yeah, honestly in any game that requires me to use an FF I struggle, its not like you can man handle a time out of it like the Impreza or XR8, or any FR or AWD car in the game or in real life,
for me personally, the setups between real life and the game are miles apart, like the Ferrari F1, the setup i would use for spa in a formula car is so much different to what I have as my game setup, and man handling a 1.31 out of it is a bit far fetched lol, and with my FGT I have kept my actual F3 setup on it for road courses, hence why i haven't blown out the water on the spa TT, I was hoping this new drag system would make things more realistic, specially in a straight line, that's what I liked about the studio liverpool F1 games, the lower the aero, the better the straight line speed,
FF cars are as much about how you drive them as they are about the tune, although both are necessary for a good lap time, whereas with many FR's or MR's a good driver can still get a good lap time even with the stock tune, much of the time. And you hit the nail on the head, you simply can't manhandle them. You have to be patient, allow them to execute the turn and rotate completely into the position at which you can begin to accelerate. If you get on the gas too early you understeer, run wide and have to lift. If you go in slightly hot, you understeer mid corner and have to either brake slightly or take slightly longer for the car to rotate, both of which cost time. With an FR or MR you can often get the car to rotate with the throttle and overcome small errors, it just isn't possible with an FF other than with the handbrake and while that looks great, it isn't fast. it's just so much more critical to be precise with an FF and stay on the racing line (the dark stuff on the track in the corners) because errors are magnified when you don't.
Cnd and I had a 5 lapper at Laguna last week and although we were nose to tail most of the race and only a couple of tenths apart at the finish, it was obvious that the Civic and Miata are not the same speed in every corner. Some corners he'd come flying out of and gain a little, some corners it was me. Overall the lap times were within a tenth, but not the same speed in every corner. There will probably be tracks the Miata will be faster at, and others the Civic will be faster at, but overall they are about the same speed. Tire wear will be a factor, but we didnt run far enough to figure out how much of a factor it will be.
I found the keys to tuning FF's are as follows:
1. Raise the front/lower the rear. This is the biggest tuning adjustment for me. Most FF's have at least 10 points difference front and rear for me.
2. Softer ARB's front, harder rear
3. More camber front, lower rear, if any.
4. Negative toe front and rear.
5. Slightly stiffer front springs than rear by a point or two but both hovering around the mid-point of the available settings.
6. LSD is important and not the same for every car. Some work well around 8-10/25/5 others 15/25/10-15 or in that general range. I tend to start with the first set up, tune the car overall, then go back to the LSD and fine tune.
7. Damper settings usually fairly neutral around 4-6. Bumpy tracks or tracks that require curb hopping lower, flatter tracks higher.
8. Almost forgot the brakes. In longer tire wear races I usually run brake balances on the order of 0/4-7. Contrary to popular opinion, 0 braking doesn't mean no brakes. Try putting 0/0 on a car and it still stops. What it will do is have less braking in front but the tires will not lock and will keep rotating. Try it and see. Stopping distances are about the same, you can trail brake with most FF's with that braking set up and just as importantly, you will have less tire wear on the front for longer races. I think for Laguna I used 0/6. When I ran a few races in the ITCC I used 0/4-6 on a few different FF's and was able to run as fast and as far on a set of tires in a particular race as I would have with an FR, although with more tire wear, but not enough that I had to pit.
This is all track dependent of course. The tune that works on Laguna, will not likely work on Deep Forest for example, you'll have the back end swinging around like a trailer on a lot of corners. You can often fix this just by adjusting the ride height and leaving the other settings the same or very close. Much more than FR's, FF's are very track dependent in their setups and so they require more work to be competitive in a series settings. This isn't true as much on Racing tires and the harder the compound, the more work is required.
When I get back next week, I'll gladly post the entire tune I used for the Civic at Laguna. It wasn't what I'd call perfect, but it was good enough to hang with the Miata at Laguna with Cnd driving and that's about as fast as the Miata will get...lol.
If I have enough time, I'll take the Volks for a spin and throw a tune on it as well. If Mel throws up a couple of tunes as well, I'm sure between the two anyone driving either of the two cars will find something they like, or at least close enough they can monkey with it a bit and make it fit their driving style.
