Physics thread

  • Thread starter LVracerGT
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I will never understand people who have invested their own money into a project, only to run down and cost themselves as much money as possible, never....

He's probably only a junior who is bitter that he only gets one update a month and no online play. If you really feel that way, express your detailed opinion on the WMD forums in the proper way, not just some neaderthal, rock-thumping 'Ummm, it feel arcade' manner.
 
I meanly drive the gt3 class cars but i have to say that after a little bit of playing with the set up and the options for the ffb the car feels really nice, nothing arcade. I had shift 2 only for like 2 days as i couldnt stand the way the car felt, but Project Cars is pure racing simulation and it can only get better and better so ignore troll comments like few post before.

Edit: LogicForce can i ask for some advice on the steering wheel and ffb settings?? As im missing a lot in ffb specially road noise, i did some adjustings and im getting better ffb but i kn theres more. My steering is a G27 and any adivice is wellcome from the logitech profiler onwards.

Thanks in advance
 
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Arhok
Edit: LogicForce can i ask for some advice on the steering wheel and ffb settings?? As im missing a lot in ffb specially road noise, i did some adjustings and im getting better ffb but i kn theres more. My steering is a G27 and any adivice is wellcome from the logitech profiler onwards.

Thanks in advance
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Well first of all let's establish the fact that a linear FFB response gives better car control than a strong response.
Also note that the G25 and G27 are 14 times too weak in terms of torque according to Niels Heusinkveld. So it's pretty weak.

Linear FFB means that your wheel is able to stay in the steering center position of the wheels of your virtual car. So it is at the angle where your virtual tyres want to be pointed at.

Too weak a FFB setting means your motor will not get enough power to get going at a fast enough speed. Causing you in turn to run behind the position you want your wheel and tyres to point at. This initial delay is also called a 'initial FFB deadzone' and is a trade all brushed and brushless non-servo motors at least have.

Too strong a FFB setting means that you have less initial FFB deadzone, but the wheel will overshoot its position it wants to be at. As it can't come to a halt quickly and effectively enough. Or when you have the wheel return direction quickly, you end up running behind the actual Physics again.

So what would I recommend...

1. Turn up the forces in the driver to 150%, especially global forces. This so you have fullmotor power available in the game.
2. Set the FFB strength in the game to 50% to get back to the most linear curvature as Logitech dictates with 100%.
3. When in the game and in a car, go into the 'F1 menu > input > FFB masks' and disable everything except 'steering force'.

Lastly you could go into FFBTweakers and adjust "TightenCenterRange" and remove this by changing it to 0.0. But hit me up on WMD pm if you want help with that. First try the above at least.
And remember if you want more strength keep an eye on how linear you steering feels, and simply adjust to what is most comfortable for you. The best thing would be to get a new wheel with more torque for more strength without the loss of linearity.
 
Talking about linearity, here is why I dislike weight transfer effects being added to the FFB signal. Or actually any 'canned effect'.

I wrote this just now at WMD in reply to a member, but I thought I would share.

He asked me why games like AC and others felt more heavier with his G25 and why pCARS doesn't.

Christiaan van Beilen
That is because other games often add or completely base their FFB on the car's weight transfer. A fake force that counteracts the direction you are supposed to steer in.
With a G25 it seems to feel 'okay' but once you have a better more powerful wheel than it feels horrible and works against you instead of with you. This because the more powerful wheel makes it harder to overcome the weight transfer effect for you as a driver, as the effect is too powerful. This in contrast with a G25 where you could still easily overcome this force and point the wheels in the correct direction, with a T500 it would work so much against you that you are constantly one step behind the Physics.
This effect can be enabled and adjusted in the FFBTweakers though. It is in the FFBTweaker documentation.
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Then he wondered why I couldn't just turn down the global FFB strength of my wheel to counter the strength of the weight transfer effect. Here was my reply.

