New! Sweet Red Candy: Alison's Ferrari setups

Are you ready for this? My new collection of setups for GPL's Ferrari exploits a radical new approach to chassis setup which I stumbled upon a few weeks ago. The gorgeous red cars from Maranello are stunning: gloriously, sensuously responsive, yet forgiving beyond anything I'd imagined possible in GPL. At last GPL's Ferrari lives up to Chris Amon's description of the real one: "That '68 Ferrari was a gorgeous thing to drive...In terms of driving pleasure, a fast lap at Spa was a fantastic sensation. Although we were down on power...the car was working beautifully. On [my pole] lap, as I came down the Masta Straight, after the kink, I caught up to Brian Redman, and I can remember going by him on the inside, at the entry to Stavelot, with my foot buried right in it, while he was having to brake in his Cooper! The thing felt tremendous." Here are some comments about my setups and explanation of my new setup technique: "Your Ferrari article is great! I had never seen Chris Amon's quote before--I couldn't believe how good a description it was of the GPL Ferrari! [Your new Ferrari] setups do indeed handle better than low riders..." - Dave Kaemmer "I could run comfortable through corners that otherwise gave me a heart attack when feeling a bump...With this setup I could accelerate much better out of the slow corners; the slides were way easier to control....I couldn't believe what I felt and saw....Wonderful, Alison! Soooo cool to drive....VERY impressive, it really lead me to rethink my setups. "Thanks, Alison, for giving me some really new perspectives on setting up the cars! :))" - Wolfgang Woeger "Holy moly! That's the finest setup I've ever driven in GPL, my own included. It's as easy to drive as an F2. A keeper. Congratulations." - Steve Smith Be careful! Reading my Ferrari article and trying my setups may shatter some of your most fundamental assumptions about GPL. If you'd rather keep thinking about setups the way you always have - if you want to keep thinking of GPL as "hard to drive" - read no further. Click here only if you dare: http://eaglewoman.maximumspeed.com/gpl/ Go to News, and then Sweet Red Candy. Alison http://eaglewoman.maximumspeed.com

Alison, you've just made more people's weekends than you can possibly count! Thanks again for everything you've done for the GPL community. -Bill >Are you ready for this? >My new collection of setups for GPL's Ferrari exploits a radical new >approach to chassis setup which I stumbled upon a few weeks ago. The >gorgeous red cars from Maranello are stunning: gloriously, sensuously >responsive, yet forgiving beyond anything I'd imagined possible in GPL. -- | "Instead of letting the moon be the Bill Mette | gateway to our future, we have let Enteract, Chicago | it become a brief chapter in our

Hey, Alison! Okay, I have a couple of replays in my GPL file something like "luvualison" (blush) from back in October or November when I tried your Cooper setups and GPL became INSTANTLY more accessible. I just now pulled out of the pits at Spa in an "Alison-tuned" Ferrari. My pb for that marque had been 3:32.78. On lap 2, I turned a 3:29.65, and on lap 3, a 3:28.69! Going through Masta is almost like pulling into the driveway! I predict we'll see a lot of red on VROC this weekend! Thanks Kurt Steinbock

Damn you, Alison! The Pacers play tonight, and tomorrow's the Texas IRL race -- now that you've given us these new setups, my wife's REALLY going to be ticked at me this weekend! <G> ;-) -- JB

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>Are you ready for this? >My new collection of setups for GPL's Ferrari exploits a radical new >approach to chassis setup which I stumbled upon a few weeks ago. The >gorgeous red cars from Maranello are stunning: gloriously, sensuously >responsive, yet forgiving beyond anything I'd imagined possible in GPL. >At last GPL's Ferrari lives up to Chris Amon's description of the real >one: >"That '68 Ferrari was a gorgeous thing to drive...In terms of driving >pleasure, a fast lap at Spa was a fantastic sensation. Although we were >down on power...the car was working beautifully. On [my pole] lap, as I >came down the Masta Straight, after the kink, I caught up to Brian >Redman, and I can remember going by him on the inside, at the entry to >Stavelot, with my foot buried right in it, while he was having to brake >in his Cooper! The thing felt tremendous." >Here are some comments about my setups and explanation of my new setup >technique: >"Your Ferrari article is great! I had never seen Chris Amon's quote >before--I couldn't believe how good a description it was of the GPL >Ferrari! [Your new Ferrari] setups do indeed handle better than low >riders..." > - Dave Kaemmer >"I could run comfortable through corners that otherwise gave me a heart >attack when feeling a bump...With this setup I could accelerate much >better out of the slow corners; the slides were way easier to >control....I couldn't believe what I felt and saw....Wonderful, Alison! >Soooo cool to drive....VERY impressive, it really lead me to rethink my >setups. >"Thanks, Alison, for giving me some really new perspectives on setting >up the cars! :))" > - Wolfgang Woeger >"Holy moly! That's the finest setup I've ever driven in GPL, my own >included. It's as easy to drive as an F2. A keeper. Congratulations." > - Steve Smith >Be careful! Reading my Ferrari article and trying my setups may shatter >some of your most fundamental assumptions about GPL. If you'd rather >keep thinking about setups the way you always have - if you want to keep >thinking of GPL as "hard to drive" - read no further. >Click here only if you dare: > http://eaglewoman.maximumspeed.com/gpl/ >Go to News, and then Sweet Red Candy. >Alison >http://eaglewoman.maximumspeed.com

