There has been some discussion regarding the possibility of maintaining
opposite steering lock through entire turns in GPL, and it has been sugested
that this does not reflect the real driving behaviour of F1 cars of the
60`s.
I will contribute with some facts and some opinions to this discussion.
FACTS:
A stabilized, as opposed to transitory, counter steering attitude of a car
through a corner is a situation where all the forces acting upon the car are
perfectly balanced and matched. The situation ends when this balance is
broken. These forces include the much forgotten inertial polar torque, which
is the inertia of an object when it is spinning around its vertical axis. In
a car, this happens when it is spinning, or going through a turn, and it is
the reason for many crashes at the exit of slow and medium corners (like
turn 8 in Watkins Glen). The forces are usually separated in 2 groups: those
developed by the tires, thanks to their grip, and those acting upon the car
as an inertial mass. The grip forces must exceed, or, at best, balance the
others if driver control is to be mantained.
There are 3 possible cases:
1- Grip forces exceed all others: the car is under control, and the
exceeding grip is used to accelerate, brake or turn, without tire slip.
2- Grip forces balance all others, but can not exceed them: this is a
transitional situation, between situations 1 and 3.
3- Grip forces are overcome by others: this is a non-control situation,
where tire slip inevitably occurs. When it does so in a straight line, the
car is either spinning under acceleration, or locking the wheels under
braking. If it happens in a turn, the car leaves its trajectory, usually
with its center of gravity following a straight line tangential to the
trajectory at the moment of the grip loss. If that loss occurs at the front
axle, the car car will not spin; if it occurs at the rear, it spins around
its vertical inertial axis.
The point here is that situation no 2 is a transitional situation, being the
point where tire grip reaches its limit. This transition can be smooth and
progressive, as is the case with rally cars with gravel or snow tires and
suspension, or it can be sudden and brutal, as is the case with circuit cars
with modern racing tires and suspensions. This suddeness is further
increased in cars with powerful aerodinamic aids, because their effect
disappears as soon as the car leaves a straight line relative to the wind.
Generally, it can be said that cars with soft suspension settings, working
with low to medium tire grip (be it due to the surface or the tires), have
smooth transitional regimes, resulting in a behaviour easy to control at the
limit, while cars with more rigid suspension settings, working with high
tire grip, have sudden transitional regimes, making them very hard, or even
impossible, to control if the limit is reached. In most modern race cars,
this is further exacerbated by aerodinamic aids, whose effect disappears
once the car starts slipping sideways.
Furthermore, it must be said that the way a car behaves at the limit (sudden
or smooth) also depends greatly upon 2 factors: suspension geometry,
especially camber, (which, if it is negative and has a value over 1,5-2
degrees, can increase cornering ability, at the expense of controlability at
the limit, and therefore it is only used in race cars prepared for tarmac),
and the rigidness of the tire carcass, which influences directly the angle
of drift (tire carcass deformation under simultaneous vertical and
horizontal loads causes the tire patch in contact with the ground to travel
in a direction slightly different from the direction where the tire is
pointing; this difference is called drift, and it occurs without tire slip,
merely due to the deformation of the carcass)
OPINIONS:
In the 60`s, racing tire technology was much more crude than it is today.
The radial tire started life then, and it was, even in 1967, at a very early
stage of development. Tires had much less grip than modern racing tires.
Tarmac technology, often forgotten, was also far less developed, and the
circuits then had far less grippier surfaces than even modern roads, let
alone modern circuits. Finally, F1 cars had very distinct characteristics
from today`s F1`s. The closest modern equivalent, chassis-wise, are modern
Formula Ford and Formula V single-seaters, and even these have modern tires
and surfaces to work with. But they do slide around, even with higher grip
than old F1`s.
What all this amounts to is this: F1 cars in 1967 had all the
characteristics to be able to behave smootly at the limit, and therefore to
be driven at that limit, drifting around with one or both axles, depending
upon suspension settings and pilot`s preferences.Some of them did it, but
most didn`t very often because they could be faster with 4-wheel drift
techniques (which is also the fastest way with GPL; check the 1:06:96 replay
at The Apex).
All this is why I think that PAPYRUS have done an unbelievably good job in
GPL; all adjectives are insufficient. I do not know, in the strictest
scientific sense, if 1967 F1 cars behave EXACTLY like they do in GPL, but I
believe very firmly that they must have been very similar, and, if there was
some difference, it just made the game better.
Finally, a word on apples and oranges: GP2 and F1RS simulate modern F1 cars,
with their huge modern tires, modern circuit surfaces, and overwhelming
aerodinamic loads; these cars do not slide around, and they are not supposed
to. Therefore, their simulators must reflect this. GP2 and F1RS are, for
different reasons, excellent simulators, but we can`t forget what it is that
they simulate, and, especially, we cannot compare their driving model with
the one in GPL. We cannot compare apples with oranges.
If anything, GPL`s model must have been, in my opinion, much harder to
conceive than those for modern cars. Racing gamers should all be very
grateful to PAPYRUS.
Finally, I want to apologise for any mistakes; I am Portuguese, and
therefore writing in English is not without risk.
PS.:Since I have the demo, I have played nothing else. My personal best is
1:08:24. Knowledge is not talent, but I`m still trying hard. By the way, I
saw at The Apex that PAPYRUS announced that the Nordschleife is in the game!
Like someone said: PAPYRUS RULES!