The SCCA membership 3 month free trial got me again, and so I opened a new iRacing account. Since I'm going to Lime Rock this Saturday, I figured I'd spend an hour or so yesterday learning the track in a Spec Miata. In general, my life doesn't support iRacing since I don't have a dedicated time to play games per week, and usually it's for a half hour at 11:30PM or so once every week or two, so I've avoided it. I tried iRacing probably close to a decade ago (when NCs were the Spec MX-5s), and I never quite got the hang of the physics/tire engine then, either.
After an hour of playing, the Miata still feels like my steering has almost no affect; it understeers like mad.
Anyone have any tips for improving turn in & tire grip feeling with iRacing? Obviously it's me, since it's so popular, but compared to something like Dirt 2.0, rFactor, Project Cars, etc., it feels totally numb.
I'm using an older Logitech G25 in a sim rig (proper-ish seat, pedals & shifter properly mounted, etc.).
Thanks!
Do you get the tires up to temp?
Have you set up your field of view properly?
Have you calibrated your steering wheel?
If yes to the above, I would be curious as to what is going on. The mx5 is okay to drive, but definitely not the most dynamic.
wvumtnbkr said:
Do you get the tires up to temp?
Have you set up your field of view properly?
Have you calibrated your steering wheel?
If yes to the above, I would be curious as to what is going on. The mx5 is okay to drive, but definitely not the most dynamic.
I believe I got the tires up to temp, how can you tell other than time? I did a full 15 minutes race by the end of the night. I did the calibration that popped up the first time I launched it.. Is there a better/different calibration I should do?
I don't believe I set up a field of view? I dunno, would that affect under/oversteering?
I will say that the wheel input is spot on, turn it 50 degrees in real life and it moves 50 degrees on screen.
But turn the wheel 50 degrees and you get tire squealing noise and then, eventually, maybe, the car will turn.
Fov can distort your speed perception A LOT!
You should verify that and make sure it is correct.
Have you tried changing the setup?
wvumtnbkr said:
Fov can distort your speed perception A LOT!
You should verify that and make sure it is correct.
Have you tried changing the setup?
I'll try to adjust it, then. It's about the same as, say, Dirt 2.0 (the most recent game I've played).
I only adjusted tire pressures and added the rear sway bar as the default config didn't use it, and turned up the force feedback slider some to try to get some feeling into the wheel. That helped a little, but not much.
Try setting the force feedback like this and see if it helps:
\
The main thing is making sure the sim knows how strong your wheel is (A G25 is somewhere between 2-3 Nm), and that you don't have everything cranked up so high that it just maxes out every force and you don't get any sensation from it.
WonkoTheSane (FS) said:
But turn the wheel 5 degrees and you get tire squealing noise and then, eventually, maybe, the car will turn.
So like, are you exaggerating here? The MX5 needs like 30-60 degrees of steering wheel input most of the time.
One thing could be that iRacing is not a game, it is a simulator. Games falsely make their cars easy to drive. A simulator gives you very close to real world physics. iRacing is not an install and jump into a race kind of thing. It took me a week or so with many hours of seat time before I was ready (questionably at that) to safely jump into a rookie race and not be "that guy".
At first, your perception of speed will be off. You don't have seat of the pants vibrations and g-forces that tell you that you are going fast. That leads you to grossly over driving the car into turns. Which in an MX-5 will lead to pushing. The MX-5 in iRacing is a full blown race car, so is harder to drive than a street car. The slicks are very slippery until you get some heat in them. The brakes also are a little weak when cold.
You definitely need to get the FOV set correctly. Honestly, just like autocross or racing, don't start tweaking the car until you can stay on the track and run consistent laps. Your G25 is fine. There are guys all the way in the pro ranks (yes, there are pros) that use G25s.
red_stapler said:
Try setting the force feedback like this and see if it helps:
\
The main thing is making sure the sim knows how strong your wheel is (A G25 is somewhere between 2-3 Nm), and that you don't have everything cranked up so high that it just maxes out every force and you don't get any sensation from it.
