What do you think are the first and most important settings we should change? I'm pretty sure the most believe the front and rear wing. But thats not true. The main and most important setting to set first are the springs. The stiffness of your springs is the first thing to adjust. So go out for 2-3 laps with default 6-6 spring setup and 10laps fuel in Catalunya Spain and watch out for bumps and dips. I have just done it and realized there are only small bumps in Turn 7,8 in sector 2 and in Turn 13,14,15,16 in the last sector.So there were no significant bumps and dips, just a little bit in the turns mentioned. So far so good.
What does a spring do?
In the realm of physics, springs are noted as being efficient machines for storing mechanical energy. When a spring is compressed, the energy required to perform the compression is stored. When the compression force is removed, the spring returns to its original shape.
In a car, compression of the suspension spring is caused when the wheel travels across the front side of a raised bump. A portion of the energy used to cause forward motion of the vehicle is redirected causing the wheel to travel up, which compresses the spring. The spring stores the vertical energy, and as the wheel travels down the backside of the bump, the energy stored in the spring pushes the wheel back down. For safety and handling, this has the significant benefit of keeping the tire in contact with the road surface as the tire travels over a bump. A similar process occurs for dips, except that the spring elongates rather than compresses to start with.
The spring's roll resistance characteristics helps to resist the forces during dynamic changes, and make the car more stable during the transition. This implies a stiffer spring is needed to minimize the compression and elongation, and therefore minimize the change to the suspension geometry.
So our target in a race car must be to make the spring stiffness as stiff as possible without reaching the point there the tire isn't in contact with the road surface cause the tire traveled over a bump (the car jumps).
That is what we will try now. The circuit in catalunya has not really markable bumps and only flat kers. So when you increase Spring Stiffness like Springs 8-8, then springs 10-10 and finally springs 11-11, you will realise that 11-11 is absolutely fine for this track. Only in the last turn the car jumps a little bit.
Next Part 3b we will go on with the wings.
Best regards
DarkPSI
Nice lesson mate. Keep them coming, they are really useful.
ReplyDeleteI had the same impression about the stiffness in this track, though I prefer to have a 10-11, as I may have some difficulties with last chincane's kerbs. Most of the times I hit them with the front suspension, so with 11-11 I get a spin. With 10-11 I don't lose too much grip compared to 11-11, but it minimizes that spin issue.
thanks for the lessons and setups provided.
mschwarz
great to hear that. So I will give it a try (10-11). One thing I realise with softer front springs is, that you'll have more grip in slow corners, so I have more oversteer, especially in turn 10. But for sure it depends on driving style. As I said I will give it a try!
Deleteso to be clear, softer front springs equals more front grip and so more oversteer under most circumstances.
DeleteKeep up the good work matey it's much appreciated
ReplyDeletethx mate
Deletethe only problem i find in this game is that 11-11 is a massive glitch
ReplyDeleteIve found that the best way to set up suspension is to set both at 1-1, then increase front until you have equal balance on the car under acceleration out of the slow corners (ie no twichy fr or rear). Say 1-4. then increase F&R keeping the same ratio until you start struggling with rear traction. Say traction out of slow corners starts to struggle at 5-8, then stick with 4-7. What do you think?
ReplyDeleteHi there,
Deletethe step by step increase is a good method to see what happens.
I would recommend you to make it the way from most stiffy to soft.
So I always start with 11-11. Then I only decrease the rear suspension by one lets say we have then 11-10, which is really great for better rear traction in my opinion. some times even 11-9 is great.
I never soften the front springs as I have no understeering in slow corners due to my antiroll bar settings which are for example 6-11. So I go with 11 front spring stiffness and 10/9 rear spring stiffness.
hope that helps
keep racing
Dark