Test for me

Car: Mini special 1000
specs: 45hp, fwd, 630kg
actions: accelerate with spinning front wheels while steering.
brake with blocked wheels while steering
corner until understeering

lfs car: uf1
wheel: thrustmaster rally gt pro
actions: same as irl

I will try how these very similar cars behave and how my steering reacts.

The advantage is that the mini doesn't have any servo sissi assistances, neither in steering nor braking aids. It also lacks this thingy... how do you call it... steering dampener (??), so I really feel every pebble on the road.

Quote from danowat :

Your physics degree might tell you that, but in reality it does get REALLY light, but it will all depend on many, many different factors.

no it doesnt ... it only gets really light when you induce understeer by stepping on the accelerator in an fwd

@shotglass, I'll have to disagree with you on that one then.

Thats right Tris, that something else that could do with being implemented on FWD cars, torque steer.

Dan,

Friction of road service, caster, Steering Angle of Inclination, quality of tyres, tyre pressures, roll bar stiffness, damping level, spring rates, PAS

These all will have an effect on the level of resistance the driver will feel through the steering.

There's many different factors for you shotglass

IMHO the 'light' feeling you say is missing, is definately there in LFS, ok it's subtle but it's something that has kept me on the track at most corners i arrive at.

it may be that because FFB as we know it isn't smooth enough to truly replicate what you feel when strapped into a real car, i mean at the limit it's a (relatively) subtle effect for real anyway, so it can get lost in the very clumsy nature of current FFB systems.

I've got a feeling that most of the 'canned' efects used by other games is simply a way to make effects stand out enough to be obvious. LFS is at least very 'pure' in the way it generates its feedback, although they might not be as easy to pick up on as other titles.

I agree with a few of the other guys here who've said that they can feel the lightness when the front tires lose traction. In fact, the other night I was driving the LX4 on Aston and felt this quite a few times because I was coming into the corners too hot. The effect is definitely there. And I'm another one of the guys who thinks the ISI sims FF sucks. The effects DO feel canned and I can't feel what the car is doing at all in those games. LFS is the only game I've tried that feels right to me (not counting the low lateral grip).

Danowat - You mentioned a small "dead area" in the center of steering in LFS. If you have very little toe out and/or your caster settings are just right, this is exactly what you should feel. I get this same feeling from some setups (seems like it's usually the RAC). Take the same car and enable Bob's Road Going setup and the feeling is gone. This, to me, really illustrates how realistic and detailed LFS's force feedback is, especially given the hardware limitations we have.

IRL the only time my Malibu (yes I know it's shit) steering goes *REALLY* light when understeering is in the wet. In the dry it is not as noticeable.

In LFS, my DFP feedback is not as subtle as it was with my Wingman Formula Force, but I can still tell that it's understeering but the lightness isn't like a switch. It actually gets lighter under hard acceleration at the start than understeer. But overall the FFB in LFS is by far the best of the racing sims I've tried (most of them). Although I have RBR, I haven't played it much and I find it hard to compare rally with road racing as the style and feedback are totally different.

As for the feedback in GTL - for me it is far more vague than LFS, and even though understeer is very light, the FFB communicates very little else to me (except the normal canned vibration effects). You can feel when you're understeering but it's not very good at warning you're about to understeer. It was the same in GTR - underteer or oversteer was always something I had to anticipate rather than feel the limits, where as in LFS I have much more feedback through FFB to what the car is doing even before understeer/oversteer occur.

It's dead easy to feel power understeer in more powerful FWD cars, the steering goes quite light then.

I've tried GTR at a friends house, the low FFB when turning too far seem so exaggerated, since the wheel goes almost limp. Felt horrible. I've no problems with RBR FFB, I doesn't feel quite so attached but then rallying is going to be different anyway. And the replays make up for any bad words that could be levelled against the game.

Quote from danowat :

in a real car once you are understeering and the front tyres have little or no grip the steering is very light, something that LFS just doesnt convey.

Bullshit.

Sorry, thats not how it works in real life.

I don't know how many times other people have to post that in most cars in most situations, the wheel doesn't magically go light when the front wheels go past the knee in the traction curve.

The steering may feel "lighter" but its more like the feel doesn't get any heavier and these type of very subtle hints do show up in LFS.

Quote from Gentlefoot :

I agree with Tris and Dan if that's possible. I too do a lot of track driving and I do feel the resistance build to the point where you are past the ideal slip angle. It is subtle though but can be greatly influenced by the amount of caster designed into the suspension geometry of any particular car - more caster = greater 'centering', greater centuring = more resistance to the point of ideal slip angle so the effect becomes more obvious with greater caster.

Hope you get me.

Reminds me that the vehicle I am most certain had the biggest "lightening" effect past ideal slip angle was a go-kart that probably had 10 degrees of caster, or something insane like that. Very noticeable jacking effect as well, which LFS simulates and few other "sims" seem to.

Quote from skiingman :

The steering may feel "lighter" but its more like the feel doesn't get any heavier and these type of very subtle hints do show up in LFS.

You know? I think that is a very good description of what I and others are trying to say here (I bolded). Well put .

Quote from tristancliffe :

I drive an MX-5. Now okay, it's a girly hairdressers car, but it frequently wins (or used to in Mk1 and Mk2 varients) best handling car of the year awards, beating porsches, caterhams, loti, etc. In that, when I drive it hard (and I mean HARD) occasionally I get understeer. When I do, the lightening effect isn't huge and obvious, it's small and subtle, and quite easy to misinterpret, especially on a wet road with reduced friction.

On a FWD car the effect is identical, but being the driven wheels you also get some torque steer into the feeling that LFS doesn't simulate, at least much, as far as I know.

