Apex Modding GT3 v0.960 base setups updated: 22 Nov 2017 Your feedback is appreciated! Please reply to this thread or send a PM. Bentley https://drive.google.com/file/d/1UiNRvyP9jdN8-ALZ7FpDjubFCOt_BWhH/view?usp=sharing Camaro GT3 2012 https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9HI-DiqotHYZ2JRem5ydlVXQlU/view?usp=sharing 799R GT3 https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9HI-DiqotHYelFyTjQyMkpYR0E/view?usp=sharing 854 GT3 https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9HI-DiqotHYOE1rT18wbkRuczQ/view?usp=sharing BMW Z4 GT3 current https://drive.google.com/file/d/19jjey8hb2bZ1b-O4zdCsLmQM6acTaZeL/view?usp=sharing Corvette Z06-R https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9HI-DiqotHYNFZya3RnWWFNdDQ/view?usp=sharing McLaren MP4-12C GT3 https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9HI-DiqotHYMUdRMzM0WEZVZ1U/view?usp=sharing Mercedes SLS AMG GT3 current https://drive.google.com/file/d/1oiq8f-apmNekVcN3OEyrDbcmAcLoEGzG/view?usp=sharing Thanks to Apex Modding for sharing their very lively, entertaining, and growing collection of GT3 racecars! In the continued spirit of sharing and enjoying, I offer these setups as an alternative to the defaults. The neutral steering was derived from skidpad tests, adding aero downforce until aero push could not be tuned out, and then shock dynamics & brakes tuned by alternating between Portugal and Silverstone with a spot check at Sebring. Some tracks, like Mid-Ohio (cresting hills in the middle of turns), will likely need alterations to the setups or an adjustment in driving style. If you wish to further tune the setups: 1) Make sure it's not a driving problem. Primarily, if you're having snap spins at turn-in after applying hard braking, I'd suggest braking a little earlier. Likewise, tire temps will tell you if you're overdriving. 2) Increasing slow rebound will add "liveliness", decreasing slow rebound will remove "liveliness". 3) If snap spins are still a problem for you, increase front slow rebound or add understeer by increasing front springs/swaybar. 4) For more oversteer in medium & fast corners, decrease rear wing. 5) My camber settings are conservative due to the skidpad and my driving style. By all means increase the camber if you prefer! 6) After any spring/swaybar/wing/camber changes, recheck brake balance and maximum braking force. 7) Explore what I didn't visit: adjust rear ride height to dial out aero push at speed due to the rear downforce pushing the rear ride height lower than front ride height. Motec or just watch high speed tire temperatures. Car Specific Notes Bentley First thing I noticed was how much acceleration is available and that you hit the rev limiter in top gear, so maxed out the rev limiter. Overall, tuning the Bentley is an exercise in making it more lively without letting all that weight take over. I dialed out understeer with the springs at both ends, removed a bit of front swaybar to increase grip, brought the slow rebound up & turned down the slow bump to liven up the chassis response, dialed out some camber, reduced air pressure until temps were more even, then balanced the braking bias. A trip to Portugal hinted that fast shocks were too hard, so lowered them to where the chassis rode more smoothly. Camaro GT3 2012 The ISI car with some Apex mod-specific limits (locked gear ratios), it feels kind of silly to talk about setting it up. The chassis is very forgiving of tuning and changes produce only small effects on lap times once camber & tire pressure are set. Mainly, stay away from the differential as the coast side is so strong it just pushes on corner entry. I wish the maximum braking force was a tad higher because the tires have the capability. I tested a spread of wing values and present what was fastest for me; a touch more wing will inspire more confidence if needed. 799R GT3 Such a neutral car on the skidpad! You can dial in all the wing you want, but this is the maximum that I'd recommend as the drag affects acceleration. Tuning the slow rebound, you can feel the chassis demanding things of you, "more of this, less of that". I left plenty of curlicue skidmarks on Silverstone's Maggots & Becketts corners while trying to find the right balance. You definitely have to stop and ask yourself whether it was your fault or the setup's fault each time. 854 GT3 I started on the skidpad with full springs, no swaybars, to balance the chassis and find a camber setting. Add in rear wing and adjust the springs to remove aero push. Testing on the tracks quickly pointed out that the tire temperatures would rapidly spike, suggesting that the shocks couldn't control the maximum spring rates. I dropped the spring rates into the range they're currently at and the magic started happening. Did not take long to find good values for slow rebound. Fast rebound settings eventually revealed themselves while adjusting the brakes at the end of Portugal's bumpy straights. BMW Z4 GT3 The BMW has lots of aero push, so you can't use much wing. I wasn't totally happy with my first release as it was too nervous and I was chasing my tail (literally!) adding front slow rebound to make the chassis settle after braking. Similar problem with the McLaren, at the opposite end, finally reminded me that I was asking the shocks to do the work of springs, so I threw away the front swaybar and increased the front spring rate to compensate. Tire pressures came down because it was too skittish in my first release. Finally, in an effort to find more front downforce, I first tried closing off the brake ducts, but that didn't show any effect, so instead I closed off the radiator which helped a bit; if you experience overheating with the current release, open the radiator one notch. *** see "15-Minute Exercise for the Reader" on page 2 of this thread*** Corvette Z06-R Most inviting to toss through turns! But restrain yourself as tire wear will eat away at lap times if you let it slide. Like the McLaren, the Corvette has oversteer that can't be tuned out when you take away the wing on the skidpad. This setup came together surprisingly quickly because the Corvette exhibits little to no aero push, thus it can run as high of rear wing as you dare. The chassis balances between slow speed and high speed no matter how you tune. Quirks of the chassis that had to be worked around are a minimum front camber of -2.0 deg and rear spring maximum of only 971 lbs/in. An experiment worth trying on the Corvette is to find when wing angle produces too much drag. McLaren MP4-12C GT3 The first wild discovery with the McLaren is that the chassis has massive oversteer that can't be dialed out until you increase wing to 4 or 5! At that point, you can start adding rear spring/swaybar as you add more wing. I made the mistake of trying to use the rear swaybar in an effort to help tire temperatures. The result was a car that didn't have as much aero push as the default setting, but it wasn't really faster because the dynamic handling was no better no matter how much slow rebound I added. The "aha" moment arrived, I minimized the rear swaybar (you can't remove it) and compensated with spring rate. A final tweak, in an effort to ease the outside front tire's burden, was to maximize the caster. Mercedes SLS AMG GT3 Pigs really can fly! Learning from the BMW, closing off the radiator reduces aero push. Unlike the BMW, you can't use minimum cooling setting. Rear wing is one touch too far for optimum acceleration. However I found I could turn very consistent laptimes, so you might find it useful for tracks with shorter straights.
