Quote from tristancliffe :

Yes, you feel it, but it's not 'feel'.

Oh, okay.

Quote from spanks :

I've raced 7 years of my life so far 5 in a kart, 2.5 in a purpose built drag car.

Quote from spanks :

G-force warning = seat of your pants feel I suppose, which is invaluable...and the biggest thing missing from a computer game

And we're all still able to anticipate understeer, oversteer, and weight transfer. I'm just saying that adding 'threshold braking' to that list isn't all that big of a deal. Give it a try if you have pedals.

If you happen to see someone puffing smoke from one wheel, it's probably me.

Quote from tristancliffe :

You do realise Spanks that there is no feel in any brake pedal - they don't work like that. Any feel you get is from the g-forces resulting from pedal pressure, not through the pedal. A brake pad with 'lots of feel' means that it reacts to pressure change more readily than other pads, and you feel that change through the accelerations, again NOT through the pedal.

You'll feel even less in a cable brake system, which I think a lot of karts are (even if only partly).

my kart was a metal linkage with a hydraulic master cylinder to a single rear caliper

cheaper, or slower karts I saw had manual cable brakes...they were horrible in comparison D:

And yeah, I suppose there wasn't really any feedback through the pedal when the braking changed, just the sweet spot that I got used to feeling to know when I pushed hard enough :P

again, I'm not opposed to adding this...so I don't really know myself what I was going on about Just making conversation I suppose

"There is no way, other than audibly and visually to know that the tire is locked up. Yes, the car will react, but since the best we have is ffb through the wheel...unless you have a simulator at home...and to visually react, and adjust the brake pedal. At that point, you've already locked up the brakes for a good amount of time, and probably already need to turn in."

Well with my rather simpel controller i don' t have trouble to figure out wheter i lock up or not. I can choose., lock both front, right front, or left front if i want to. But normally i never want to lock tyres ofcourse.

But i' m glad some agree, especially if an important braking point is full of bumps like on as national reversed just before the very tight lefthander. People just adjust brakes so they can hit brakes 100% making there brake distance very short with the 'abs' setting. Also on south city tracks, such settings gives sometimes a unrealistic advantage and a very digital racing experience, braking point is always identical, tyre temps or setup will hardly effect braking points with the 'abs' settings.

I will be waiting for the next updates :boing: and hope max brake force will have a lot higher minimum value or can' t be changed at all. For example, brake force of fo8 locked at max of 1600nm per wheel. Will create nightmares for some drivers though Who are not used to controlling the brake pedal.

In real life an FO8 would create nightmares for them, so why not in LFS?

Quote from Bob Smith :

LFS still has brake help, doesn't it? Or has that been removed along with throttle help too?

LFS has still got brake help, I think I've left it on

What is all the fuss about? LFS still has brake help, so why should this brake force thing matter?

Does having a low brake force give you a competitive advantage? I don't think so. If you want to be fast, you need to modulate the brakes. If you don't, you will get locked wheels because
(a) downforce decreases when the speed drops,
(b) the car gets lighter when going over bumps in the track,
(c) engine braking is added when you shift down,
(d) tyre grip decreases when the tyres wear out or overheat.

If you set the brake force so low that you avoid locked wheels under all circumstances, you need to brake much earlier, and will be several seconds per lap slower.

If LFS would enforce a minimum brake force, it does not make a difference for the fast guys. But LFS will get harder for the others: drivers who are learning, or are less talented, or drive with mouse/kb (unless they switch on brake help, assuming it's still there). Some of those may give up on LFS, and buy a different sim.

What will you gain?

Quote from wsinda :

Does having a low brake force give you a competitive advantage?

It certainly can! Set the brakes just right so that they don't lock with the maximum braking force you'll ever use at that track (e.g. for T1 at SO1), and you'll be quicker. Yes, you still have to modulate the brakes as speed decays, but you know that at 100m you can slam on the brakes 100% and be safe (once your tyres are warm).

Trust me, it can find you time and consistency. If used unwisely it can cost you a lot more time of course, but that's the skill of 'cheating' for you.

Quote from wsinda :

If you set the brake force so low that you avoid locked wheels under all circumstances, you need to brake much earlier, and will be several seconds per lap slower.

I don't know how far you take "under all circumstances", but generally I have to disagree with this statement.

1) You gain lots of consistency by making sure most corners don't require any special attention to the brakes. Besides that, it's also much less tiring/stressing to be able to just mash the brake with little risk of damage, which can play a big role for your mental performance in longer races.

2) You can greatly prolong the life of your tyres when you don't lock them up, or at least only very seldom.

3) The time lost by not using maximum brake force is minimal, compared to messing up the corner exit. It's better to consistently lose a tenth or two at a corner, than to get the corner right 80% of the time with the 20% screwups costing you seconds in the corner and on the following straight. Especially on public/medium level races consistency quickly pays off big time.

The only real negative thing weaker brakes do is putting you at a disadvantage in position fights. There it doesn't matter if you take the corner optimally - if the opponent can outbrake you, he has gained the position. Your more ideal corner entry won't help you there as he'll be in the way, denying you the line you'd normally take.

