Thanks for the more fleshed out posts on the simulators. I'm gonna start putting more time into GT6 - sports medium tires only (or harder)...

 

After playing gt4 and gt5 for a couple years, I tried iracing. Think I got into all of 2 sessions before becoming too annoyed to continue. Calibration issues with steering wheel and just a very weird feel, or should I say lack of feel... Even after the wheel issues were supposedly worked out. Guess it depends on the totality of your setup. Maybe I should have given it more chances. Or maybe it doesn't like Macs. I don't know. But I wasn't impressed.

 

There's a lot to iRacing including the steering wheel settings and car setup. Apparently the off the shelf settings of the car can be greatly improved and there are tons of forums out there with recommendations for car setups. I have not dug that deep yet, but rather use it to practice race tracks before I go there in the IMSA CTSCC series.

It can be frustrating at first, but with methodical practice and not letting the car yaw/oversteer (to cause it to spin), it can be a very helpful tool to make you a better driver.

 

I'm attending a seminar tomorrow on advance data analysis, and have been thinking it would be need to start using data in iRacing to help improve my times. Perhaps this would be a good way to practice data analysis in the offseason. I haven't searched a whole lot yet, but I believe there are some iOS apps that can integrate with iRacing for this.

Billy, do you use any of these, do you recommend anything, or do you know of any that are compatible with AIM Studio?

Also, want to start converting replys to post online, but seems like the only option is video capture programs, would be really nice to have a quick and easy conversion!

 

If you have not tried iRacing recently, it may be worth another go; the tire model and physics are updated every couple months, and most of the comments I've read in here are not applicable anymore. The difficulty in controlling oversteer, in particular, has been eliminated - slides seem to be about as difficult to control as a slide on r compounds would be in real life, and are much more predictable than in previous iterations. The cars feel much, much better than even a year ago.

Steering feel is greatly affected by improper wheel setup, but there is a wealth of knowledge on the forums on the topic. Mac OSX does not support Logitech wheels well, however - users must choose between 900° steering or force feedback. A better option would be to Bootcamp Windows.

iRacing does support various data acquisition programs. Personally, I use iSpeed for driving feedback, and McLaren's ATLAS software for chassis setup. MoTeC's software is also supported.

iRacing's laser scanned tracks, chassis physics and solid online racing are what first attracted me to the sim, and the ongoing updates keep me interested.

Oh, and great article, Mr. Johnson! Thanks for taking the time to put these together.

 

Thanks Billy, agreed regarding the comparison to real life driving and the fundamental approach to the technique required to drive on rcomp tires and cars with aero, and I have had similar experiences (gee, if I put down 500hp at corner exit in real life in a big aero race car, why can't I put power down in a 350hp i-racing car? ) Though I don't have the credentials on my resume to say I have driven a 650hp nationwide car. Kudos to you, that's pretty awesome haha. Please, call me Nick though

I do want to comment on one of your statements for anyone reading this thread:

I would be very cautious about making the statement that iracing is "probably a lot more advanced than GT" when "driving up to the limit." Gran Turismo simulator development began in 1992, with its first production release for Playstation in 1997. The original designer, Kazonouri Yamouchi still leads the company and development of the simulator, now over 20 years in the making, with some brilliant software and race engineers feeding in to its testing and development. Development began about 10 years before the designer of iracing began on the sim in the early 2000's, though they drew from previous experience in other sims I believe. Kazonouri himself is a long time real life racer, competing in notable european and japanese professional endurance series. The company is also directly involved with global professional motorsport and pulls that experience in to the design of their simulator. Although I won't go in to the specific differences of the simulators that I am aware of (specifically exactly what each of the engines models and what it doesn't) I can assure anyone reading this that both physics engines utilize chassis and tire models that are very advanced (even purchased by companies in the automotive industry to aid in their design of components). With the release of PS4, and Polyphony's ability to now utilize a much more powerful hardware platform, you could expect a physics engine that may not be rivaled by any commercially available simulator with the release of GT7. Not trying to be a GT fan boy, and I also am not criticizing I-racing too much (and as expected it seems the community is giving great feedback on their recent iterations.) But I just don't want this thread to position the Gran Turismo series as sub-par to I-racing from the persective of being a legitimate, advanced driving simulator and powerful tool to improve real life driving skills with. The *racing simulator* portion of i-racing (organized competitive environment) and its modeling of the tracks is what i-racing unquestionably does better, that has been their focus in their market - but GT is not too far behind, and there are many other things GT does better. Again, each sim has their strengths and weaknesses and I would recommend both as a great tool for learning, but would recommend doing research to decide what is best for their interests and budget.

