Is there any word on clutch physics?

See rFactor1 and the Grinding Gears mod.. That is how you handle mis-shifts/improper clutching. Force the user to put their shifter in neutral, clutch down fully and back into gear. This mostly happened if they haven't properly rev-matched. The addition would need to be if they attempted to shift with power on it would hold the gear until rev's go down or the clutch is depressed.

 

The grinding tranny mod did it about as well as you can, but 64r is right - people talk about realism, and although that mod did a good job it's still not realistic to be able to put the stick into position when you do it wrong.

But there's no better solution without a FFB shifter, and if they don't already exist I'm sure it won't be too long...

 

Really interesting post.

Even though it wouldn't be perfect I think many want to be punished for making a mistake in gear change. Then we would really pay attention how we shift gears.

In your example, when h-shifter is in 4th gear but the simulation is in neutral, the solution could be to press clutch and then move a gear stick first to neutral and then back to 4th gear. Not a perfect solution but still better what we have now.

 

A half way house solution (as opposed to no house solution) could be to make all missed shifts (when using H-Shifter) put sim into neutral. To recover, you have to go back to neutral to select/re-select your desired gear. Of course, relevant crunch sound to be played loudly so everyone in your house can tell you missed the gear

 

That's exactly the way grind tranny mod for rf1 does it. See several posts above you .

If we had that in rf2, I'd be satisfied, can't be done much better than that with our current hardware shifters.

 

In the petition thread, it was pretty much agreed that a grinding tranny mod with a dedi server option to enforce it (so it is equal for all) would be fine. Servers that want to use the current system like it is presently simply do not click that check box. On those servers, if a driver wanted to use the real clutch option he could just enable it on his own.

What we agreed is that a dedi server should have 3 options for clutch: auto (same as now), manual (same as now) and real (grinding tranny mod).

 

Yup, absolutely, John. Especially in longer events- back int he day, a broken clutch was often the difference between victory and a DNF.

I was really hoping to hear from ISI on this. Maybe a status update. If the answer is "not until next year at earliest" then OK, so be it. But if the answer is "we tested an early beta for the next build then YES!

Of course if anyone knows of a grinding tranny mod plugin that's being developed, that'd be awesome too.

 

Not just DNF, but there should be possibility of individual gears breaking up. Such feature was in NR2003.

 

You have stated one of the core problems of clutch simulation in an exquisite and astute explanation, but I propose that your reasons are not good reasons to outright forgo any form of clutch simulation altogether. A relative solution should be attainable. Many other physical aspects of real motorsports cannot properly be simulated in a simulator, but an attempt is still made. Motion forces cannot be simulated without expensive motion systems, but for those of us who cannot afford those systems, modern sims simulate motion by adding on-screen head sway, extra wheel FFB, and enhanced tire noise. The same solution can be used to provide a little feedback for bad shifting. Perhaps a violent screen shake, a jolt on the wheel, and a horrible tranny grind will be enough to get a little more clutch simulation. I would be happy with those solutions. However, I too have wondered about a powered FFB sim racing shifter. At the rate that sim racing technology is expanding lately, maybe one is right around the corner! Who knows . . .

 

Yeah, we are limited by the hardware, but it doesn't mean we can't come up with a solution that is "good enough". What we have now is not good enough to be considered a clutch simulation; simulating clutch damage, being able to break the gearbox or individual gears and it going into neutral instead of the gear you wanted to select when you mess up (and the associated grinding noise) would be a vast improvement.

 

Slightly OT, sorry. The toe and ball of foot go on the brake, pivot your foot so your heel pushes the throttle. You seem to be thinking of toe\piggy downshifting Trying to push both pedals with you foot vertical, using both sides of your foot limits your learned skill to perfectly placed pedals. Watch some YouTube videos and practice on your G25 and you can h/t in most cars, no matter what position the pedals are in. I'm not trying to be a know it all, as I am not great at it, just a G25 owner who can adapt to most real road cars now after alot of practice.

 

When I had my G25 I had fiddled with the brake and gas pedals as much as I could to raise the brake above the level of the gas. With my T500 it's easier and I bought a 3rd party brake pedal pad too.

 

Proper Heel Toe Technique

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klMur6TPkrM&feature=youtube_gdata_player

 

It's easier in real life because the brake pedal has resistance. With a standard G25 the brake pedal goes very low and feels 'loose' and the stretch to get over to the throttle means the braking fluctuates alot. I have a chunk of rubber inside my brake spring which makes heel and toe many times easier.

 

Indeed, that's why the G27 pedals feature a spacer behind the brake pedal. Think that and 3 possible positions for each pedal are all that changed from the G25.

 

I've been using a G25 since 07, I've made a couple of mods to the shifter to stiffen it up a bit and I added a piece of rubber tubing inside the brake pedal spring that adds a touch of realistic squish to the brake pedal. I was in a scuba diver's store 1 day and saw the rubber band for a spear gun and thot . . . I know what I can use that for, works great but I did have to fine tune it twice.

And for the shifter, Logitech just missed the mark. The shifter should have been a gated ffb joystick, that way it could be knocked out of gear forcing a reshift. A load cell for the clutch is prolly too much, I don't see any useful information there (I guess they could simulate a clutch failure . . . pedal to the floor and stay there kinda thing) but it could definitely use a stiffer spring. A load cell for the brake pedal is intriguing but still prolly cost prohibitive but could provide some interesting game play.

 

I was too surprised how much easier heel and toe is in real car! With g25 my braking fluctuates terribly as you said, very very hard to brake efficiently.

 

Depends on the car though, in my old Corsa the angle/rake between brake and throttle pedal is so different there is no way, not that I need to h/t