wow.... i don't know what to say.... the ferrari's easier to drive than my XR4Ti..... thanks so much, alison! i'd never thought of the bump-stops giving so much trouble! mark

Thanks Alison, think Ill stick with the Ferrari for a while ... :-)))) Henrichsen.

Well done again Alison...more interesting reading and great new setups to boot! Keep up the good work :-) Regards, Ian

Alison, I tried your new Ferrari setups today. I can describe my inital thoughts in just one word: "WOW". The car handled beautifully yet didn't lose any speed at all almost with the higher ride height. I was able to do a fast lap (for me anyway) at Silverstone without spinning in just my 5th at speed lap around the track. I was able to run my quickest lap ever at Zandvoort within about 4 laps and then smashed my old record later. I can't wait to try the other tracks now! Thanks so much Alison! Great going! Dan Belcher Team Racing Unlimited

I've downloaded your setups and now I have to play with the gearing for my F3's. Just tried F3 at Monza and it looks promising. More stable than mine for sure.

Great job Alison! I have to admit I was sceptical at first, since I don't usually like low rider setups myself. But when I tried your Spa setup I found that yes, you do have the rideheight set higher than I did, and yes, it does indeed make the car much nicer! I guess I was bouncing off the bump ***s and didn't know it. Maybe Papy should have included some silly sound to let you know the car is on the bump ***s, since a real driver can feel it with his butt. Haven't matched my times with my old setup yet, but I think once I tweek it to suit my style under acceleration I can only get faster, since it already feels much better when braking. You can trail brake like crazy with this thing! Thanks, Alison. I highly reccomend the new setups to anyone! -A **** Posted from RemarQ - http://www.remarq.com - Discussions Start Here (tm) ****

Am I the only one who just cannot get on with any of Alison's setups and have terrible results with all of them? Don't get me wrong. I admire and respect all that she had done for a great many people and I'm not trying to trash all her hard work, but see nothing in them myself. I have read how much more stable they are compared with others, yet for these responses I can only read chronic understeer. I'm no rail rider but the barriers at the Curva Grande and Lesmos are now pretty well covered in *** deposits. The best that I could do at Monza after 25 laps was a 1:33.56 compared with my own setup returning 1:28.90. I found the same thing with the Cooper and Brabham setups where I average 3 to 4 seconds faster. Another observation about the Monza test was the disparity of tyre temperatures (taken after 8 lap runs where I hit nothing). eading from inner to outer they looked like this.... RF- 218/212/208 RR -226/231/223 LF - 235/235/234 LR - 226/235/229 Am I missing the point here or is a difference of 10 degrees across one tyre really ok? As I stated earlier, I'm not knocking things, simply trying to fathom this out in my own mind. Maybe it just comes down to personal preference and driving style. For my part, I simply fail to see where front end grip comes into the equation with any of Alison's setups. Maybe I'm just the re-incarnation of Nigel Mansell <G> Regards Mark

mmmmmm candy....... huh? OH..... um...... yeah, i like them too... thanks alison

> Am I the only one who just cannot get on with any of Alison's setups and > have terrible results with all of them? Don't get me wrong. I admire and > respect all that she had done for a great many people and I'm not trying to > trash all her hard work, but see nothing in them myself. I have read how > much more stable they are compared with others, yet for these responses I > can only read chronic understeer. You are right... The setup used cause understeer. But, it also makes the car more stable. For new comers, this makes the car a lot easier to drive. Maybe you have a different driving style. Philster