Quote from AndroidXP :

I don't know how far you take "under all circumstances", but generally I have to disagree with this statement.

1) You gain lots of consistency by making sure most corners don't require any special attention to the brakes. Besides that, it's also much less tiring/stressing to be able to just mash the brake with little risk of damage, which can play a big role for your mental performance in longer races.

2) You can greatly prolong the life of your tyres when you don't lock them up, or at least only very seldom.

3) The time lost by not using maximum brake force is minimal, compared to messing up the corner exit. It's better to consistently lose a tenth or two at a corner, than to get the corner right 80% of the time with the 20% screwups costing you seconds in the corner and on the following straight. Especially on public/medium level races consistency quickly pays off big time.

The only real negative thing weaker brakes do is putting you at a disadvantage in position fights. There it doesn't matter if you take the corner optimally - if the opponent can outbrake you, he has gained the position. Your more ideal corner entry won't help you there as he'll be in the way, denying you the line you'd normally take.

Point One, Point Two and Point Three: With these you are telling me you agree, that it is true that this brake-force settings is used as an abs system and is giving an unfair advantage. What is your point? You want to keep this settings? Although it takes away some(for me a lot) of the fun of racing?

With all circumstances i mean, nearly impossible or very bad driving with cold tyres is required to get lockups. Will never happen with regular drivers.


Tyre-life? Yes indeed you have to be carefull with the brakes when they are setup like real brakes. I don' t see a problem there, just dont lockup. Most likely you can do about 1 to 3 laps less on a set of tyres.


@wsinda
There are many fast drivers who use brake-settings so low, it is really not possible to lockup and turn-in braking is very easy. The timeloss of the extra brakedistance is minimal. Not seconds, but more like 0,2-0,3sec but it the advantage is much bigger: Cooler tyres, very easy and digital(brake-point always identical), turn-in easier.

Today i received a set for fbm with brakeforce set as low as 565nm and i though 700nm was already to weak and difficult to get lockups on.. Yet, people are incredably fast with it. Why, bumbs didnt affect them while braking. Also the track required braking while cornering a bit with car out of balance, with such low setting, this gets very easy. Just brake and on turn in keep braking, tyres wont lock anyway.

I was replying to wsinda...

Quote from Bluebird B B :

You want to keep this settings? Although it takes away some(for me a lot) of the fun of racing?

Why does it spoil your fun? You can choose to set a high brake force, and control the car in your style. Or do you mean that you have less fun because you're slower than others, because you use a high brake force (which is harder to drive)?

A high brake force may seem closer to RL, but RL drivers have an advantage over sim-racers: they can control their brake input by the force that their left foot puts on the pedal, whereas sim-racers must brake through the foot's position (which is harder to control precisely). Next to that, RL racers also get feedback by feeling the G forces. RL racers have it easy, methinks.

Quote :

Today i received a set for fbm with brakeforce set as low as 565nm and i though 700nm was already to weak and difficult to get lockups on.. Yet, people are incredably fast with it.

Well, you can get the same result with 700Nm and the pedal at 80%. (FYI, the FBM's default setup has brake force at 541Nm...)

Quote from AndroidXP :

1) You gain lots of consistency by making sure most corners don't require any special attention to the brakes. Besides that, it's also much less tiring/stressing to be able to just mash the brake with little risk of damage, which can play a big role for your mental performance in longer races.

OK, point taken. I had been thinking of hotlapping, but in long races the consistency is a big bonus.

We are currently able to tweak braking force to near perfection! I mean very very close; there are a few situations where you might be able to brake faster if you had more braking force on tap but people certainly aren't taking that trade. If you don't think the current setup makes you faster you are kidding yourself.

It makes it less fun because braking is hugely important part of racing and this is a simulation. Yes - without the vestibular (motion sense) input, driving a sim is harder. NFS has plenty of "fun" and forgiving braking to offer. Braking isn't a particularly important part of the NFS franchise. Braking is an important part of LFS - and it should be realistically modeled. For the same reason ABS is outlawed even in many big-money race organizations: Highly assisted wheel to wheel racing is usually boring with less opportunities to overtake. It takes the driver out of the equation. You should be offended that someone thinks you need it.

I think LFS should have brake forces for each car set as they would in real life. The only thing that should be adjustable on the vehicles is brake balance, and that should only be for the cars that it is adjustable in real life.

Well, if you look at all the adjustments you can make to the cars in LFS, it is not that accurate to real "road" cars that are stock. Look at all the adjustments you can do with the things... That is not with stock parts and honestly, being able to adjust brake power/ balance is quite an easy modification.. I can do all that in my Pontiac but I choose to only use the Balance adjustment. With what I have, power can be changed by poping the hood and turning a knob. Same with balance.

Currently, I like to be able to lock all 4 wheels on command if needed. I can get out of some prety hairy T1 situations by locking the wheels for a moment and sliding around crashing cars where sharply turning runs a high risk of spinning and ending up with the rest of the twisted mess. Sure it gives flatspots but I would rather that than having a damaged car.. tires change far faster than damage can get repaired..

