I love LFS...i think it is far beyond and other racing sim in realism, fun and online play. BUT...i dont know whether im the only one but shifting without lifting off the accelarater just ruins it for me. I know it is possible to flat shift in real life but....for example, racing GTR cars, in real life they would never flat shift. I somtimes try not to flat shift on pupose, to make it more realistic. But the advantage you gain from flat shifting is so much that i loose speed and the competive edge just to make it more realistic. It just doesnt seem right to me....does anyone think the devs will change this somehow....???
I've never had engine damage in FZR or FOX or GTi. I've done plenty of longer races in them (20+ laps). GT and GTTurbo, I have seen engine damage from flatshifting. LX4/6? Don't know, never flat shifted them. I have always lifted with them and I do lift with GT/Turbo now.
The XRR is a bit more prone to engine damage from flatshifting, at least in my experiments. Maybe the turbo cars are more likely to suffer damage in this way?
Who's to say an engine would be badly damaged after 20 laps of flat-shifting in real life? It depends on several things.. The gradual damage to the engine in LFS is there but i've ran 40 laps flat-shifting and the engine has been fine in an FXR. If it was damaged it wasn't noticible, laptimes were very consistent.
But if the dev's were to make the engine damage more substantial.. i get the feeling that would piss people right off.
Nah, not at all. At least IMO. I'd rather lift the throttle myself, but I only flatshift because everyone else does.
People probably would get pissed off though. To some, it isn't fast enough to get a fast time compared to everyone else. They just think when times go down due to updates, that is a bad thing. Look at everyone complaining about times at Blackwood in the GTi when the patch came out. Something changed to make the car a bit slower and folks didn't like that.
I think flatshifting wouldn't really damage the engine as much as it would f*ck up the clutch. So the problem here is really more of a missing damage modelling, rather than insufficient engine damage.
Right now, especially in the turbo cars you almost HAVE to flatshift to be competitive. If you don't, all or most turbo pressure is lost during shift and you're considerably slower.
I'd really like to see a bit of skill being needed for shifting up and down in LFS - for me its one of the least realistic aspects of the game; people slamming into chicanes at top speed, braking hard and flicking almost instantaneously through 3 or 4 gears then driving on again. In real life you would wreck your clutch, engine and gearbox doing the sort of thing that some manage round BL, SO and AS. If you look at driving the F1600 in NetKar, you have to drop off the gas in order to change up, the change up takes a short period of time, then you are off again. If you don't ease off, the gear will not change. This actually adds far more finesse to driving this tricky car and adds another absorbing aspect to mastering the skills. It ends up giving, for me, a far more convincing driving/racing experience.
In a race car, using semi auto clutch, people generally don't flat shift although it is possible, they will come off the throttle to about 25-75% while shifting because the clutches simply don't allow flat shifting, it would cause too much damage
Some of the engines in LFS have a very high redline, compared to the rpm of peak power. When you flatshift the FOX it doesn't even cross the redline, f.e. A 3,2 Liter Porsche motor I worked with peaked at it's redline. Under racing conditions it was mandatory to redline that car to get any good power from it, which caused a lot of engine problems for all cars that ran that engine.
Some of the LFS cars cross the redline a bit and before the patch I had to easy of throttle in the XFR on longer races. Now I didn't notice any effects of flatshifting in my last 60 lap race.
But you should also notice that we drive each of our cars only once. 20 minutes of racing and the car goes to the yard and we shift+s into a completely new car. You can do few things to a car to wreck it within such a short time (unless putting in the "Rally gear" ).
(This doesn't mean that LFS's damage system is in any way realistic, you should just notice that you can't expect immediate gearbox failure from one bad shift like you might expect from your own car)
There's no reason why the peak power can't be well before the redline. The peak power point is defined by how the engine combusts fuel over the rev range (basically), whilst the redline is usually the point where the engine MIGHT start to lunch itself, or suffer bad effects (valve bounce for example).
Obviously in real life you'd not make the engine capable of revving much above it's peak power because that's wasted money, but you could. Therefore LFS's engines aren't WRONG, they just wouldn't make money in real life. Have YOU ever seen a Scavier engine in real life? No? Well, there you go then, no one buys them
Well, at least this explains some of my lap times - I never flat shift in LFS. I tend to let off most of the way but get back on the throttle just an instant before the clutch is grabbing again.
So if I was to be lazy, and flat shifted, I'd be faster :/ It just doesn't feel right to flat shift. Makes the game feel arcadie, I even lift off to shift when I play games that you don't have to. I'm probably the only person in the world who plays Need For Speed Most Wanted, and lifts off on shifting, and gives a tap on down shifting.
when i first started driving in real life my first car was a vauxhall viva 1256 cc, it was gutless so i used to flat shift that when i was in a hurry and because the engine was so slow racing it never did any damage.
btw giles villeneuv used to flat shift the ferrari f1 car all the time , this before electonic aids and paddel changes etc
^^I think LFS would improve significantly if you had to do this or risk serious damage or just missing a gear change, it's one area where NetKar really has the edge, I'm afraid to say. It's siomething that has to be learned and mastered. It really adds to the gameplay.
I do that when I'm not racing, i.e. exploring the track or just messing around, as you said specially on some cars it doesn't feel right when you flat shift. But when I'm racing I know that it's faster to do it and I just do it.
For example; If you take the engine almost to redline and then decide to flat shift, whilst holding the clutch in for what some people would consider "too long" or long enough to bounce off the limiter a few times and then reef the clutch back off the floor, then yes, you are going to be causing damage to the engine, clutch, gearbox and possibly your diff if it's weak enough.
But if you flat shift before getting too high in the rev range, using just enough clutch to mix in the new gear and being smooth with the whole operation then the only thing you're going to be doing is wearing out the clutch slightly faster.
That's my opinion anyway. I certainly don't go round flat shifting everywhere. It's not necessary when you have enough power and just cruising the streets.
One thing i'd really like to see in the game is the shifting made more realistic, here's how:
Non GT class vehicles - Slower shift speeds. You tap the 'S' button and it actually takes a pre-determined length of time for the shift to complete. Flat shift only available with manual clutch, causes damage to engine.
GT class vehicles - Faster shift speeds. Tap the shift button and it shifts a fair bit quicker then non-gt class shifts. Flat shift only available with manual clutch, minimal damage to engine.
F1 cars with paddle shift - Same as they are now, almost instant shift. No engine damage caused.
Manual/Auto clutch - I play with manual clutch, keyboard and mouse. I think the operation of the 'auto' clutch in LFS makes it a sequential automatic. Therefore, holding down the shift key shouldn't be activating the clutch, thus elminating flat shifting whilst 'auto' clutch. Flat shifting should only be available with the 'manual' clutch IMO.
what wrong ?? firther more, what's that single word answer ? doh !!
IMO, in real life GTR cars have the sequential box that cuts the power a bit even if your foot in fully on the trottle (if you u consider that flashifting)..
and by the way, flatshifting in LFS is getting on my nerves as well as that fu*** locked diff exploit that seems to be back.. AFAIK, i never flatshit, i use a sequential gearbox on GTR cars with a cut while shifting and the blip on downshifting , just like in real life..i dont care if im competitive or not with those crazed poeple on the track...
Don't know, never flat shifted them. I have always lifted with them and I do lift with GT/Turbo now.
).