Christiaan van Beilen
Yeah, but that's just a general volume dial. One general dial that controls two things at once, strength/torque and rotational speed.
Let's say the car wants the tyres to be at a certain angle and this corresponds to 90 degrees wheel rotation, within 1 second. The car Physics expect that the tyres are always at their center of steering.
Now let's say for example that with full linear force to the left (let's say +100%), the steering wheel rotates 90 degrees in 1 second. This steering position is feedback to the game and is directly related to tyre position/angle.
If we do the same but add weight transfer the counter. If the weight transfer counts as 50% because we drive a tail heavy car, than the force that turns the wheel to the left is only 50%. Which means that at our 1 second mark the wheel will only he at 45 degrees, halfway of where it should be.
In other words, we would need 2 seconds to get to 90 degrees steering wheel angle. That's a delay of 1 second in which the Physics could require a completely different steering wheel and thus tyre angle.
Now if we would turn that general volume dial down to 50% general volume, if at 100% it would be perfectly linear. We would get 50% strength and results in just 45 degrees in 1 second, because not only did we turn down the strength but also the rotational speed.
Now with weight transfer and half the general volume we would have a turning strength of 25% that results in turning just 22.5 degrees angle on the steering wheel.
In other words we would need 4 seconds to get to 90 degrees steering angle, while the Physics wants you to be there in 1 second
So with stronger wheels we either would need to use more muscle to counter intuitively fight the fake weight transfer effect, or make it easier on the muscles but have a huge delay behind the Physics.
All in all, the wheel would feel out of sync with what is going on Physics wise.
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Hope this was of interest to some of you guys. :)
Basically the answer was that if you want more strength from a wheel, get a stronger wheel. But keep the FFB signal as pure as possible so that it doesn't cause a delay and odd effects, amking everything feel out of sync.

Linearity is the key, and buy strength with your dollars (unfortunately as I crave a Bodnar wheel). ;)
 
LogiForce
Well first of all let's establish the fact that a linear FFB response gives better car control than a strong response.
Also note that the G25 and G27 are 14 times too weak in terms of torque according to Niels Heusinkveld. So it's pretty weak.

Linear FFB means that your wheel is able to stay in the steering center position of the wheels of your virtual car. So it is at the angle where your virtual tyres want to be pointed at.

Too weak a FFB setting means your motor will not get enough power to get going at a fast enough speed. Causing you in turn to run behind the position you want your wheel and tyres to point at. This initial delay is also called a 'initial FFB deadzone' and is a trade all brushed and brushless non-servo motors at least have.

Too strong a FFB setting means that you have less initial FFB deadzone, but the wheel will overshoot its position it wants to be at. As it can't come to a halt quickly and effectively enough. Or when you have the wheel return direction quickly, you end up running behind the actual Physics again.

So what would I recommend...

1. Turn up the forces in the driver to 150%, especially global forces. This so you have fullmotor power available in the game.
2. Set the FFB strength in the game to 50% to get back to the most linear curvature as Logitech dictates with 100%.
3. When in the game and in a car, go into the 'F1 menu > input > FFB masks' and disable everything except 'steering force'.

Lastly you could go into FFBTweakers and adjust "TightenCenterRange" and remove this by changing it to 0.0. But hit me up on WMD pm if you want help with that. First try the above at least.
And remember if you want more strength keep an eye on how linear you steering feels, and simply adjust to what is most comfortable for you. The best thing would be to get a new wheel with more torque for more strength without the loss of linearity.
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Thanks a lot for replaying, i definetly gonna try, i disabled all the mask except the steering force after reading one of your post early this week and it make it feel more natural but then i lost a lot of fb when going over bumps or kurbs but the cars felt better, so im gonna try what you said and ill come back to post the resoults.. thanks
 
I guess this is more about the physics, but if mods see fit move the post :)

Just testing a little the responsiveness of the 1M and current tires..

 
Just had my first go on pCARS in a while. Tried the 12C at Silverstone International. Half of that track looks nothing like what it should, but on to the physics. The 12C felt too tail happy and washy. Fair enough it's pre-alpha. So I switched to the SLS AMG road car which is Beta 2, and it should have completed physics right? The car was only a tad better than the 12C. The rear end reacting way too much to undulations in the road surface, and the car was floating around. It was quite a challenge to keep the car in a straight line down the straights of Brands Hatch.
 
And why can I not do it in both places? I'm well aware of giving feedback to the devs on the pCARS forum. But to say the car's physics are supposedly completed, I'm just expressing my concerns here - and was hoping someone was going to say "well they're not completed because"...
 
Aderrrm
And why can I not do it in both places? I'm well aware of giving feedback to the devs on the pCARS forum. But to say the car's physics are supposedly completed, I'm just expressing my concerns here - and was hoping someone was going to say "well they're not completed because"...
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Who was saying 'complete' here? I never did at least.
 
