Anyone got any tips? I am struggling with my first season!
This is going to sound insane, but try using this set up for just about every track and see how you do. As long as the CPU isn't set to Legendary, you should be able to get a decent handful of finished right off the bat.
Aero:
Front/ Rear Wings: 9-11 and keep them even with each other (If a course has a lot of tight turns, I would definitely set both to 11)
Brakes:
If you are still getting use to braking, I would use large braking discs on courses with lots of quick tight turns on medium-high pressure.
With respect to braking bias, just know that if you want your car to understeer a little bit easier make the front higher than the rear (53-47) and vice versa if you are on courses like Monza that has a lot of high speed turns (47-53). Just be sure to pay attention to how quickly your brakes heat up and cool down. *Too hot= lock up*
Balance:
Again this is going to sound crazy, but set both front and rear anti-roll bars to 11 at ALL TIMES not matter what course you are driving on.
Suspension:
Ride height- Until you start to learn how to tune cars on your favorite courses, I would simply keep your front and rear ride height even with each other. I will usually throw my car to the ground for every course (1-3, usually one). The rule of thumb here is the lower the car is to the ground the less down force you will have (aka you will accelerate much quicker, BUT KEEP IN MIND as long as you have your wings around (10-11) you will compensate for it. Also low ride height means less suspension movement, (aka it will be a little bit harder to make your car fish tail around corners). Again, setting your antiroll bars to +11 increases this effect as well.
Spring stiffness- Not matter what course I am racing on I always keep my spring stiffness at +11 for both front and rear. I never change this and again, have it this high will make the suspension much stiffer.
***In actuality, these settings so far aren't going to make much sense, but trust me.... when you play it in the game you find driving to be a lot easier.
Gear/ Gear Ratios:
This is a very tough skill to nail down and requires a lot of testing. Every track is different, so I wouldn't recommend using the exact same ratios, but definitely using one similar shape is a start.
I usually throw gears 1-4 up all the way (regardless of track) then set 5th gears about 25-39 Kilometers slower than 4th gear, then 6th gear about 30-35 kilometers slower than 5th, then to figure out where your 7th gear should be, simply drive the longest straight on the course and make your 7th gear SLIGHTLY LONGER than the rev limiters (when the red lights on the wheel come on). And make sure on this straight you are ONLY USING DRS, do not use any KERS because realistically, you aren't going to dump it all in one spot on the track. *Note: I usually save two settings for courses; One qualifying and race set up. This is going to be your qualifying set up*
Then for your race setup I typically make my 7th gear about 5-10 kilometers shorter than my qualifying setup. Again, with some tracks this may not be the best possible thing to do.
Alignment:
***By far, this is the most difficult setting to understand in this game***
Camber: (imagine that you are standing right in front of a race car and looking that the front wheels) When you adjust the camber on a car, you either making the wheels turn in a inward direction \ / or outward direction / \. When camber is set at the default middle value the wheels won't have any turn in | |. The benefits of have you wheels turn in ( \ / ) *esp on extremely curvy tracks* is that your wheels are constantly resisting each other, on both straightaways and corners. So the major advantage of having your tires turn inward is that you will be able to engage curbs a lot more aggressively (I usually have both F/R around 3.30). But the major disadvantage of have a turn in camber is that you will have slower acceleration (because your tires are resisting each other) and quicker tire wear. ***I would recommend usually staying left of the center value and keeping F/R even for sure***
Toe angle: (Imagine that you are positioned directly above the car and looking directly down on the body) Similar to camber, the toe angle adjusts the angle of the top/ bottom of the tires. ( \ / or / \ ) This setting should greatly differ from track to track. I would recommend keeping the F/R values even with each other and setting both of them one notch away from the setting all the way to the right ( I think one is the values is 0.06 or something)
Here is a Quick version of everything I just said:
Aero (F/R): 9-11 (*I recommend starting at 11)
Brakes: 47-53 or 53-47 (*I recommend making a car understeer first 53-47, then work on backing of on the aggressive use of over braking)
Balance (F/R): Antiroll Bars at +11 AT ALL TIMES
Suspension: Ride Height (F+R): (1-3) *Start at 1, then play around with settings once you get use to a course*
Spring Stiffness (F+R): Set to +11 AT ALL TIMES
Gears/ Gear Ratios:
1-4) all the way to the right
5) 25-39 KPH slower than fourth gear
6) 30-35 KPH slower than fifth gear
7) Qually set up: go to longest straight, using ONLY DRS, make gear slightly longer than the rev limit (AKA when the red lights begin to blink)
Race set up: about 5-10 KPH slower than you 7th gear on your qually set up
Alignment: Camber (F+R) : slightly left generally speaking
Toe Angle (F+R) Slightly right generally speaking
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AND THAT IS IT!! I apologize for this being unnecessarily long, but these are the settings that I will typically use on a coure that I am unfamiliar with. It should work just fine on many tough courses like Suzuka or Nurburgring with little adjustments here and there. I would also recommend if you are using a racing wheel with force feedback, to turn off ALL DRIVING AIDS. I promise you, with this setting you won't need them and they will only make you drive slower (no TCS and no ABS for sure) It might take a day or two to get use to it, but it really isn't t nearly as hard to drive without any aids on as it is on GT5 (no ABS in that game is extremely difficult to nail down perfectly) If you have any other questions about F1 2011 set ups just let me know. I would be more than happy to try to answer your questions.
PSN ID- DAshiznit08, GBM_DAshiznit08
This is crazy. How spoilt are you?
