Race simulator for club racers

Race simulator for club racers

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Discussion

BertBert

18,955 posts

210 months

Tuesday 25th February 2014
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I could be completely wrong, but isn't Adrian's based on rFactor?

woof

Original Poster:

8,456 posts

276 months

Tuesday 25th February 2014
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I should have added that I can only compare it to iRacing.

NJH

3,021 posts

208 months

Tuesday 25th February 2014
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That is the thing though, I wouldn't read much into any of the sim games in terms of driving. I have iRacing as well and have heard all the debates over the years, OTOH I know that the model of my own car or the one I did of a 968 would produce almost identical numbers to what we would see from the data logger in a real car. Its a moot point really but a few years back I had rFactor, iRacing and LFS and my own feeling was that it was LFS which did more real things than the other two if one ignores the ludicrous slip levels. I don't know if anyone is doing anything with LFS any more. I have worked with aircraft simulation systems btw so I know how much work is involved in getting everything together in terms of physical interaction, its an enormous amount of work and I think this is where the whole home based sim game debate goes awry as its never going to feel anything like a real car when your control points are bits of plastic bolted to a desk with no real effort put into accurate feedback or control weights.

woof

Original Poster:

8,456 posts

276 months

Monday 3rd March 2014
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Here's a few laps of Brands & Snetterton from my sim session

Snetterton
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyseSXdqo0U

Brands
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox8P1799qCw

QuaifeHobbs

8 posts

122 months

Monday 3rd March 2014
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BertBert said:
I could be completely wrong, but isn't Adrian's based on rFactor?
Yes BertBert is completely correct my sim is based on Rfactor, but the difference is everything has been built in house using real data so that all the cars and tracks are much more realistic than what you can download off of Rfactorcentral.

ShakeyJake188

108 posts

129 months

Monday 3rd March 2014
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QuaifeHobbs said:
Yes BertBert is completely correct my sim is based on Rfactor, but the difference is everything has been built in house using real data so that all the cars and tracks are much more realistic than what you can download off of Rfactorcentral.
With that in mind, will you be selling a licence and download for your cars & tracks for home sims?
It's defiantly something I would be interested in as i'm quite far away!

designndrive62

743 posts

156 months

Monday 3rd March 2014
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ShakeyJake188 said:
With that in mind, will you be selling a licence and download for your cars & tracks for home sims?
It's defiantly something I would be interested in as i'm quite far away!
I would have thought that to be able to run the tracks and cars Adrian uses you would need a proper sim setup as he has. As far as I am aware, proper race sim tracks and cars with their physics etc such as used by the f1 teams and proper training centres like this require so much computing power to run all the algorithms that it needs something of a supercomputer to run the stuff, despite having foundations in Rfactor that we can all enjoy at home.

BertBert

18,955 posts

210 months

Monday 3rd March 2014
quotequote all
QuaifeHobbs said:
Yes BertBert is completely correct my sim is based on Rfactor, but the difference is everything has been built in house using real data so that all the cars and tracks are much more realistic than what you can download off of Rfactorcentral.
And I have to say that once we changed the setup a little to be what I was used to, the car was very authentic to the track and lap times. It felt like it took ages to get used to the Simm-iness of the experience, but looking back it didn't take that long at all.

And the other big difference to the home r-factor? You won't have AQ-H next to you at home imparting his knowledge not only about setup but also about driving!

Bert

Edited by BertBert on Tuesday 4th March 19:49

BertBert

18,955 posts

210 months

Tuesday 4th March 2014
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woof said:
Here's a few laps of Brands & Snetterton from my sim session
Brands
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox8P1799qCw
One of the things I found was that Clearways felt a little odd, certainly felt a little different to get to grips with than in real life. How did you find it?
Bert

woof

Original Poster:

8,456 posts

276 months

Tuesday 4th March 2014
quotequote all
BertBert said:
woof said:
Here's a few laps of Brands & Snetterton from my sim session
Brands
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox8P1799qCw
One of the things I found was that Clearways felt a little odd, certainly felt a little different to get to grips with than in real life. How did you find it?
Bert
grip is one thing that can change - clearways in real life can be very slippy.
You mentioned it took a while to get to grips with the Sim and I have the same problem. It takes me a while to get used to it. I think you need to be more predictive than reactive on it. Which will make you a better in real life. I still drive reacting to the car - whereas someone as good as adrian knows when something is going to happen.