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>Damn you, Alison! The Pacers play tonight, and tomorrow's the Texas >IRL race -- now that you've given us these new setups, my wife's >REALLY going to be ticked at me this weekend! <G> >;-) >-- JB

JB, Guess I'm really lucky. My wife is going to Atlantic City for the weekend. So after work,I'll be checking out Alisons' Ferrari setups till the early morning hours. Joel Willstein

Joe your either close to me or your wife is making a long trip to AC aka Atlantic City!! I live about 40 minutes from "The Donald's AC"..lol. I'm not a nite-lifer nor a *** person so I havent been to AC since the Steel Pier was there in the early 60s! <g> But many love all that gold & glitter because its packed most of the time! Cheers Thom_j. P.S. I hope your wife wins big & then you'll be set for life!

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>Great job Alison! I have to admit I was sceptical at first, >since I don't usually like low rider setups myself. But >when I tried your Spa setup I found that yes, you do have >the rideheight set higher than I did, and yes, it does >indeed make the car much nicer! I guess I was bouncing off >the bump ***s and didn't know it. Maybe Papy should have >included some silly sound to let you know the car is on the >bump ***s, since a real driver can feel it with his butt. > Haven't matched my times with my old setup yet, but I think >once I tweek it to suit my style under acceleration I can >only get faster, since it already feels much better when >braking. You can trail brake like crazy with this thing! >Thanks, Alison. I highly reccomend the new setups to >anyone! > -A

You bring up a very good point. Just how to you know if you are hitting the bump stops? I've gotten so use to low riders,that I've most likely just got use to my Lotus handling a certain way at each track. But now I've started to raise the ride height and increase the springs and sway bars a great deal. The effect is that the car handling is much more controlled without sudden changes. Joel Willstein

I never got on with them. They're excellent setups but I need a lot of front end and these setups don't have that. -- Cheers! Graeme Nash http://www.karisma1.demon.co.uk ICQ# 11257824 ________________________________________________________________________________ "There's never enough time to do all the nothing you want" (Calvin & Hobbes)

On Sat, 12 Jun 1999 20:02:53 -0400, "Joel Willstein"

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>>Damn you, Alison! The Pacers play tonight, and tomorrow's the Texas >>IRL race -- now that you've given us these new setups, my wife's >>REALLY going to be ticked at me this weekend! <G> >>;-) >>-- JB >JB, > Guess I'm really lucky. My wife is going to Atlantic City for the >weekend. So after work,I'll be checking out Alisons' Ferrari setups till the >early morning hours. >Joel Willstein

Turns out I was fairly lucky, too -- the Pacers played so badly that I just listened while playing with Alison's Ferrari setups! The Pacers lost, but the Ferrari setups are real winners! <G> -- JB

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>Joe your either close to me or your wife is making a long trip >to AC aka Atlantic City!! I live about 40 minutes from "The >Donald's AC"..lol. I'm not a nite-lifer nor a *** person >so I havent been to AC since the Steel Pier was there in the >early 60s! <g> But many love all that gold & glitter because >its packed most of the time! >Cheers Thom_j. >P.S. I hope your wife wins big & then you'll be set for life!

I'm not really that close,as we live on Long Island. If she wins big,it's a hypersimulator for me :) Joel Willstein

I have waited for these (Ferrari) set-ups for a long time. I first 'discovered' your work on the BRM set-ups and was (almost) instantly a success in a car I had until then been very poor in at best. Thanks for all your hard work! Now, at long last the Ferrari is eminently drivable... Yes Amon liked the handling of the Ferrari and as you say it was just not competitive in the straights. "The Ferrari handled nicely, but we were not very competitive on horsepower, and the thing was terribly heavy. That was my first season with Ferrari, and for nearly all of it I was the only driver. I kept telling Mauro Foghieri that we were slow in a straight line, and it was a long time before he believed me. That's the trouble with 12-cylinder engines: they make a lovely loud, powerful noise! But that doesn't mean they are shoving much out..." Which fits exactly with what you say in the sidebar of the Advanced Setup Guide. Matthew.

