. Setting this wrongly can completely ruin the car's handling, braking and steering. A slight tweak negatively increases the car's stability through corners, but this is offset by loss of braking ability and steering effectiveness.

Many people use 2.0 for front and 1.0 for rear, the default of FC suspension setting. But many don't realize that using that camber value on default spring rate and ride height is a bit too high. On stock FF car, the car body roll angle would measure at about 1.5 degree front and 1.0 degree rear. So it would be normal if you use 1.5 and 1.0 for camber. But on FF car with 10.0/10.0 spring rate where the body roll would be measured at 0.5 or less degree, using 2.0 camber for front would surely make the car more understeer.

Camber also not necessarily have to be higher in front. On some car with heavier rear, it should be the rear that need to be higher. In car with RR drivetrain, family wagon and some MR, it is best to use higher rear camber. In most cases, it's best to leave this at 0 (zero) if you are using stiff spring rate or using race car.

Camber need to be adjusted if you change ride height or spring rate. Because with less body roll you will need less camber. With low spring and high ride height, the camber must be high too, to compensate with more angled body roll. Although you can use camber to balance the car, it is better if you don't.

If you have understeer problem try using zero camber.

When drifting camber can be used to create more even grip on sideways. by increasing the camber more than optimum grip, you can reduce the side which has too much grip when sideways. But as always, use this tuning method after you balance the car enough using other suspension.

TOE

Adjust the angle the wheel will face. Negative value will make the wheel front facing more out = \ /. Positive value will make the wheel front facing more in = / \. It is better if you don't use toe to balance the car. But you can use it if other balance method do not satisfy you. Balancing the car with different suspension part can result in different feeling.

For drifting, if you want to easily exit drift use negative toe, and if you want to sustain drift longer use positive toe.

STABILIZER

Antiroll bar or swaybar, it is a part to reduce the car roll. You can use stabilizer to balance the car. Using higher front will create more understeer.

If you want to use overall soft suspension you should at least use higher stabilizer. You can use low stabilizer if you intent to use stiff suspension.

In real life using stiffer stabilizer will make left and right wheel less independent, that is, when the left wheel meet bump and sent to go up, the right wheel wil follow it more on stiffer stabilizer. The effect of stabilizer in GT2 still not tested yet.

BRAKE BALANCE CONTROLLER

You should use brake balance to give the most grip to the tire. If you feel the front tire loosing traction first, you should reduce the front value. If you feel both tire loosing traction, you should reduce both. Start with maximum value for both front and rear, and gradually decrease it based on what tire give up traction first.

GEAR RATIOS

If you are too lazy to tune this, just use auto setting to whatever top speed you need. Using the same auto setting in any final drive will give you the same top speed. Using lower final drive have the same effect as using lighter flywheel. If you have acceleration problem with some race car, use higher final drive.

Short gear is prefered when the car have peaky power curve. You can do this in two ways:

• move ratio slider to the left for low gear and move ratio slider to the right for high gear
• using tranny trick, auto (as small as possible) at final drive (as high as possible) and then use final drive (as low as possible), can shorten the gear more. So the 1st gear will have faster, tall, less spin. And last gear will be the same.

The key to gear tuning is matching the gear to the corner speed or straightaway speed.

 New gear ratio * new final drive * new speed = old gear ratio * old final drive * old speed

AERODYNAMICS/DOWNFORCE

Adjust the downforce. Increasing the overall downforce (by adjusting both front and rear by the same amount) essentially makes the car heavier, this making it more stable at higher speeds. However, this increase in "weight" is to the detriment of top-end performance. Lowering the downforce increases top-end performance but makes the car less stable at top speed. Increasing the front downforce alone causes it to oversteer. Increasing the rear downforce causes it to unersteer.

LSD

Limiting the speed differences of left and right wheel. Low value make the left and right wheel can have high speed differences, so the car have more free movement. But if one side of the powered wheel loosing traction, the power will be all transfered to that wheel, and if this continue, that wheel will spin. In other word, without using LSD, the power that goes to the left or right wheel can reach 100:0 ratio. By using LSD, the left and right wheel power split will be limited. But limiting power split can also limit the cornering ability of the car.

• LSD Initial : LSD for no throttle and no braking, cruising or throttle off.
• LSD Accel. : LSD for throttling condition.
• LSD Decel. : LSD for braking condition.

ASCC

Automatically brake the loosing traction wheel to balance the car. This help controlling the car greatly, but if your car is already balanced, using this can reduce your cornering speed. Only use this to aid uncontrollable car. This option is considered as cheat to some.

TCSC

Limit the wheel rotary acceleration to get better wheel traction. Using this can greatly increase the car control and grip. It will increase acceleration and braking when used max. This option is considered as cheat to some.