Bruce,
Here ya Go.
A couple of weeks ago my beloved, faithfull ACT labs Force RS gave
up and I had to get anotehr wheel. As there were/are no ACT Labs here
in the UK I bought the above wheel and promised one or two guys
here that I'd pst my thoughts on it once I'd had time to get to know
it.
Apols for the line wraps, Agent seems to do that, originally typred
as email.
So here goes :
Guillemot/Thustmaster Ferrari FF Wheel.
I'd heard 2 or 3 bad points about this wheel before I got it.
1) Poor Clamping Mechanism
2) Flimsy Gear Shift paddles
3) Mostly negative comments about the pedals.
I was actually quite pleased with the clamping mechanism, it is pretty
similar
to the MS wheels which are regarded as having the best clamping
mechanism in
most articles.
The gear paddles do feel a little flimsy although I believe they have
been
beefed up in later models, certainly I don't feel they are likely to
break
but the switching action is a little "mushy" compared to other wheels
I've
used.
I can't comment too much about the pedals as I used some MS pedals
with my
ACT labs wheel and have kept these in use for the Ferrari wheel.
Certainly
they are not as good IMO as the MS pedals but quite usable.
The strange thing about them is that the pedal plates themselves are
hinged
which feels very odd.
A very nice feature that I've only tried in a very haphazard way is
that
the Ferrari pedal box can be stood on it's end, upside down and raised
off
the ground 2 or 3 inches and be made to operate as "normal" pedals
(i.e.
hinged at the top, rather than at the bottom.
I think if I could make a sturdy unit with the pedals in this
arrangement,
fix the plates so as not to be hinged they would be very good and
allow
more precise control than the MS pedals (by virtue of them being
hinged at
the top.
The wheel itself is smaller than the Act labs but feels very
substantial.
The grip is ***ised plastic which I found got sticky in use but
after a
few days this went away once the sheen had worn off.
I should mention the little stick-shift on the right-hand side, I use
it for
looking left & right in GPL as I find it useless as a gear-shift
(quite
simply it is much too far forward).
Whilst awaiting it's arrival I sought the views of users as to good
core.ini
settings. In all I tried 6-7 different settings, none of which I liked
particularly. I read all the stuff at slotweak, all of which makes
sense but
it's not what I want from a wheel.
All I really want to feel from the wheel is the level of front-wheel
traction
I have. I'm really not concerned about feeling the rumble strips, the
armco/
other cars if I hit them. I also like to feel the lateral balance of
the car
which I find most of the setting gave me. What they didn't give
however was
this front-wheel grip feedback.
In a real racecar you tend to mainly feel what the front wheels are
doing
via the wheel, the rear-wheels by the seat of your pants and your
general
senses.
Anyway, I found the lower settings seemed to bring in this feel, so I
went
lower, to cut a long story short I ended up with exactly the same
settings
that I used for my ACT Labs. Perhaps this is not surprising as they
both use
IForce, but I have found wheels treat these signals differently.
Anyway, here is what I have :
allow_force_feedback = 1
force_feedback_latency = 0.002
force_feedback_damping = 2.000000
max_steering_torque = 200.000000
I have no Spring or damper Gain in Control panel and Overall Gain is
set at 70%.
I'm pretty sure it's the settings that Alison arrived at when she
tested the ACT Labs
and I'm sure being a real-life racer also, she was searching for the
same feedback as I
was.
My only difficulty has been in getting used to using 2 paddles to
change gear, one on
the left, one on the right. Before that I used a single paddle on the
ACT Labs which I
would pull to c/up, push to c/down.
I got used to the new way in an hour or two and was quite confident
going into my first
race. However, with the extra things to think about in a race
situation I reverted back
to old habits and made a real mess of my T1 downchanges. I was ok for
the rest of the
race and have been OK since.
Overall I think the force feedback I am getting is as good as the
Force RS, certainly
in GPL. I would still like my flip-flop gearchange but can get by OK
with this. The only
worrying thing is the longevity of those paddles.
Oh, there is one thing that is a problem for me. You cannot make very
quick major steering
changes with this wheel. i.e. VERY quick opposite lock. You run up
against the internals,
not sure what it is but it really drags. Not a huge issue in GPL
(although it has meant
the difference between saving it and losing it at least 4-5 times,
once in a race). I'm
wondering if this will cause me a problem in games such as
Rallymasters, CMR2 etc.
Incidentally, the wheel costs about 77 (prob $115-120) from software
first in the UK.
Maxx