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> Are you ready for this? > My new collection of setups for GPL's Ferrari exploits a radical new > approach to chassis setup which I stumbled upon a few weeks ago. The > gorgeous red cars from Maranello are stunning: gloriously, sensuously > responsive, yet forgiving beyond anything I'd imagined possible in GPL. > At last GPL's Ferrari lives up to Chris Amon's description of the real > one: > "That '68 Ferrari was a gorgeous thing to drive...In terms of driving > pleasure, a fast lap at Spa was a fantastic sensation. Although we were > down on power...the car was working beautifully. On [my pole] lap, as I > came down the Masta Straight, after the kink, I caught up to Brian > Redman, and I can remember going by him on the inside, at the entry to > Stavelot, with my foot buried right in it, while he was having to brake > in his Cooper! The thing felt tremendous." > Here are some comments about my setups and explanation of my new setup > technique: > "Your Ferrari article is great! I had never seen Chris Amon's quote > before--I couldn't believe how good a description it was of the GPL > Ferrari! [Your new Ferrari] setups do indeed handle better than low > riders..." > - Dave Kaemmer > "I could run comfortable through corners that otherwise gave me a heart > attack when feeling a bump...With this setup I could accelerate much > better out of the slow corners; the slides were way easier to > control....I couldn't believe what I felt and saw....Wonderful, Alison! > Soooo cool to drive....VERY impressive, it really lead me to rethink my > setups. > "Thanks, Alison, for giving me some really new perspectives on setting > up the cars! :))" > - Wolfgang Woeger > "Holy moly! That's the finest setup I've ever driven in GPL, my own > included. It's as easy to drive as an F2. A keeper. Congratulations." > - Steve Smith > Be careful! Reading my Ferrari article and trying my setups may shatter > some of your most fundamental assumptions about GPL. If you'd rather > keep thinking about setups the way you always have - if you want to keep > thinking of GPL as "hard to drive" - read no further. > Click here only if you dare: > http://eaglewoman.maximumspeed.com/gpl/ > Go to News, and then Sweet Red Candy. > Alison > http://eaglewoman.maximumspeed.com

> You bring up a very good point. Just how to you know if you are hitting >the bump stops? Sounds like something the game needs to produce a semi-*** sound far, at the very least. Joe McGinn ========================================== Staff Writer for the Sports *** Network [link lost in import: /***.com/] ==========================================

Graeme you too? I like all Alison's setups Especially the Hondas {& Tim Wheatly's are a 'tad' better for me}but I expected these to be as easily adjustable when I hopped into the***pit as her other setups! I guess its probably me & I prefer more front'end myself.. I'll see if I can fine-tune them as I do with Wolf's Lotus setups... ;O) "O" Well.. Cheers Thom_j.

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> >Am I the only one who just cannot get on with any of Alison's setups and > >have terrible results with all of them? > I never got on with them. They're excellent setups but I need a lot of > front end and these setups don't have that. > -- > Cheers! > Graeme Nash > [link lost in import] > ICQ# 11257824

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>> You bring up a very good point. Just how to you know if you are hitting >>the bump stops? >Sounds like something the game needs to produce a semi-*** sound >far, at the very least. How about a comical "boing" sound.

: Am I the only one who just cannot get on with any of Alison's setups and : have terrible results with all of them? Don't get me wrong. I admire and : respect all that she had done for a great many people and I'm not trying to : trash all her hard work, but see nothing in them myself. I have read how : much more stable they are compared with others, yet for these responses I : can only read chronic understeer. I'm no rail rider but the barriers at the : Curva Grande and Lesmos are now pretty well covered in *** deposits. The : best that I could do at Monza after 25 laps was a 1:33.56 compared with my : own setup returning 1:28.90. I found the same thing with the Cooper and : Brabham setups where I average 3 to 4 seconds faster. Monza is the wrong place to try the cooper set ups - you're never going to be fast in the Cooper at Monza anyway. Try the Glen instead where stability and handling is more important than power. -- Richard G. Clegg Only the mind is waving Dept. of Mathematics (Network Control group) Uni. of York. www: http://manor.york.ac.uk/top.html

You are all heretics!!!!!!!! The real drivers in 1967 had no such sounds emanating from their beasts. Therefore we cannot have them in our 1999 simulation!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Seriously, I agree that an indicator for the bump stops would be very helpful, just as several other indicators have been proposed over the past few months that would have been helpful. They could always be turned off for those who don't want or need them. I think these recent threads demonstrate exactly why an indicator would prevent us from "going astray" and would, in fact, make the simulator itself more realistic and the enjoyment of the simulator "more realistic." Also, I hope my sarcastic rant will prevent the real ranters from making the same point, as they always do, when someone suggests a way to make GPL more accessible. Marc.

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> >> You bring up a very good point. Just how to you know if you are > hitting > >>the bump stops? > >Sounds like something the game needs to produce a semi-*** sound > >far, at the very least. > How about a comical "boing" sound.