I'm assuming because FLX didn't say they're not complete, that they weren't. :P

It's good news if they're not complete for the SLS, but it's the general feeling I get for some road cars, and have done since 2012.

Edit: So I got a response from Casey on the pCARS forum which was nice. Can someone tell me which road car has the closest physics to being classed as "complete"?
 
Aderrrm
I'm assuming because FLX didn't say they're not complete, that they weren't. :P

It's good news if they're not complete for the SLS, but it's the general feeling I get for some road cars, and have done since 2012.

Edit: So I got a response from Casey on the pCARS forum which was nice. Can someone tell me which road car has the closest physics to being classed as "complete"?
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Actually I'd like to hear that too.. (idea.. ask again @ WMD :P ) But I'd gladly see your input on these threads below, as I know your a real talent in real car as well as in the virtual 👍 (And please the Formula C discussion as well. ;) )

http://forum.wmdportal.com/showthre...ty-transient-grip-problems-in-all-sims/page12

http://forum.wmdportal.com/showthread.php?17495-quot-Floaty-quot-Steering&p=668008#post668008

http://forum.wmdportal.com/showthre...re-of-pcars-(under-power)&p=668234#post668234
 
LogiForce
Talking about linearity, here is why I dislike weight transfer effects being added to the FFB signal. Or actually any 'canned effect'.

I wrote this just now at WMD in reply to a member, but I thought I would share.

He asked me why games like AC and others felt more heavier with his G25 and why pCARS doesn't.
Click to expand...


I have a G25, & like the feel of heaviness. Even with GT games set to 10, it's nowhere near as heavy as in reality, especially for cars without power steering. So, as a result I find this information disturbing. Just because something is technically accurate, doesn't necessarily mean that it feels realistic.

Will we be able to have access to the all the FFB settings on the PS4 version?
 
VBR
I have a G25, & like the feel of heaviness. Even with GT games set to 10, it's nowhere near as heavy as in reality, especially for cars without power steering. So, as a result I find this information disturbing. Just because something is technically accurate, doesn't necessarily mean that it feels realistic.

Will we be able to have access to the all the FFB settings on the PS4 version?
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A G25 is at least 14 times not powerful enough to properly reproduce feedback. So no wonder it doesn't feel realistic. At least the input will be 1:1 with the Physics. After all, Physics powers your FFB motors and the position sensor turns the wheels in game. If there is a relay between the game Physics sending a signal and the signal being executed by the position sensor (that turns your tyres), than the stuff will be out of sync and you are behind the actual situation in terms of car control.

I never said that weak wheels don't need an adapted FFB profile to make them feel better. As there is the issue with the weak wheels that your hands can easily stop the wheel completely when the forces are too weak.

So personally I would like to see a FFB profile on a per wheel basis. Leaving it all open for custom wheels.
 
Timppaq
Actually I'd like to hear that too.. (idea.. ask again @ WMD :P ) But I'd gladly see your input on these threads below, as I know your a real talent in real car as well as in the virtual 👍 (And please the Formula C discussion as well. ;) )

http://forum.wmdportal.com/showthre...ty-transient-grip-problems-in-all-sims/page12

http://forum.wmdportal.com/showthread.php?17495-quot-Floaty-quot-Steering&p=668008#post668008

http://forum.wmdportal.com/showthre...re-of-pcars-(under-power)&p=668234#post668234
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The physics releases thread shows the progress of each car but it's a bit confusing if you haven't been closely following the developments. And the google doc in that thread didn't work for me.

I'll definitely give the FC a try, and I'll wait on posting in the first 2 threads you linked until I've tried a few more cars and stuff. But straight away I understand the aims of both them threads with the floaty steering and lack of low speed tyre bite. Will try your camera setup for the steering fix. :D:tup:
 
FLX1981
And you are reporting that here and not here: http://forum.wmdportal.com/showthread.php?12636-Mercedes-Benz-SLS-physics-discussion/page14 because..? I doubt the devs have time to read GTP, so if you want the cars to improve, get your feedback to the right places.
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Maybe someone here will think "Yeah, that's an issue for me too. I should get off my arse and let SMS know".

How about simply encouraging more communication (here, there, everywhere), instead of reciting some sort of rigid place of communication substitution manta?
 
Because here is not the place to discuss such matters. Would you talk about the job you do, intimate details, in public, or would you do it in private?