WonkoTheSane (FS) said:
But turn the wheel 5 degrees and you get tire squealing noise and then, eventually, maybe, the car will turn.
So like, are you exaggerating here? The MX5 needs like 30-60 degrees of steering wheel input most of the time.
Sorry, I dropped a 0 there.. I meant 50 :) Apparently the 0 was sticky, as I noticed it was missing from all of the above.
Thanks for the tips, I'll check it out tonight if I get a chance.
Avalanche325 said:
One thing could be that iRacing is not a game, it is a simulator. Games falsely make their cars easy to drive. A simulator gives you very close to real world physics. iRacing is not an install and jump into a race kind of thing. It took me a week or so with many hours of seat time before I was ready (questionably at that) to safely jump into a rookie race and not be "that guy".
At first, your perception of speed will be off. You don't have seat of the pants vibrations and g-forces that tell you that you are going fast. That leads you to grossly over driving the car into turns. Which in an MX-5 will lead to pushing. The MX-5 in iRacing is a full blown race car, so is harder to drive than a street car. The slicks are very slippery until you get some heat in them. The brakes also are a little weak when cold.
You definitely need to get the FOV set correctly. Honestly, just like autocross or racing, don't start tweaking the car until you can stay on the track and run consistent laps. Your G25 is fine. There are guys all the way in the pro ranks (yes, there are pros) that use G25s.
Yeah, I've had this wheel since it was new (2005/6?) and played sims since forever, and I understand the need to get seat time with whatever physics engine you're playing with (It took me a month before I could complete a rally in full-damage mode for example). But it feels totally dead-stick compared to other sims.
On the car physics thing, I do have a spec Miata with a couple of hundred hours logged on track in it, so I'm fairly familiar with how a real Miata responds to input. The only time mine has ever responded close to this way was when I had a set of undersized RRs on it and it just plowed for days as soon as the tires warmed up. If it responded like this car does, I'd be looking at what's wrong with the alignment/suspension or switching platforms if it couldn't be fixed. It's not fun or eager to turn at all.
WonkoTheSane (FS) said:
The only time mine has ever responded close to this way was when I had a set of undersized RRs on it and it just plowed for days as soon as the tires warmed up. If it responded like this car does, I'd be looking at what's wrong with the alignment/suspension or switching platforms if it couldn't be fixed. It's not fun or eager to turn at all.
I went back and looked at the baseline / rookie setup for the MX5. If you are not running the fixed setup rookie series you should consider adding rake by lowering the front / raising the rear, and adding additional negative camber (around -4) to the front.
At Lime Rock, it takes a while to heat up the tires. They're usually feeling pretty decent by lap 4 or so:
red_stapler said:
WonkoTheSane (FS) said:
The only time mine has ever responded close to this way was when I had a set of undersized RRs on it and it just plowed for days as soon as the tires warmed up. If it responded like this car does, I'd be looking at what's wrong with the alignment/suspension or switching platforms if it couldn't be fixed. It's not fun or eager to turn at all.
I went back and looked at the baseline / rookie setup for the MX5. If you are not running the fixed setup rookie series you should consider adding rake by lowering the front / raising the rear, and adding additional negative camber (around -4) to the front.
At Lime Rock, it takes a while to heat up the tires. They're usually feeling pretty decent by lap 4 or so:
Thanks for the tips, I'll give it a try. I'm not doing any series or anything, I was just hoping to learn Lime Rock before heading out there this weekend ;)
That's a cool chart, are those sorts of analytics available inside of iRacing, or is that an external program?