I will try and pool some facts based on my online resources to give you a comparison of the comprehensiveness and general architecture of each of their physics engines/ chassis and tire modeling. Some things you could model (like airflow and variable downforce at each corner of the car based on speed and yaw angle) could be modeled extremely accurately utilizing a CFD model. But this is extremely memory and processor intensive. You could get 95% of the accuracy of that using simpler calculations and approximations, with a LOT less pull from system memory that could be better utilized in other areas. This is an example of the kind of differences you might see in each model. (Note that I don't believe either sim really models simulated "air flow over the cars body" but you get the idea.)

 

Good stuff Billy.

I've been doing performance driving and sim racing since around 2000. Nothing to the level of yourself, but probably is a little more than the average HPDE driver.

What I've seen over the years with sims is that they all have some issues no matter how good they are.. However, it depends on the intent of the sim driver as to how useful it is for a tool. i.e. if your goal is the beat other sim racers, you'll likely find out how to be "fast" in the sim rather than focusing on real world concepts... If you focus on real world concepts but in the virtual world, then you'll likely be a little slower than those exploiting the sim nuances but it makes translating those skills to the real world easier.

As far as the Grand Turismo series, it is true that the Grand Turismo engine (in some shape) has been used as a basis for some professional sim rigs in the past. However, similar to ISI's professional offering rFactor Pro, it's not 'exactly' the same thing we get as consumers. Even then, the best sim racing engines can be hampered by controllers. Let's face it, the GT series is designed around people playing with gamepads. I've been involved with Project CARS on the PC for the last few years and it's been enlightening seeing what goes into creating a tire model (let alone the chassis, aero, and suspension simulations). Today, we just don't have the processing power to do all of these things well in real time with all the bells and whistles (i.e. graphics, sound, etc) at an affordable level. With that, pretty much all consumer based "racing sims" have their limitations. As a consumer, you just have to determine what your goals are and and use it in a manner that will aid your goals.

I will say, I'm not a huge fan of iRacing but it's gotten better. I signed up right at the end of their beta period (around summer 2008) but have only done a total of 30 official races. I have a Class A road license but iRacing is just not something I enjoy so I rarely use it. iRacing's biggest lure is their multiplayer structure. If you are into online racing, there is nothing better at the moment than iRacing's structure for public racing. If you have the time and can do private league racing (whether with iRacing or any other sim), that will be the best experience you'll have but it's tough to find a league which uses cars/tracks you like and a date/time which matches your schedule.

I do believe sim racing is useful when being used in a useful manner. I do believe it's hurtful when not used in the correct manner for real life training. I can't count the number of students who have said "I don't understand why this is so hard! I'm so good at Grand Turismo". I'm not trying to knock GT, but that seems to be what I hear the most.

I do think the tire models of the upcoming PC sims are better than iRacing (rFactor 2, Assetto Corsa, Project CARS). Granted, iRacing continues to improve theirs but I think the next crop of PC sims have a pretty large step up on what iRacing is currently delivering in that specific department. If you are a sim racer, 2015 looks to be a great year with those three sims becoming officially released. If you aren't a sim racer, I highly encourage you to consider getting into next year.


http://www.wmdportal.com/projectnews...del/#more-6739

You can see some videos of professional race driver Rene Rast doing some practicing on his sim rig:

https://www.youtube.com/user/RastRene/videos

 

It's not a knock on GT, it's a knock on the ignorance of novice drivers (especially at HPDE's) to think that driving around in ANY sim (probably with a controller and all of the driving aids on with racing soft tires) equates to an experience that directly translates to driving on the limit in real life. As an instructor I'm sure you have heard far more retarded words and assumptions come out of your students mouths. I think the fact that you hear "I play GT, why is this so hard?" is just because GT is the most widely played video game sim, and therefore affecting the largest population of novices. It has nothing to do with the effectiveness or accuracy of the sim itself. Like you say, when used properly, it's a fantastic training tool.