LFS does torque steer that you can feel in the FFB. Just take the UFR for a drive as its simple to spin the wheels in and you will notice right away.

i can deffinatly fel the wheel lightten when understeering. of course i'm using a DFP 100% ffb in profiler and 95% ffb ingame.

its extremely obvious. everyone else has already taken the words out of my mouth.

I dont know how you guys can feel the wheel go light on understeer when its not even coded into the FF...

i'm sure it is. either that or alot of people including me are crazy.

I think torque steer in LFS is quite noticable with something like the XF GTR on a tight track. Put your foot down hard out of a corner or over some bumps and it goes all over the place.

Quote from steve :

I dont know how you guys can feel the wheel go light on understeer when its not even coded into the FF...

Just think what you said:
1. Have you looked at Scawen's code?
2. As far as we are led to believe, there are no effects, so NOTHING is coded into the FFB. It's pure physics baby.

Ok,

1) LFS has the best FF ever, it is so good that it could never be improved, its just like driving a real car.

2) In real life the steering wheel never goes light in understeer conditions

3) Everyother sim (possibly bar RBR) has rubbish FF.

Keep it up blinkered masses, the brain washing is working really well........

now u are putting words in people's mouths. no need to get angry. lets try and look at this logically and respectfully.

nobody said that the force feedback was perfect. we know for damn sure that rfactor and gtl arent.

Not angry at all my friend, just can't be bothered with it, with being told that a real world condition that I can go outide and feel right now, is wrong, it doesnt happen.
Also, the fact that no one can ever level any critisim at LFS, I am a BIG LFS fan, but that doesnt mean that

a) I can't enjoy other sims

or

b) I can't state when something (I believe) is wrong.

Fanboys are a very odd breed.....

[quote=danowat]Ok,

1) LFS has the best FF ever, it is so good that it could never be improved, its just like driving a real car.

2) In real life the steering wheel never goes light in understeer conditions

3) Everyother sim (possibly bar RBR) has rubbish FF.


Do you truly believe that IRL when you get understeer that it feels like someone has put the car up on bricks and taken off the front wheels because this is what happens in ISI based sims. It just not do this.

If understeer is caused by too much drive to the front wheels it will get loose, this happens in LFS now. If its caused while slowing down it does not do this. its more the pressure build up stops. There is too much weight to the front for it to go loose.

No, I don't believe that, I believe what I feel when the situation happens IRL, it doesnt feel like "someones put it on bricks", but it feels decidedly light, and as my hardware is setup ATM, GTL feels more lifelike than LFS in that respect.
Also, understeer is not just to do with drive, you can understeer IRL without even touching the throttle.

Dan,

Quote from danowat :

Also, understeer is not just to do with drive, you can understeer IRL without even touching the throttle.

That's nothing different to what he said?

The point was,
understeer without/with little throttle = heavy wheel
understeer with heavy throttle = somewhat light wheel

Exactly like it is in LFS now.

But again, we should really see what the new physics change in the FF behaviour, maybe we will get a bit lighter wheel on understeer. Maybe the wheel force will stay completely the same, but the force just BEFORE losing grip will be higher (remember: physics currently aren't that perfect in this tyre state), so it will seem like a lighter wheel.

What we will not get is this bullshit from the ISI sims. I've yet to see someone let go of the wheel on understeer, because magically all forces are gone.

Btw

Quote :

LFS has the best FF ever

Yes.

Quote :

it is so good that it could never be improved

No.

Quote :

its just like driving a real car.

Not quite there, but far closer than any other sim (sans RBR).

Quote from steve :

I dont know how you guys can feel the wheel go light on understeer when its not even coded into the FF...

LFS just doesn't work that way, like others have said the ffb is influenced by the forces acting on the front wheel. If LFS is incorrect then it's more likely to do with something that affects those forces. LFS doesn't have any effects coded into the ffb, it's all generated by the physics engine.

Anyway I'd try playing with some settings Dan, I personally don't like the way most set up their ffb, the feel of the ffb is so subjective.
When it comes to understeer I do definately feel it in LFS so maybe it's just not pronounced enough. The XFR is the best car to test it out in but it's there in all of them.

If you're adament your real cars get a really light wheel with understeer, might I suggest you drive a few experiments?

Be careful because inducing understeer could lead to an accident, so don't try it on busy streets or blind corners. <-- Disclaimer.

First, go into a corner a bit too fast, and turn the wheel a bit too much to induce understeer, but with NO throttle. You'll find the wheel will only go a bit lighter.
Second go into a corner a bit too fast, and turn the wheel a bit too much to induce understeer, but with medium throttle. You'll find the wheel will go a bit lighter and pull left and right as the different wheels get different levels of traction.
Third, go into a corner, and turn... blah blah, but with full throttle. The wheel will go very light, but will also move around quite a lot as the various wheels get different levels of grip.

It's very important that when trying to compare real life values with simulated values you test certain conditions. In a front wheel drive car, the front wheels steer and drive, and this will mean you get mixed signals through the steering wheel. You must reduce the 'torque steer' lightness before claiming it's the understeer that makes steering wheels go light.

Then, if you can, do the same thing with a decent RWD car. Without the driven wheels interferring so much with the steering feedback you'll notice that the LFS simulation isn't far off (bearing in mind FFB technology).

Then, also in the rear wheel drive car, kick the back end out. You'll see that the steering wheel appears to automatically countersteer. Don't touch the wheel, let it automatically countersteer, and it will correct the slide for you (but it'll take more room than if you did it manually, and only if you allow it correct it rather than keeping full throttle on). LFS simulates this 'automatical countersteering', and I don't recall feeling that in any other sim.