GT5’s New Tire Degradation Dynamics Explored

Amongst the listed changes for GT5’s v2.02 update earlier this month was an adjustment to the tire wear speed. Up until this point players had been used to the three tyre compounds within each grade – Racing, Sports and Comfort – wearing at relatively similar rates while offering different outright grip levels. The soft tires were the racers’ obvious choice for grip without a tire life penalty.

After the December update this changed and the softer tires no longer had the same longevity as the harder compounds. The exact nature of this change has been the source of some debate on the GTPlanet forums, however GTP member chuyler1 has put together a very nice analysis of the current tire wear rates on the Racing grade tires that members planning to participate in longer races will find very useful.

GT5 Photomode image by Grand Prix.

Comments (65)

  1. starbutt033

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    1. TokoTurismo

      @HugoReyes-8 Ahem. You wanna know why.. Because it’s not a “Racing Simulator”, it’s a “Driving Simulator”. Did you forget or are you just purposely trying to complaining. Please don’t start thank you…

  2. wheresmadug

    Cant cope with this new tyre wear on soft tyres… Can some one please point me in the right direction to a set up that helps save my front tyres….

  3. Blood*Specter

    And I think you are 100% right HKS. So they need to take some stats and get hot. If nothing else, they have to make clear distinctions between cars, past present and future. Looks like F1 and the Red Bull X’es will have to be classified differently for tire ware mode and perhaps even physics. But that actually makes the task less hard for PD to manage. The more they are able to divide the cars into specific classes, the easyer their job will be, and the more realistic the simm will become.

    I think they can pull it off. Especially looking at how far they have already come. It may not be 100% accurate, but it will be pretty close. And light years ahead of every other driving simm out there. The PS4 might have to have expandable memory.
    Something else to buy…..yes. But the GT game would blow everything else away. And memory is now pretty cheap :)

    1. HKS racer

      Well I think PD always kept GT series into sim/cade bundaries, they simplifyed lot of things compared to other products (pc sims). Now with GT5 we have good/great FFB, an enjoyable driving experience but it’s time to move further into simulation, expecially all the aspects and features not strictly related to FFB, I’m talking about flag rules, race weekends, tyres/oil/engine/brakes temperature, multiclass racing, proper tyre wear for different type of cars, gaps related to all the drivers not only P1 (crucial for strategies)… ecc ecc. I think all GT users after playing GT5 are more than ready to deal with a full blown simulator. Even GT5 could be one if they add all those features needed, so it’s all about PD’s vision, will they keep adding childish stuff like horns, museum cards, 200.000 helmets and suits? Or they’ll go for a full blown sim with GT6 (hopefully keep patching GT5)?

  4. Blood*Specter

    Forgive the long post:

    I definitely like the change but I hope the tire model is tweaked. IDT the PS3 has enough computing power to handle every aspect of the tire model. For example: temperatures, down force weight and track surface irregularities for each circuit, for each car (up to 16) simultaneously. (There are so many more) That would take a dedicated chip.

    PD must first strictly define the cars into four classes:

    1. Racing Cars: (TC, NASCAR, GT300, GT500 Rally, LM, LMP, F1, RM GT1/2/3)
    2. Tuned: (User modifications and Specialty shops like Amuse, Opera…ECT)
    3. Stock: (No mod and no specialty cars included)
    4. Arcade/Open: (Any thing you want race against anything else all mods allowed)

    If this is executed well, there will be no more arguments about what a racing car, street car or tuned car actually is. Once that is done, they will be able to build a tire ware model that will work for each class of car according to the track it’s running on and the weather conditions. Please don’t forget rain tires PD.

    Then restrict the type of tires for each type of car. Racing car? Then use racing tires.
    Tuned or user modified car? Use sports tires.
    Driving a new stock car from dealership? Use comforts.

    Of course, some cars are sold with exotic sports tires when you buy them, so find out which cars come with which tires and equip them that way from the dealership.
    I doubt a Prius comes with the same type tires that a GTR come with from the dealer.
    And that same Prius doesn’t have the same tires as a Prius TC.

    For the record using Nurburgring 24h as the model:
    Racing soft=4 laps
    Racing Medium=7 laps
    Racing Hard=10 laps

    Of course the smother the car is driven, the longer the tires will last.

  5. deadcat777

    Instead of shortening the lifespan of soft compound, they should increase the lifespan of hard compound instead.

  6. pipi_r6

    I don’t like this new tire wear, it’s not real, the soft tires likes the qualification tires, you can do 3 fast laps ???

    if don’t change that GT5 end for me, simple like that!!!

    1. HKS racer

      Did you read the anyalisis by chuyler1? I guess no. The problem is not racing soft tyres, the problem is racing hard. Even if they last longer most of times they are simply not fast enough to be worth using them.

      Another problem is young silly kids pretending racing soft tyres to last more than 20 laps.

    2. TokoTurismo

      You do know why GT5 is called is called, the real driving simulator” right? You should thank chuyler1 for discorving this hard work. No I don’t want to start a agurement or anything, but I’m happy chuyler1 found out about this. Thank you very much chuyler1, you rock. :)

    3. TokoTurismo

      You do know why GT5 is called is called, the real driving simulator” right? You should thank chuyler1 for discorving this hard work. No I don’t want to start a argument or anything, but I’m happy chuyler1 found out about this. Thank you very much chuyler1, you rock. :)

    4. pipi_r6

      GT1 cars!!! lol, just kidding

      Racing softs, betwwen 12 : 15 laps,
      Mediums 15 : 18
      Hard softs 18:21

      Nascar cars. soft tires 14 laps, lol thats really happens???

