Weight Reductions and handling for 500pp

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ampire

ampire

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I've been doing a lot of 500pp races and I have found that weight reductions make the car handle worse relative to other low pp racers.

It seems like its always better to add bolt on power equipment (exhaust, filter, chip, etc) than to buy any of the weight reductions/hood/windows etc.

With the weight reductions, the car seems to sit worse in the corner, possibly because the car's weight balance front/rear does not change with the weight reduction, but the overall weight is less, so it loses stability in the corners.

I have also found that the most competitive cars are in the 470pp range when purchased and its best to just bolt it on up to 500pp, gradually removing some bolt ons as the engine breaks in. Any time you add ballast or reduce power the car becomes substantially less competitive.

Anyone else find this to be the case?
 
Maybe stiffen the sway bars?
 
It must mess up the weight distribution, you could try moving the weight towards the front or the rear, the car symbol also tells you the weight distribution
 
Cowboys965
It must mess up the weight distribution, you could try moving the weight towards the front or the rear, the car symbol also tells you the weight distribution
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That was my theory as well. The apparent weight distribution stays the same, for example car starts at 55/45, you add stage 1, its still 55/45. Maybe the lighter overall weight but the same weight bias results in bad handling...

When you add ballast back in its always worse than not removing the weight in the first place...
 
I rarely even do stage 1 lightweight unless the car is very heavy stock. I do wish you could reverse the process as in previous games but once it is done, its done.

The only lightweight I usually put on cars is the window weight reduction (and probably one of the biggest wastes of Cr. in the game) but I did it to distinguish which used vehicles with miles I had applied the refresh to both engine and chasis.
 
95GTIVR6
I rarely even do stage 1 lightweight unless the car is very heavy stock. I do wish you could reverse the process as in previous games but once it is done, its done.

The only lightweight I usually put on cars is the window weight reduction (and probably one of the biggest wastes of Cr. in the game) but I did it to distinguish which used vehicles with miles I had applied the refresh to both engine and chasis.
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Same here, after I bought it for my otherwise awesome Maserati Gran Turismo S, it was about 490pp so I figured the bump to 499PP would make it a great competitor. Nope, lap times went to **** and I wish I just bought the sport tune chip instead.
 
Also seems like the engine stage 1-3 are just as dangerous and should never be purchased to reach a PP class level.
 
ampire
I've been doing a lot of 500pp races and I have found that weight reductions make the car handle worse relative to other low pp racers.

It seems like its always better to add bolt on power equipment (exhaust, filter, chip, etc) than to buy any of the weight reductions/hood/windows etc.

With the weight reductions, the car seems to sit worse in the corner, possibly because the car's weight balance front/rear does not change with the weight reduction, but the overall weight is less, so it loses stability in the corners.

I have also found that the most competitive cars are in the 470pp range when purchased and its best to just bolt it on up to 500pp, gradually removing some bolt ons as the engine breaks in. Any time you add ballast or reduce power the car becomes substantially less competitive.

Anyone else find this to be the case?
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No, I find it to be the case for people (no offense) who don't know how to tune their added parts (suspension, lsd, etc) or people who can't drive lighter cars as well.
Somewhere around 1000-1100KG is GT5's "sweet spot" for weight, where you get the least PP for the best performance, and it doesn't change from car to car, if it's heavier, take weight off, lighter, add weight on.
 
CSLACR
No, I find it to be the case for people (no offense) who don't know how to tune their added parts (suspension, lsd, etc) or people who can't drive lighter cars as well.
Somewhere around 1000-1100KG is GT5's "sweet spot" for weight, where you get the least PP for the best performance, and it doesn't change from car to car, if it's heavier, take weight off, lighter, add weight on.
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I use a dual shock 3 controller, so lighter cars can be very twitchy for me, so maybe you are right. I know how to tune cars pretty effectively, but I am pretty mediocre at racing online. My best 500pp car can do 1:29-1:30ish solo on trial mountain for reference.
 
really depends on the track where you are best served getting your PP from. ie. on nurb, generally speaking, HP wins.. whereas on autumn ring, weight reduction may trump hp if you are smooth and can utilize the improved cornering.
 
Depends on the car and it's inherent abilities to begin with, the course you are tuning it for and how well you can drive different drivetrain setups. Keeping many mid range cars withing the 1000kg-1300kg range depending on course tends to keep you well balanced in weight and power output. Some cars can void those things, like NSX's and RX7's these cars tend to be faster than comparable vehicles in their weight class.

Just look up tunes online or on here, and if you like to tune it yourself just remember when you add weight to give your car some sort of balance to it. Most cars are good with a slightly heavier rear than front(some can't get there at all so close to 50/50 will do), what I notice is that cars with a tendency to mimic weight distribution of an F1, the NSX definitely fits that to a T. Remember to tune your suspension according to the tires you are riding on, racing tires require stiffer springs and vice versa for road tires, toe and camber also must be changed to work with the tires as well. Happy tuning, trial and error, hope the update helps us along with set up saving and a test course for our cars. Don't quit with tuning, always back up before doing irreversible things to your car.
 
ampire
That was my theory as well. The apparent weight distribution stays the same, for example car starts at 55/45, you add stage 1, its still 55/45. Maybe the lighter overall weight but the same weight bias results in bad handling...
Click to expand...
I've also noticed that weight reduction can change the handling, which is stange because like you say the weight distribution diagram doesn't change. It is still faster, though, you just need to re-tune the car to get the handling balance back.

When you add ballast back in its always worse than not removing the weight in the first place...
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In my experience, any ballast that brings the car closer to 50/50 improves handling. Personally I try to avoid ballast, but if it's not possible and my car is say 60/40, then I'll weight reduce it and add some rear ballast to get it closer to 50/50.
 
I found the best is always lighten it. Maybe a little bit more power than scale it back, but depends on the car to meet restrictions. Only if the car is insane to drive would I say add some weight to even it out
 
How you tune and set up a car depends on the type of car (F/R, M/R, etc) and the kind of tires you will use, plus the type of track you will run on; ie, set up for Daytona speedway is quite different from Trial Mountain.

Some of the people who run 450PP races frequently say to increase HP to allow passing instead of improving handling through weight reduction.

For circuit races, I like a balanced car, and typically do weight reduction stage 1 on my 450-500PP cars, then apply remaining PP to HP.

I race cars at this PP level with Sports Tires (Hard/Soft). So, the weight reduction is very noticeable to me.

PS. I don't like adding aero to my low PP cars because it doesn't add enough performance for the PP cost (in my opinion).
 
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