I am not against the idea of being able to adjust braking power seeing as not all of us have wheels.. I have a G25 but that is just me.

Quote from AndroidXP :

I was replying to wsinda...

oeps sorry

"ith what I have, power can be changed by poping the hood and turning a knob."
Power of the brake-assist system you mean. Not related to maximum brake-force a certain brake-system can deliver. But it might be impossible for a human being to use it with the brake-assist systems turned off.

So in effect, the knob can feel like turning down brake-power of your car(and making your car no longer legal on public road )

Quote from skstibi :

Well, if you look at all the adjustments you can make to the cars in LFS, it is not that accurate to real "road" cars that are stock. Look at all the adjustments you can do with the things... That is not with stock parts and honestly, being able to adjust brake power/ balance is quite an easy modification.. I can do all that in my Pontiac but I choose to only use the Balance adjustment. With what I have, power can be changed by poping the hood and turning a knob. Same with balance.

Yes, the adjustment's we can make to the suspension are a little bit over the top. The ability to adjust transmission gearing ratios in particular, since most transmissions only have 1 or 2 ratio-sets available, is a bit much but it does allow used to model real cars a little easier and the standard ratios are very close to optimal for everything but, perhaps, rally tracks. Final Drive, Damping Force, Spring Rates, Caster & Camber are available in a fairly broad spectrum, although not with the fidelity of control LFS offers of course, and I don't have a problem with the way it's set up now.

I'm not aware of a part you can install in line or on a Master cylinder/booster assembly that allows one to adjust overall braking force - Do you have a link to it? By moving the linkage farther down on a pedal you can increase pedal pressure by reducing your mechanical advantage but this just means you have to press harder.

Yes a proportioning valve can, with a flaring tool, be installed in 10 minutes on virtually any car, Brake Bias is fine the way it is.

Most stock cars have the brake balance adjustment fixed, you can not adjust it at all. This is for safety reasons, because people would mess with it. If you give people that option, they will abuse it and kill themselfs and other people around them.

Just imagine some one who thinks they know what they are doing, they figure setting brake power to 50/50 front/rear is better than the stock setting. That would be a very hazardous situation for them, and for other drivers. If they press the brakes to hard they are garanteed to spin and crash, possibly into someone else, especialy since they probably don't know enough about the dynamics of a car to control the spin.

Brake force isn't adjustable by any means on any vehicle. The only thing that regulates brake force is the drivers foot. The brake booster can be adjusted on some cars, but it just means that you have to press the pedal harder to lock the wheels, because the assist is gone.

And saying that LFS alows so much adjustment of other things that it should alow force adjustment is just wrong. The only way LFS can continue to get more realistic is by starting to fix some of the variables they alow people to change now. A large portion of the setup screen should be locked for the road cars. There should be pre-set options for gearing and suspension.

It doesn't have to be too restrictive, but it should be more realistic, and brake force adjustment is the most unrealistic thing in LFS next to the gearing ratios.

Another point: It's very easy to cheat, if you have a wheel.

If LFS were to fix the brake force to, say 800, and I want it at 600, then I can tell the Logitech Profiler to scale the brake pedal input down to 75%. Presto, I'm back at the current situation where I can stomp on the pedal and still be safe from blocked wheels.

(And if your driver software doesn't do this for you, you can always place a carefully chiseled piece of wood under the pedal.)

But people wouldn't do that, because each car and setup would require a different sized bit of wood, rather than individual settings in LFS. See which one is easy (LFS) and which one is more difficult (except for one car/track/setup freaks)?

You can change maximum brake force - higher friction pad:disc combinations, larger diameter discs (more wheel braking torque for a given CF), and grippier tyres. But the first is usually limited by feel and price, the second by wheel sizes (unless you are a ricer with 20" wheels on your drift 'car'), and the third by the rest of the 'package'. And heat. So in practice there is a limit to most cars abilities, and it's not plausible to increase it without making something else worse.

Most race classes restrict you to curtain configurations, some don't even alow you to run big(er) brakes in the first place, but you will never see a car with brakes too small to lock the wheels. Because that would mean that brake fade would decrease stoping power to the point it might become a hazard.

On a lot of classes in UK club racing brakes are free. Plenty have insufficient brakes to lock the wheels except at slow speeds, and usually with some amount of lateral load transfer or bumps. I can't lock my Reynard's wheels until below 90mph (well, maybe I could if I was stupid/brave/talented enough to try, but I'm not, so nerrrr).

Quote from tristancliffe :

You can change maximum brake force ... by wheel sizes (unless you are a ricer with 20" wheels on your drift 'car')

Wheel size is irrelevant if you can keep your tire diameter the same with an appropriate profile. But I agree; It's been mentioned a few times that you could just change the calibration of the axis or I guess wood is an option too. If someone wants to go to that much trouble to cheat then I guess they have earned it (as much as a cheating louse can earn something) but currently you have to be a glutton for punishment not to use the system in place and taking it away would mean that 99% of the field is on the up and up.