Hello Emery, I have downloaded your F858 setup, I have noticed that you have set damper compression (slow and fast) much stronger than rebound. It goes against generally accepted theories, I cite from the following paper "Generally the rebound forces are greater than the compressive forces". http://www.theoryinpracticeengineering.com/drift_mag/basic_damper.pdf But it works for you, nothing to object. Cheers.
I haven't dissected the .hdv, but keep in mind that each damper setting is independent of one another. So, just because compression and rebound both have 15 "clicks", doesn't mean they're on the same scale. Just a thought.
Sorry, setups are presented in my case as N/m not clicks (it is an option that you can activate in the player.json). "Damper Units":true, "Damper Units#":"Display dampers (shocks) in garage as: 0 = setting (e.g. 1-20), 1 = rate (e.g. 1000-9000 N\/m\/s)",
Paper also says, "An overly stiff shock in compression will not absorbs the bumps very well and can contribute to the well known bouncy ride." Do you find the ride in the F858 to be bouncy and not absorb bumps compared to the default setup that was provided? You'll find all my setups use similar high compression settings for the dampers as I'm seeking to control reaction to the driver's inputs and slow them to a range suitable for an old man's reactions.
What's below is using the Z3 as an example: Thanks for clarifying that. After swapping my display setting and seeing the actual units, I plugged some known chassis numbers into a suspension calculator I have. The rebound values seem a tad underdamped based on a 60% critically damped assumption I like to use for "real life" racing applications. Compression is obviously WAY above what *should* be acceptable. Just screwing around with a calculator plugging in some values from the HDV: Try 150 front spring/110 rear spring. 11000 front rebound/5200 front compression (low-speed). 11700 rear rebound/5200 rear compression (low-speed). I did have to lower the spring rate a bit to return damping values that were within the constraints as set in the HDV. You can always dial roll-stiffness back in with bars if needed. Not sure when I'll be able to get some seat-time myself, but really want to try both 'methods' to see what feels better. I've found many instances in rF1 where a setup that *should* work in real life just didn't feel any good in the sim.
You are right, remember that suspension springs are not your only springs. Tires are also a spring, in RF1, tires were so stiff that the softer springs were better for performance. Cheers.
Dear Lgel and ucfquattroguy - Allow me to expand your horizons. Compression biased damping is a real-world technique for tuning race cars. It is not new--I learned the concepts over 20 years ago. Rest assured that rFactor 2 physics are not broken in this regard. The physics are nicely detailed in http://www.kaztechnologies.com/wp-c...rs-Chapter-from-FSAE-Book-by-Jim-Kasprzak.pdf (well worth saving a copy to your hard drive) and this paragraph from page 15 best summarizes compression biased damping: "However, the use of dampers in race cars is much different than in passenger vehicles where dampers are primarily used to damp the sprung and unsprung masses. In race cars dampers are a key component of suspension tuning. As mentioned above, dampers control the RATE of weight transfer in transient maneuvers. During these events we are making use of the unique characteristic of the damper, the fact that it develops force proportional to velocity, not displacement like springs. In this respect, the damper acts like a dynamic spring, developing force when in motion during transient maneuvers. Thus, you can think of the damping ratios as dynamic spring rates!"
Very useful thread Emery,thanks and all you have a happy year! These setups,especially for 854,gave Apex mod a new life! Have a ride@palm springs with 854 and Emery setup!!!!!!Its heaven!!! Again thanks and keep up the great work!!!
As I wrote: "But it works for you, nothing to object." I respect diversity, and enjoy it. Citing now Confucius, "If the cat catches the mice, who cares about his colour?" Cheers.
Classy response Lgel. As always you have my respect You too Emery, it is nice to share your work with the community.. After recently watching this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psdvOfWkayI & https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8By2AEsGAhU it doesn't really matter, run with which ever approach comes natural and gives you the best avg lap time.. Everyone is different..
Thanks for posting set-ups and explanations, Emery. It all helps us educate ourselves and learn various perspectives. And, of course, we can endlessly try out all alternatives for ourselves--a luxury almost no one in real life racing has.