rec.autos.simulators

Alex
(alexti)

P.S. Going back to try it with other cars :)

| During the past few days I was experimenting with Cooper
| and Honda at the 'Ring with surprising results. In both
| cases after trying several setups (default, Alison's,
| Andreas Wilke's) I was totally frustrated by not being
| able to put any decent time (high 8:30 in Cooper,
| low 8:40 in Honda). The car just didn't feel right.
| So I decided to load chassis from my favourite Lotus setup.
| 8:19 in Cooper, 8:25 in Honda. It doesn't seem to make any
| sense. Am I missing something?
| Alex
| (alexti)
| P.S. Going back to try it with other cars :)

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I take applicability to all cars as a measure of how successfull a certain
setup strategy is, adjusting and tweaking to a point where now I indeed use
the same base for every car (with "natural" adjustments to suit specific
characteristics) at every track and then tweak to suit the conditions.

Jan.
=---
"Pay attention when I'm talking to you boy!" -Foghorn Leghorn.

Yes, I used only chassis setup from Lotus.

Alex
(alexti)

GRE (GPL Race Engineer) gives some tips which
I used to create a chart which is here :
http://jc.simracing.dk/maxx/maxx_article1.htm

It says F2/FD but the table is as applicable to F1

Maxx

Since Papy went to the trouble to model different engine curves, different
wheelbases, different tracks, different weights, different c.g.s, different
aero, etc., for each car in the game, I'm amazed anybody but a rank amateur
(or somebody with a remarkably dead butt) would think one setup would work
for more than one car.  Then again, I know some churls who don't even bother
to change the setup (except top gear) from track to track!

--Steve Smith

I couldn't adjust a car to a given track if I didn't have a known base. I
believe one has to know how the car will handle or one won't be able to push
it hard enough to find out what to change.

I used to have different setups for all the cars, but now most of the time I
find one click overall (to adjust for total weight) or one click on the
springs to accommodate weight distribution or the odd damper adjustment to
"tighten things up" from the base suffises for me. Number of clutches in the
differential needs to be set/compromised per car and top gear/progression
adjusted per car/track combo, but chassis setup remains pretty constant
across the various tracks (as was more or less the case back then, I'm led
to believe). Real time is found on the track, not in the garage.

Obviously, with lower forula cars all having the same engine, the setup work
per track reduces ever further. I have found only Monaco and Zandvoort
(shorter) and Spa (taller) need a gearing change.

With unlimited practise time, slight improvements could be made by fine
tuning setups further (assymetric... etc.) but I think you will find a lot
of that has more to do with knowing the track like the back of one's hand by
then than anything else. In my situation (zero practise for most races) I
find it doesn't pay to look for that extra half a second and subsequently
crash because this latest setup creation throws up a surprise under race
conditions. Better slightly slower but consistent.

Jan.
=---
"Pay attention when I'm talking to you boy!" -Foghorn Leghorn.

So Jim Clark comes into this category then?

To my knowledge he used the same setup from track to track except gearing.
When he did make a change after winning the event he asked his mechanics to
put it back the way it was!

Of course there will be different approaches. Those that have the ability to
adapt to be fast with seemingly any setups, and those that take the
scientific approach to understanding the theory of how the car behaves in
different conditions to find that extra speed. Not sure I fit either of
those being seemingly average with any setup :-(

Tony

Neither could Portago, who knew so little abt. cars that he used to scrawl
his initials inside the door sill so he could remember which cars he'd
driven.

You think this invalidates my argument?

--Steve

Eldred
--
Dale Earnhardt, Sr. R.I.P. 1951-2001
Homepage - http://www.umich.edu/~epickett
F1 hcp. +16.36...Monster +366.59...

Never argue with an idiot.  He brings you down to his level, then beats you
with experience...
Remove SPAM-OFF to reply.

Fully agreed in principle, except that I've found much the same thing:
once I've developed a setup which seems to work well for (say) the
Coventry, I can transfer it to another car (perhaps the Ferrari or the
Eagle) and it'll be somewhere near.  It certainly doesn't result in
the second car handling identically, but I can usually 'sort it' with
a no more than a couple of clicks on any one tweak.

I do wonder just how different the cars really are - they're all
around the same weight and dimensions in absolute terms, and are
possibly on the same tyres so you'd expect /similar/ numbers to work
okay.  Does anyone know whether roll centres and camber curves vary
between cars?

I import original gearing back to the new car, though - no way I can
see the same ratios working across engines!

Jonny

I have seen a table giving different front and rear width, which
differs a bit, too. (some cars are smaller at the front, some aren't, iirc)

   Calis

--Steve

Which is not to say a bad setup won't work for a good driver...or v.v., or
any other combo.

--Steve