At the risk of continuing a pointless rant :)... I have to agree, Sim developers seem to have created for themselves a 'false purity' that prevents them from adding simple touches (that could indeed be optionally disabled) that would increase accessibility in order to make the 'game' more real. As some guy I saw interviewed on TV who designed Flight Sims for the RAF said, "If my brief was to make a 100% real simulation at the end of the day I would have ended up making an aeroplane." Matthew.

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> You are all heretics!!!!!!!! The real drivers in 1967 had no such sounds > emanating from their beasts. Therefore we cannot have them in our 1999 > simulation!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! > Seriously, I agree that an indicator for the bump stops would be very > helpful, just as several other indicators have been proposed over the past > few months that would have been helpful. They could always be turned off > for those who don't want or need them. > I think these recent threads demonstrate exactly why an indicator would > prevent us from "going astray" and would, in fact, make the simulator

itself > more realistic and the enjoyment of the simulator "more realistic." > Also, I hope my sarcastic rant will prevent the real ranters from making the > same point, as they always do, when someone suggests a way to make GPL more

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> accessible. > Marc. > > >> You bring up a very good point. Just how to you know if you are > > hitting > > >>the bump stops? > > >Sounds like something the game needs to produce a semi-*** sound > > >far, at the very least. > > How about a comical "boing" sound.

>My new collection of setups for GPL's Ferrari exploits a radical new >approach to chassis setup which I stumbled upon a few weeks ago. The >gorgeous red cars from Maranello are stunning: gloriously, sensuously >responsive, yet forgiving beyond anything I'd imagined possible in GPL. I am absolutely amazed. And I didn't expect to be, to be honest: your Coventry setups, which were so fervently applauded here some months ago didn't do anything for me, since I belong to the "get your braking done before you steer" school (has also something to do with my controller - still no split axis). Those setups had way too much understeer for my liking. But the Ferrari setups are brilliant! A tad too much mid-corner understeer, maybe, but otherwise, they really feel like cheating. :) No fighting just to stay on the track, no more problems when applying throttle out of slow corners, braking is much easier, etc. Finally, I even have a chance to overcome "driver induced oscillations" without ending up in the wrong direction. And I am much faster than before: Within a few laps, I egalized my personal best (in the Eagle) in Monza! With a Ferrari! And was two seconds faster than ever before in the Ferrari on that track. (I generously attribute one of those seconds to my improved skills since I last drove the beast from Maranello, but anyway.) Randy, is there still time to replace the new default setups in ver 1.1 and use Alison's? -- Wolfgang Preiss \ E-mail copies of replies to this posting are welcome.

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>> You bring up a very good point. Just how to you know if you are hitting >>the bump stops? >Sounds like something the game needs to produce a semi-*** sound >far, at the very least. >Joe McGinn >========================================== >Staff Writer for the Sports *** Network >[link lost in import: /***.com/] >==========================================

I'd like to hear the crunching sound of molars being smashed to pieces when you hit the bump stops. :-) /petern

I don't mean to be churlish about these new setups, but it does seem a bit odd to me that, even if there is no tell-tale sign for us to know when we've hit the bump-stops, that Alison, as a member of the Papy beta testing team, didn't have access to some sort of debugging version of the program so that she could tell whether this (and other unwanted effects) was happening. After all, when testing the physics model they must have produced this kind of data just to check that it was behaving more or less how they expected. It's a bit late now to say that their setups have been screwed up from the beginning! Maybe they were just having fun watching everyone struggling in online races, guffawing to themselves... Seriously, though, it does show that it's just as important for them to tune the default setups as it is to tune the actual physics model itself.

>>> You bring up a very good point. Just how to you know if you are hitting

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>>>the bump stops? >>Sounds like something the game needs to produce a semi-*** sound >>far, at the very least. >>Joe McGinn >>========================================== >>Staff Writer for the Sports *** Network >>[link lost in import: /***.com/]

This certainly is one of the big drawbacks of sim racing in general. You really can't feel what the car is doing,when it's doing it. We assume,and that's the problem,other than reading and evaluating tire temps. Alison Hine figured out the latest method of setups based on more than a year of driving GPL,and in the process,spending most likely 1000s of hours. And the direction of sims now is to increase the amount of options that we have to play with. While in reality,the vast majority of sim racers,search for setups to download and modify the best they can. In other words,most of us,can't setup a car. Joel Willsten