WonkoTheSane (FS) said:
Thanks for the tips, I'll give it a try. I'm not doing any series or anything, I was just hoping to learn Lime Rock before heading out there this weekend ;)
That's a cool chart, are those sorts of analytics available inside of iRacing, or is that an external program?
iRacing can output about 250MB/hour of telemetry if you turn it on, everything from ride heights, tire temperatures, to brake pedal position is logged. I use MoTeC i2 pro based on a workbook that an iRacing user created:
https://members.iracing.com/jforum/posts/list/3282338.page
I believe McLaren ATLAS (F1 teams use this) can natively open iRacing telemetry files, and there are also a number of iRacing specific apps that can look at telemetry.
In reply to red_stapler :
Wow, that's cool... Thanks for the info! I'll definitely look into that!
red_stapler said:
Try setting the force feedback like this and see if it helps:
\
The main thing is making sure the sim knows how strong your wheel is (A G25 is somewhere between 2-3 Nm), and that you don't have everything cranked up so high that it just maxes out every force and you don't get any sensation from it.
WonkoTheSane (FS) said:
But turn the wheel 5 degrees and you get tire squealing noise and then, eventually, maybe, the car will turn.
So like, are you exaggerating here? The MX5 needs like 30-60 degrees of steering wheel input most of the time.
Those settings really made the wheel feel a whole lot better.. The Mx-5 still understeers like a pig, but at least you can tell the wheels are doing something now.
I did try setting the FOV to the recommended settings, but at 45°, it's unsafe to race as you can't even see the right side of the car at the front, so I slid it back to 60.
It's better, but still pretty "meh" feeling.
WonkoTheSane (FS) said:
It's better, but still pretty "meh" feeling.
Did you make any of the chassis setup changes I suggested?
red_stapler said:
WonkoTheSane (FS) said:
It's better, but still pretty "meh" feeling.
Did you make any of the chassis setup changes I suggested?
Not yet, I only had about 20 minutes so I was trying the other settings. I'll try again next seek with your chassis changes.
WonkoTheSane (FS) said:
red_stapler said:
Try setting the force feedback like this and see if it helps:
\
The main thing is making sure the sim knows how strong your wheel is (A G25 is somewhere between 2-3 Nm), and that you don't have everything cranked up so high that it just maxes out every force and you don't get any sensation from it.
WonkoTheSane (FS) said:
But turn the wheel 5 degrees and you get tire squealing noise and then, eventually, maybe, the car will turn.
So like, are you exaggerating here? The MX5 needs like 30-60 degrees of steering wheel input most of the time.
Those settings really made the wheel feel a whole lot better.. The Mx-5 still understeers like a pig, but at least you can tell the wheels are doing something now.
I did try setting the FOV to the recommended settings, but at 45°, it's unsafe to race as you can't even see the right side of the car at the front, so I slid it back to 60.
It's better, but still pretty "meh" feeling.
This is HUGELY important in iracing.
Basically, it tells me that you need to somehow get closer to your screen. Any way possible.
If it defaulted to 45, it is possible that you are actually less than 45, because that is as low as it will go.
I had this same argument with my friends who do iracing often and once I moved my screen to about 14 inches from my face, everything was better. It really changes the "intuitiveness" of controlling the car.
I tried the same thing too. I just increased my field of view so I could see the apex and other things outside of my narrow range. It seemed better.... It was not. I did a race where I hit a car under the pacelaps because the FOB was all wrong. On my screen I was still 10 to 20 feet away. In reality, I was in his trunk!
Step 1 for any game made after the mid 2000s*: Slide FOV slider all the way to the maximum.
I think a lot of people get really hung up on an accurate FOV, which is always going to result in a reduced FOV. I'd rather be able to see a somewhat normal range of stuff, even if its slightly distorted, vs. seeing stuff rendered accurately with insane tunnel vision.
For example, a 22" 16:9 monitor 14" from your face will result in a FOV of approx 73degrees, or about 40% of what you can see in real life. I have a 35" Ultrawide screen about 27" from my face, which results in a pathetic 61degree FOV. I play with it set at maximum though (most games top around 120, but those that go higher I set to 140ish.