    5. pipi_r6

      Excuse I explained me wrong
      what i want to said is this,

      the tires need to do this laps.

      Racing softs, between 12 : 15 laps
      Mediums 15 : 18
      Hard softs 18:21

      and not 8 with softs 11 with mediums and 14 with hards.

      thats is my opinion about the tire wear.

    6. Tenacious D

      pipi, I agree, but this is better than Racing Softs lasting about as long as Racing Hards. Maybe this can be tweaked a bit in an update, but I don’t expect dramatic changes. If tire wear wasn’t accelerated somewhat, GT5 wouldn’t have much pit strategy at all.

    7. HKS racer

      Well let’s say every different motorsport discipline have different tyre wear values and grip. I remember some years ago in F1 qualifing tyres ran out pretty quickly. Even this year in some circumstances soft compound didn’t last more than 7 or 8 laps.
      It really depends on what discipline we are talking about. No doubt GT endurance cars have different wear values from F1’s. Problem with PD is they “simplified” it using the same wear with every type of car.

  7. HKS racer

    Thanks for this tyrewear news in homepage. I was looking for something “official” like this, so thanks for the tip!

  8. marktyper

    Nice!!! The analysis helps me realize that Soft compound is still the best for grip races and endurances for the gaps… Cause I know that even you use Soft in Endurance, while the RH is staying cool (tire wear wise) , the RS is obviously expanding the gap…
    PLUS, I realized and felt too that the update of 2.02 affected some changes in the tire wear of Soft compunds.. I usually use Racing and Sports soft lately cause I realized the potential of expanding the gap right away compare to Using RM.
    THANKS to chuyler1 for the analysis! I’m planning to make some analysis too about Sports Soft and Racing Soft differences :) Cheers!

  9. VspecZR1GT2RS89

    This some great info there, thanks chyuler for the info!!! This will mean more tests. But I would love to see a test with comfort tires and sports tires as well to see how they will match up to the new update. That will be great! :)

  10. TokoTurismo

    My birthday persent. :D Thank you Grand Prix, Kaz, and PD. :) I agree with montecarlo87, this does make GT5 more real. So awesome I say. ;)

  11. TakumiFuji01

    I wish GT5 had a tire system by different brands like Yokohama, Bridgestone, Dunlop, Falken, Toyo Tires and etc.
    I definitely want to use Potenza RE-01Rs and Advan Neova AD07s.

  12. montecarlo87

    I noticed the change the hard way when I barely made a full lap on the ring using the Peugeot 908. But I like the change, it’s brought the real simulator even more realism.

    1. superfluous2

      I’m continually surprised by people that buy GT5, which is billed more as a simulator, and expect arcade-racer sound effects.. Go buy Need for Speed or something.

    2. YZF

      superfluous2> let me guess – flat panel TV with thin and crappy built-in speakers? What do you expect from them? Connect serious surround sound system and you’ll hear true GT5 sound.

    3. MadmuppGT

      I have to agree with YZF, I recently treated myself to a sony surround sound system and was blown away by how much different the engine sounds are… Especially now I have some bass to kick it up a notch, Especially the muscle cars, I could just sit and hear them burble on idle all day!

    4. lancashire lad

      To all the fan boys.I have a big tv linked up to a big surround sound system and the car sounds are Not real and they do sound like hoovers.Turning the sound and bass up just makes them sound like louder hoovers.Watch in car footage of any racing cars on youtube and tell me GT is the same.No it’s not so it’s not a sim in the sound department,get it sorted for gt6 PD.

    5. TokoTurismo

      @lancashire lad “Sigh” boring, we heard this a million of times now. Figures… I went on youtude and check out a video that was made before the update arrived. You can notice how the engine sound has change a bit, it was a comparison between the old an new engine sounds in the cars. If you don’t believe me, go check it out it’s there.

    6. GT HP Nut

      Let’s sort out what this game is, it’s a DRIVING simulator, not a SOUND simulator,

      Btw, who would bother to record the engine sounds of 1000+ cars?

    7. superfluous2

      @ YZF – Playing it on a Samsung 46″ S6 LCD with Panasonic 5.1 surround.
      I like it, I just don’t understand why it’s such a big deal to some people.

      The thing is, cars sound *very* different on a racetrack than they do accelerating between sets of traffic lights on the road.
      I have taken my daily driver to a couple of track days, and the difference between driving quickly on the street and constant driving at full RPM on track is quite pronounced.

  13. GoSpeedRacer

    Very happy for the separation of wear across tire types, but I’m still on the fence on the life of each tire grade.

    1. machwebb

      Yep good improvement. But I reckon a slower wear rate would be great. I tested the softs at Autumn ring in a Elise 111r RM at full chat and after 3 laps they were half worn and had barely any grip. Not sure if this is enough! However I tend to do longer races so the option of different length stints on the different compounds is now a possibility.

      I think a parameter in the event settings for wear rate would be very cool. To cover off longer races. On a 50 lap F1 race I would want 10-12 laps out of my softs and don’t think that would be possible right now (I would have to pit every 2 or 3 laps) I’m gonna test this later.

      I like the latest tyre updates, it has added a new dynamic to the game, but a little longer wear rate please..

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