When you pay into pCARS, you become a member of the workforce; as such, it should be treated like that.
 
This thread is to discuss the physics of the game. If every member who invested in pCARS treated it as you describe you'd have more than a few hundred people viewing the pCARS forum at any one time. Some people just wanna play the damn game. 👍
 
Logiforce's comments about the problems with simulating weight transfer are spot on. That's exactly the issue AC suffers from on the T500RS, at least last time I tried it on my thrustmaster wheel around v0.7. The G25 is much easier to manhandle indeed and as a result you can be faster with it and drift more comfortably.

I have confidence that Kunos will tune it out, in fact 0.7.7 is reported to have helped already...

On the downside, pCARS feel with a G25 is pretty limp since to some extent it feels like they have tuned for higher end wheels :)
 
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I think the weight transfer in AC is pretty spot on. If I lose the car under hard braking I know why, unlike a lot of other games that have you facing the wrong way on the track wondering "what the hell was that all about".
 
fatkrakr
I think the weight transfer in AC is pretty spot on. If I lose the car under hard braking I know why, unlike a lot of other games that have you facing the wrong way on the track wondering "what the hell was that all about".
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AC physics are not the issue, representation in the FFB engine is what I was responding to...
 
Indeed, the issue is that you just want to feel the car stepping out (if you desire this effect, I don't) but you don't want it to overwhelm you. And it overwhelms you once the amount of torque exerted by that effect becomes more than easy to counter with muscle power. Yet as this effect is just a percentage of total motor output, as the FFB wheel gets more powerful (more torque) this effect becomes to much to handle and ends up working against you counterintuitively.
 
Wolfe
For all this talk of force feedback and gritty details, I hope Project CARS also nails the foundation beneath it all. Things like brake fade, volumetric throttle response, and advanced FFB are great, but it's all kind of pointless if fundamental handling dynamics don't play out as they should.

Understeer is relatively well-covered, but too many simulation games fall apart on the oversteer end. Some games either fail to make oversteer a liability on corner entry (Forza Motorsport 4), or go kind of overboard on that (mid-engined cars in GT5). After you exceed a certain rear slip angle, it could end in draconian snap-overcorrection (Gran Turismo 4), or failure to correct in spite of countersteer (any ISImotor game I've tried).

Some of this has to do with the tire model -- and I know SMS hopes to address that -- but the tire model isn't everything. I'm not much of a programmer, but in some games, it's as if the chassis is subjected to the whims of tire algorithms that occasionally overlook the mass of all that metal up there, or spit out odd behaviors. Things tend to get a little sketchy when it comes to rotation (and roll/pitch).

What do you think, @LogiForce? It's still early yet, but as long as we're talking about physics I would appreciate it if you could compare your experience with that of Live for Speed, not only for its tire model but also the way it simulates mass/momentum upon an axis. :) I have not played iRacing, rFactor 2, or Assetto Corsa; from my experience LFS remains #1.
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I have to give you (@Wolfe) some credit for getting me to spend some more time with LFS, what a blast with my new wheel, and triple screen. I tried LFS demo some time back and wasn't too impressed but I think I was putting too much focus on the graphics. Actually, the graphics are not bad at all now that I can run it with everything on max and triple.
LFS may be dated but I will be paying for the S2 license. This will give me some triple-screen fun until I upgrade my graphics card/s to allow triple screen on the current generation sims (pCARS, AC, and Raceroom).
Note, if you haven't tried AC, you should as you will not be disappointed being an LFS fan. pCARS and Raceroom are very good also but a little more hit and miss at their stage of development. All have their own pluses and minuses and but in my mind all very worthy sims.
 
I'm glad you're having fun with it. :)

It doesn't seem like there's a free demo of AC I can try (I need a NetKar Pro license?). I don't know if I could run the game, I stopped keeping up with high-end-graphics PC games years ago...I wouldn't be here if Project CARS wasn't releasing to consoles. From what I hear, I have no doubt that AC has superb physics, and I'll have the processing power to play it someday.
 
It was just under a year a go for me, but I've got a lot of hours in that car. iRacing has the best physics for race cars imo. The MX5 is hit and miss depending on which version of NTM you're looking at and that's where I think the great, natural feeling of road cars in AC trumps it. I only had a tiny go in the Z4 GT3 in AC but to me it felt a bit bland. No road car has wow'ed me in pCARS yet but the race cars are at least looking promising. :)
 
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