You are going to love these cars Spool. Keeping yourself from sliding around the track, that might be difficult. The M5 car series is what you might call "traction adventurous" also.
Have you messed with Argo's idea to normalize the car types Dean?
The M5 (endurance) seems strong at this point.
484 4 door and more is looking popular. What is our other series? Drivers choice?
I have not tried Argo's way of changing the cars. I was leaning towards PP adjustments for the cars as it is very easy to track/see in the game. I spent 5 hours last night testing. I really don't want to go back through them all again (don't have the time either at the moment). The PP limits to me are the easy button.
The M5 is not traction limited it is the "M5 on Steroids Series".
I still say spool needs the PT. We would actually have a chance to keep up with him.. . . Then again he would probably figure out a way to make it go fast.
In the grand scheme of things the PT was not nearly as far off as you would think. As I got used to it I got better at throttle control and limiting wheel spin and using it more as a point and shoot car and rolling through the corners instead of trying to get any power down in the corners. It was fun and I was only 3.5-4 seconds off the fastest cars that I tested and I did not do any suspension tuning to it just tossed a race soft in it. I bet with massive dif adjustments and more weight up frount it would get better.
Basically my range from slowest to fastest tested at GVE was 1:12.5-1:16.5. (the PT was at 16.5). Sauce was in the low 12's and actually clicked off a lap in the 11's but he had more time tuning specific cars for testing. I was tossing in generic tunes and making quick changes to get the feel and the range of as many cars as possible so with more time and tuning my times should come down at least a half second across the board at GVE.
there are some really fun cars in this group. Some are twitchy while others borderline manic. Then there are the ones that are almost boring. there is something for everyone in this group.
I like the sound of an M5 series. Do we all have to wear collared shirts and Titleist hats while we race them?
In reply to dean1484: What were your two fastest cars on Grand Valley East?
I would have to look I don't remember. I ran so many of them. I have a list I should scan it and post it so people can see what I do.
Basicly as I suspected all the Subaru were very fast. I don't remember what was the fastest off hand. There were a couple other ones
I really liked the Audi A4. It just drove nice but was about a second off the subi times.
I put a tune in one subi that was weird. You almost had to drive it like you were on dirt. It was great fun. Not the fastest tune for the car but I would run it.
Argo1
SuperDork
8/19/15 5:24 p.m.
Air, you may be on to something with your "Misc" series. I ran all six cars at Midfield and the fastest was 1:29.878 and the slowest was 1:30.210. Crazy variety but they were very competitive. Maybe a series were you can only use a car twice and not in consecutive races and you must use each car at least once?
Yes, that was what I was looking for, a group of seemingly different cars that are competitive. We should try and test those tonight. We still do need a SSS series. I like the "only use the car twice" idea also.
One thing to check with those is to try them on a few other tracks to make sure they are still equal. Would not want to have a clear ringer for some tracks. Of course, you would need to test all the cars on all the tracks to figure that out...
Here is the list again:
- Alpine A110 1600S '73 - (419) - RR - 60,200cr
- Mercedes-Benz SL 500 (R129) '98 - (438) - FR - 168,090cr
- Land Rover Range Rover Evoque Coupe Dynamic '13 - (415) - 4WD - 60,000cr
- Buick GNX '87 - (427) - FR - 31,080cr
- Renault Sport Mégane R.S. '08 - (414) - FF - 41,000cr
- Nissan 180SX Type X '96 - (409) - FR - 24,980cr
I'm still hoping to make it tonight but looks like I'm going to be stuck in the office. How many more test night are there going to be?
Start of season should be next Wednesday.
For the Potpourri series (the testing seemed to go good, but the Alpine is iffy) here are a few more cars that could be subbed in for the Alpine or the Merc (which is suspiciously fast on larger tracks):
- Nissan Stagea 260RS AutechVersion '98 - (417)
- Subaru BRZ S '12 - (407)
- Acura RSX Type-S '04 - (402)
- Toyota Tacoma X-Runner '04 - (414)
The RSX and the Tacoma seem to be the most interesting contenders.
These are the current cars:
- Alpine A110 1600S '73 - (419) - RR - 60,200cr
- Mercedes-Benz SL 500 (R129) '98 - (438) - FR - 168,090cr
- Land Rover Range Rover Evoque Coupe Dynamic '13 - (415) - 4WD - 60,000cr
- Buick GNX '87 - (427) - FR - 31,080cr
- Renault Sport Mégane R.S. '08 - (414) - FF - 41,000cr
- Nissan 180SX Type X '96 - (409) - FR - 24,980cr
It would not be a tragedy to leave the list as is though. The thought is, you can only use each car TWICE. Only TWO cars of each type per race. Car choice goes to those lowest in the rankings (HC to leaders). Car choice does not have to be made until race time (futher HC).