Damani Marcano

4 posts

105 months

Tuesday 26th January 2016
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I know this thread has been quiet for a while but I thought you would like to see a review of ProSim's latest simulators. They are designed for drivers to have at home or for teams to have in their HQs.

At the end of this review is a split-screen comparison between the simulated VW Golf that I race and the actual golf both on Silverstone.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JKE7Amm7rI

The wheel, pedals and software are the same as the one at the Pro-Sim HQ.

Damani Marcano
http://damanimarcano.com


RobM77

35,349 posts

233 months

Tuesday 26th January 2016
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Thanks for posting those reviews and thanks for the OP for the initial thread. 2016 will be my first year of racing since 2010 and in a car I've never driven before. This simulator therefore interests me greatly for both getting back up to speed and learning to brake with my left foot - I'm off to check out their website now - thanks.

Damani Marcano

4 posts

105 months

Wednesday 27th January 2016
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RobM77 said:
Thanks for posting those reviews and thanks for the OP for the initial thread. 2016 will be my first year of racing since 2010 and in a car I've never driven before. This simulator therefore interests me greatly for both getting back up to speed and learning to brake with my left foot - I'm off to check out their website now - thanks.
No problem. That's great!
Please mention Piston Heads and seeing my review here when you do :-)

Damani
http://twitter.com/@DKMRacing
http://damanimarcano.com

evilmiyagi

127 posts

108 months

Wednesday 27th January 2016
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Damani, do you know the rough cost of a session with AQ-H tuition?

I'll be comparing to a general test day at c. £200 a day

Damo

Damani Marcano

4 posts

105 months

Wednesday 27th January 2016
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evilmiyagi said:
Damani, do you know the rough cost of a session with AQ-H tuition?

I'll be comparing to a general test day at c. £200 a day

Damo
Hi Damo, For that £200 is that the cost of everything like prep, tyres, brakes, general wear and tear, repairs, fuel etc?

To compare it to ProSim you would also have to add on the cost of an instructor. ProSim is more like you are paying for instruction on a sim not just using a sim. So you can get about 4 runs with instruction and data analysis between sessions and it works out to be about the same cost as hiring a decent instructor for half a day.

Working with Adrian at ProSim last year was a huge part of me going from a novice with no experience of racing cars or even driving on the road to getting fastest lap in a VAG Trophy race last year.

It is best to phone to ask about prices because it will depend on what you want to do. You can also share a session with a friend or team-mate. You can even book out the whole day for a group too. Adrian is really helpful and friendly and will help you figure out what is best for you.

Does that help?

Edited by Damani Marcano on Wednesday 27th January 23:54


Edited by Damani Marcano on Thursday 28th January 00:10

evilmiyagi

127 posts

108 months

Thursday 28th January 2016
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It does thank you, I've just got Adrian on FB so will give him a shout..

Damani Marcano

4 posts

105 months

Thursday 28th January 2016
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evilmiyagi said:
It does thank you, I've just got Adrian on FB so will give him a shout..
Great! Please tell him you saw this post and mention me :-)

RobM77

35,349 posts

233 months

Sunday 7th February 2016
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Damani Marcano said:
RobM77 said:
Thanks for posting those reviews and thanks for the OP for the initial thread. 2016 will be my first year of racing since 2010 and in a car I've never driven before. This simulator therefore interests me greatly for both getting back up to speed and learning to brake with my left foot - I'm off to check out their website now - thanks.
No problem. That's great!
Please mention Piston Heads and seeing my review here when you do :-)

Damani
http://twitter.com/@DKMRacing
http://damanimarcano.com
I had my first session at Pro Sim today and yes, I did mention you and this thread. smile I had a two hour session and got a huge amount out of it. It reminded me of three years that I spent perfecting my swimming in a treadmill style pool with countless underwater cameras, slow-mo, data and one to one tuition: that took me from being barely able to swim a length to putting in very competitive times over distances up to a mile or more. I realise that's an obscure analogy, but essentially what this is is a 'lab' type environment where the instructor can see and critique your every tiny move and you can try absolutely anything at a relatively low cost and crucially have no consequences if you cock it up and crash, which leaves you open to just trust the coach and try what's been suggested. I've raced on and off since 2001 and had bits of tuition over the years, but this was my first time having tuition with datalogging and in the actual car I'm racing (you can't fit a driving coach in a real single seater, or even a racing saloon with a full cage etc), which I thought was invaluable. Yes, it's not the same as being in the real car, and neither was the tiny swimming pool with a current and cameras like being in a real pool or lake; but like that environment, the numerous advantages massively outweigh the disadvantages, particularly if you're a club racer like me with a low budget and perhaps 4 or 5 days a year tops in a real car at a real circuit with one set of tyres and no money for crash repairs....

