Quick suggestion, with the inclusion of Ballast in the latest patch, at the moment

however it goes in one lump in the car.

First suggestion.

My racing/physics knowledge is not great, however, sure there is a differance to putting 50KG over the front wheels and 25KG over the rear wheels is differnet in physic terms to having 75kg at 66% towards the front?

Therefore is there a possibility that the ballast can be split? (ie placement areas)

Second suggestion, with a movable amount of ballast is there the possibility that it can be moved from left to right?

The examples would be to either off set the weight of a driver on a tin top ie balance the car (or to make the effect greater to help cornering dynamics)

So my suggestion

1. Splitable quantites of ballast
2. Moveable left and right of ballast compared to just front to back.

Cheers,

and thanks for listening

Dru.

Quote from Dru :

Quick suggestion, with the inclusion of Ballast in the latest patch, at the moment

however it goes in one lump in the car.

First suggestion.

My racing/physics knowledge is not great, however, sure there is a differance to putting 50KG over the front wheels and 25KG over the rear wheels is differnet in physic terms to having 75kg at 66% towards the front?

Therefore is there a possibility that the ballast can be split? (ie placement areas)

Second suggestion, with a movable amount of ballast is there the possibility that it can be moved from left to right?

The examples would be to either off set the weight of a driver on a tin top ie balance the car (or to make the effect greater to help cornering dynamics)

So my suggestion

1. Splitable quantites of ballast
2. Moveable left and right of ballast compared to just front to back.

Cheers,

and thanks for listening

Dru.

If given a choice, one would like NOT to split the ballast. If ballast is a must for a car with already good F/R weight distribution, it should be placed as low and as close to the center of gravity as possible. This to maintain good mass distribution AND minimize moment of inertia.

For cars that are front or rear heavy, it depends. If one has say an F/R car that's too nose heavy, say 60/40 F/R, one would place the ballst as far back as possible OR as close to the wheelbase center as possible. This revolves a tradeoff between mass distribution and moment of inertia. Even so, splitting up the masses is still not such a brilliant idea. Why on earth would you want to split 2 masses on a dumbell farther apart when one doesn't need to?

+1 for moving the ballast left or right

weight split over the wheels will have the same 'height' ie low centre of gravity but will have more direct load pushing down at the wheels which would be benificial rather than in the middle of the car surely and the weight is not on the wheels.

Weight OVER wheels gives more traction (over drive wheels that is) as thats why in karts you see people jumping up and down to get better drive, the only thing is the seat of the driver is in the middle not directly over the drive chain, but the next result is the same.

Another example is, in F1 say, where they build cars under weight they can put ballast anywhere to help balance the car or give it certain properties, one such place is in the front nose this help pull the front of the car down that little bit more so when the car hits bumps etc etc there is that fraction more mass directly at that point to help pull it down that little bit quicker, that the same massed car pulling it down from 'somewhere' in the vehicle.

Quote from Dru :

weight split over the wheels will have the same 'height' ie low centre of gravity but will have more direct load pushing down at the wheels which would be benificial rather than in the middle of the car surely and the weight is not on the wheels.

Weight OVER wheels gives more traction (over drive wheels that is) as thats why in karts you see people jumping up and down to get better drive, the only thing is the seat of the driver is in the middle not directly over the drive chain, but the next result is the same.

Another example is, in F1 say, where they build cars under weight they can put ballast anywhere to help balance the car or give it certain properties, one such place is in the front nose this help pull the front of the car down that little bit more so when the car hits bumps etc etc there is that fraction more mass directly at that point to help pull it down that little bit quicker, that the same massed car pulling it down from 'somewhere' in the vehicle.

No matter where you put the mass, the force has to go through the wheels. If you put more mass at the CoG then all four wheels will get a share of it, it you put it inline with the rear wheels then the rear wheels get a larger proportion of it.

Quote from tristancliffe :

No matter where you put the mass, the force has to go through the wheels. If you put more mass at the CoG then all four wheels will get a share of it, it you put it inline with the rear wheels then the rear wheels get a larger proportion of it.

so is that a +1 for one or either or neither suggestion then?

I think the oval 'racers' might want left-right adjustment of ballast, and normal racers might too when/if corner weight differences are introduced. But I see no advantage to having the ballast splittable.

Quote from tristancliffe :

I think the oval 'racers' might want left-right adjustment of ballast, and normal racers might too when/if corner weight differences are introduced. But I see no advantage to having the ballast splittable.

not going off topic, but a question, ok so corner weight differences are not here, but side weights surely are already, after all the position of the driver can make a huge difference to the handling of the car depending upon the circuit and how the kerbs are taken already and also if you take a passenger you have the option of in the front or in the back that already handles this kind of thing right?

Yeah, offset CoG's are in LFS, but the effect of those isn't all that great really. Some of the cars benefit from having the driver on a certain side for certain tracks, but there's not much in it. If we had to optimise the corner weights of a car for a given ballast/driver/car combination then great, but until then justing making the cars heavier is enough.

People spend years asking for ballast, and as soon as it arrives people want more and more features for it. Just seems odd that many people can't be happy with what they've got.

Quote from tristancliffe :

Yeah, offset CoG's are in LFS, but the effect of those isn't all that great really. Some of the cars benefit from having the driver on a certain side for certain tracks, but there's not much in it. If we had to optimise the corner weights of a car for a given ballast/driver/car combination then great, but until then justing making the cars heavier is enough.

People spend years asking for ballast, and as soon as it arrives people want more and more features for it. Just seems odd that many people can't be happy with what they've got.

gotcha, cuase switching thr driver definately does alter the way you can either take or 'avoid' particular kerbs, for instance the last chicane on FE Gold.

Personally I find that the disadvatage of sitting on the left (even though I drive LHD cars on an almost daily basis) offsets the advantage of having the mass distribution of the car slightly more favourable. And I'm usually within a second or two of many WRs so I'm not completely crap...

Quote from tristancliffe :

Personally I find that the disadvatage of sitting on the left (even though I drive LHD cars on an almost daily basis) offsets the advantage of having the mass distribution of the car slightly more favourable. And I'm usually within a second or two of many WRs so I'm not completely crap...

yes 'gotcha' is a term widely used to say 'i understand what you are saying thanks.

Ah, I took it as gotcha as in 'ha ha, I caught you out'. I'll remove the unnecessary bit from my last post. Sorry for the confusion...

Hi

In my private league we sorely miss the opportunity to weight punish the faster drivers in the racing cars which do not allow for passengers (we are looking for tight racing rather than actual competition however peculiar that may sound).

I was not aware that there is a ballast option.

Please: what patch? How to apply ballast?

Kind regards
/Henrik Målberg