I think we are pretty solid on the M5 Series, not sure if this will be Wed or Sun
- 05 or 08 BMW M5
- 575 pp
- No Aero, or NOS
- Full Tune
- No tire restrictions
- 5 min Sprint Race (reverse grid of standings)
- 15 min race (grid based on Sprint race), Fuel and Tire use on HIGH
I think we need to do this as a lap number race. Can I switch between timed and lap number races? (maybe I am thinking of qualify / race setups)
After you all left I searched the dealerships using the search box that lets you search for part of a car name. Anyway I searched for all FR cars with the word base and came up with a great bunch of cars. I tested several and they are a hoot to drive. They would make a great spec series or a tire and fuel series or a tuner series or both. The bad side is that they are pricy. The cheapest one I found that seemed to work both ways would be the BMW m3 gt2 base model. I added weight and tuned it to 600 pp and it eats tires as fast as the m5. The good part I it is much more stable and is easier to drive due to the arrow but it is also a faster car so you have to be in the game all the time. The cost is $350000. The really fun cars are $950000. There is a FR GTR in this group that I took the tires off it in 4 laps. About five min of run time and I used more than half a tank. This would make for a great fuel and tire series. The Honda HSV is also in this group but I i remember from Argos testing a while back it was a ringer. I will post up a photo of the list I was looking at and maybe we cane make a series out of it some how.
Air there was an issue with changing between race types when I hosted the JR touring car series. I forget what it was exactly but it took some weird steps on my part to be able t swap between the two. I think I had to do a timed qualifying on both but I could then have one race with a set number of laps and another with a time limit.
e30Matt
HalfDork
8/20/15 11:55 a.m.
In reply to aircooled:
A little testing needs to be done on the 4WD cars, they need a small PP bump (5pp?) to be competitive with the other layouts. The 4WD cars take a PP hit because of the traction advantage they have, but at this PP the other cars can get the power down just fine which essentially leaves the 4WD's underpowered.
Edit: looking at my spreadsheet the best 4WD cars I tested were ~1 second behind my top times at Trial Mountain, but mid-pack overall. The caveat is that 4 of the 6 slowest cars I tested were also 4WD (including the 3 slowest times), so overall the 4WD doesn't rank well. On faster tracks with longer straights they will probably be even worse.
Ok back to my testing last night these are the cars I got when I sorted on "FR" and "Base" I see basically two sets of cars here that could be used for a series of different types of races.
The cars with the red box's are tire and fuel pigs with the GT-R Nismo being the worst and also probably the worst to drive (great handling but lots of power) This means spinning it out of corners is a big possibility and it uses up rear tires at a alarming rate in stock tune. I was done with my tires in 5 minutes of racing!!!! And then there is the fuel it drinks it!!! I think tuning it would help a lot and it would mean some real thinking in terms of tire and rule management would be needed. I think it is just to fast to be fun to be a good one make series. Insanity is fun or a while but quickly gets tiresome.
The GT-R GT500 and the Z GT500 are lots of fun and much calmer cars. Both easy to drive, fast and great handling and eat tires a little faster than the M5 but much better driving car than the M5 and a bit faster meaning longer races (more laps) than the m5 in the same time frame.
I have not tested the SC430 but I can assume that it is comparable to the other two above (some one should test this car)
The M3 GT2 is a great car. Fuel and tire ware are basically the same as the M5 but instead of a wallowing pig of an M5 it is a race car and is a lot of fun to drive and the price is at least reasonable compared to the other cars.
I did not test the two cars in Yellow to see how they stack up with each other and or the others. IF some one has some time that would be something that may be a interesting series. I am thinking that maybe just leave then stock and or adjust as needed to make them equal. No tuning other than mods to even the two cars (if needed)
The 86 Race Car (The Toyota at 403 pp in the photo) is also something I have not tested. This could possibly make for an interesting tuner to say 450+/- PP or just leave it stock. It is VERY cheep compared to the other cars. Again it needs testing for both how it drives and fuel and tire and as a stock "SS" form and in tuned form.
The reason for these cars was that all are paintable and all are race cars. We have not done a race car series in a while so I am thinking we should entertain one.
This selection of cars I think leads to a lot of possible series, Fuel and tire (or not) tuning or SS, Do we mix it up and put two or three cars in a series or do a single make. And most important everything I tested were good driving cars mostly due to being race cars and having aero. But maybe it is time to take a brake from the slip and slide street cars and take a turn at some race cars again. In either case A series with these is an easy button answer if we need a series. We just need to figure out $$$$$ as some people are short on cash so may be the BMW or the Toyota 86 Race
Ohya I skipped over the HSV-010 GT as per Argo's testing a couple series ago it was the clear ringer when tuned to a spec matching similar cars.
Interesting. I had no idea there were that many base models.
We can test this, but Keith's credit wallet is going to be smoking!
There are actually more these are all the FR one's
I just played with the M5 cars and I like them. Plenty of power, decent handling, and enough tail out action to make you manage the tires. Why no aero though? It adds PP, so you'd have to turn down the power or add weight, but it could give a tire longevitiy advantage. Just a thought.
We want to maximize tire punishment so we can keep the races shorter.
Actually, I like the race car option at SSS with fuel and tire wear, especially since there's a chance we won't run a race car series for number 8.
I currently have about 2 million credits. I can't afford to buy every car possible for each series but I can get at least one.
It seems to me that it is buying all the tuning parts that eat up most of my funds.
In reply to Keith_Goodrich:
That will happen. Just make sure you log in every day and do the seasonals when you're at full bonus. It's pretty easy to clear about $1M per group, though some of them are tough. I usually skip the high PP race car races.