I should say at this stage that I'm a keen user of PC based sims and have been for years, so I am used to driving sims. For most of my life I've lived in the sticks with practically no internet, so don't (can't!) actually take it very seriously online with actual racing against other people and championships etc, but I have tried most of the popular PC sims over the years, compare my times with others online and currently drive on 'Assetto Corsa' every now and then (about 30-60 minutes a week in winter, much less in summer) for fun and to get my motorsport fix. Pro Sim was better than all of those, although I have to confess, it has carried over that slightly glassy, floating feeling that RFactor always had (compare to the beautifully organic feeling Assetto Corsa), but what's overwhelmingly obvious is that the tyre model is on a different planet to RFactor or even Assetto Corsa and there were no "yeah, but" thoughts with Pro Sim - it quite frankly felt very real from the off, with the only difference being that you don't feel the limit from the tyres, you instead run on visual cues and memory from driving a real car, which of course I'm used to, if a little slower on lap times with compared to real life.

To come back to the principle of being instructed on a sim, the whole thing is just incredibly useful. In real life I've spun about three times in 15 years of racing, but today when Adrian suggested trying something new I spun about three times in ten minutes trying it, which is the beauty of sims - you can spin and crash without obliterating your season's budget. To be honest, I can't even lock up under braking in real life because I usually nurse two sets of slicks through a whole season hehe With a sim, you can do all of that without it mattering one jot, which means you can concentrate 100% on Adrian's instruction and exploring different techniques.

What I should swiftly emphasise at this point, having compared Pro Sim to a home setup, is the significant distinction between Pro Sim and a sim at home on your PC. For starters, the tyre model and other aspects are taken from, and validated against, real life data. Adrian has humbly mentioned on this thread that he uses RFactor; but to his credit, as far as I know, so do most pro-level sims, including many F1 sims, so that should not be taken as a negative. Secondly, on the hardware side, you are sat in a real single seater tub (F3000) using the same muscles and actions you'd use to drive a real racing car, and with the huge wrap around screen, seeing the same thing you'd see in a real racing car. I didn't examine the physical setup in detail, but for example I did notice straight away that the braking was measured not by a potentiometer on a sprung brake pedal (like a home sim on a PC), but by pressure sensors connected to actual brake calipers, presumably running off a real hydraulic braking circuit. I genuinely felt like I was in a real single seater for every lap I drove. One thing I thought I'd get really badly was motion sickness, as this limits me on PC sims to stints of about 20-30 minutes with an hour's break afterwards, but strangely I didn't get any at all at Pro Sim.

Lastly, but definitely not least, I should mention Adrian. He's a very capable but humble and also friendly instructor who's also obviously at the sharp end of top level competition and with a huge depth of knowledge that a club racer like me can only hope to scratch the surface of. The instruction is certainly very different to most ARDS instructors that I've sat with, and more akin to the Rob Wilson or Mark Hales style of driver coaching. That alone is worth the trip I'd say.

As for what I personally got out of it: I am now confident that I'm not going to crash attempting to brake with my left foot for the first time in my new car next month; I've learnt techniques applicable to a modern slicks and wings car, rather than the hairy historics with no grip and big V8s that I enjoy driving on PC sims (big visually obvious slip angles make sims easier because your only feedback is visual) or the heavy road cars I obviously drive every day; I've learnt how to use a sequential shift, something I've never done before as I've always raced stick shift manuals; I've also had a first look at the world of datalogging and understanding the small details of what I do with my feet and hands in a racing car; and lastly, I hope I've got faster wink oh, and how could I forget - it was fun!

So, to sum up, at Pro Sim you're getting expert one-to-one tuition using datalogging in a lab type environment where you can try anything without expensive ramifications, for a budget that I feel fits in with a club racer's annual budget just fine. Highly recommended.

Edited by RobM77 on Sunday 7th February 17:25

andy97

4,691 posts

221 months

Sunday 7th February 2016
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How much did your 2 hour session cost?

RobM77

35,349 posts

233 months

Sunday 7th February 2016
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andy97 said:
How much did your 2 hour session cost?
YHM