To get a realistic FOV with a single monitor, your eyeballs would literally have to touch the screen. Also note that even though in game, you are looking at an object far away, the screen is the actual focal point for your eye so moving it close may cause difficulty if you are older.
*Before 2000s with games like Quake you could set fov to 180+ and E36 M3 gets super weird. 
This is why I race with a 43 inch TV at 1080P. The TV is on the desk my eyes are probably 36 inches form teh screen or so. ( I can measure it tonight as the assetto corsa group is racing tonight. I give up detail for proper FOV. My "other" racing setup for the PS4 (ya first world problem here) I am using a 55" plasma TV and with that I can use my play seat with the TV on the wall again at 1080P. I would love to go higher resolution but a bigger screen let you get better and more realistic FOV making the game that much better.
FOV is great but nobody should be racing with like a 30 degree FOV because they have a small display.
I'll just jump in with a comment on the MX-5, a couple of builds ago it was a really fun car to drive, the front end was pretty planted and it was very easy to get the car to rotate. Perfect for experienced users but not so much for a rookie car. Since then they have tamed the car down with the baseline setup and I think that is part of your problem here.
The spec racer ford is a free car included with the base content, it's also not as tail happy as it used to be but you may want to take it for a spin just to try something else.
In sim you are typically going much faster than you think you are it also doesn't give you a good sense of where your weight is until you really learn the visual cues, sounds, and the information your wheel is trying to convey. This means you usually go in too hot and bounce off the brakes during turn in making the front light. Back up your braking points, come off the brake earlier to settle the car, coast to the apex and concentrate on hitting that apex and nailing the exit hitting the gas as early as possible and modulating it to avoid offtracks. As you do this you will naturally bring your braking in closer and closer but you gotta feel what the car can do when your not messing up the dynamic with your inputs. This is one of the limitations of sim, in real life you know where the weight is because you feel it in your butt, in sim it still conveys this information just not as intuitively.
FOV is important. iRacing took the time to program in the FOV calculator for a reason. If its coming up with a very small FOV try to move the monitor closer to your wheel.
Yes FOV Is Huge, to say just set it to max is a very Incorrect and misleading statement so do not listen to that terrible advice. I had the problem with a LOW FOV when I started 4 years ago so I did the same listened to Terrible advice set my FOV to I think it was 80 or so then when I got a 34" UWQHD 1440 Monitor I set it about 18" away and the change was Insane, Now it took me a good bit of time to re adjust as I had been running like 2 and 1/2 years at the wrong FOV but since I re trained my Hand eye coordination I found I can hit apexes now about 90% of the time, ( I am working on my RC Skills not great but at min 5X better then I was.
Matter of fact since it was mentioned I realize I need to re measure as I moved some items so the monitor may be a bit closer now then it was when I first got the Monitor.
I almost forgot if you set the FOV to what the Sim calculator says it should be but you feel to close to dash/Windshield Open the sim do a lap then stop and exit car. Pause replay select the cockpit camera view hit Ctrl and f12 it will open the camera tool then you can basically use the top Right Adjustment ( I think it is top right) can slid that ( basically seat slider) Back until either you find the right position or grt to 250 in which yo no longer see your view moving rear ward.
As well as you can adjust the Seat Height and the Center position of driver compared to car centerline.
I think I will make a Short Stream/Video an dgo over those so people can see what I am referring to in this instance. I actually stream about 90% of anything I do on iRacing so I have a lot of Videos explaining the Gen 7 Brake Bias and Master cylinder sizes and hw they relate to each other etc. as well as do some guides explaining why I change a setting in the setups and what that does to the car as far as speed, tire wear, stability etc.
Just look up my Name on YouTube (James Vining)
I have changed to a G9 ultra wide and what a difference. You really get the sense of speed with one of these. As things go by you on screen they accelerate to a blur at the far edges. I actually got a little motion sickness the first time I used it but that quickly went away.
I am in the camp of more FOV is always better but it is very screen size and distance you sit from the screen dependent.
