AC GT3 @ Red Bull Ring - Sunday 10th July 2022

[RasmusP]

My MoTeC is 1.0.21.003, I have just downloaded the latest version, your archive only seems to work with the latest MoTeC version.
i like your workspace

Thanks for the feedback! I only remembered some "conversion" back then.
It makes sense that this is only doable in one direction as the older version can't know how to handle a newer workspace model without a patch.
I guess motec doesn't provide compatibility patches for older versions, when you can download the new version for free

My workspace is a bit of a mess. I tested different things over the years and never really cleaned it up again so you'll find random stuff that doesn't make sense in there hehe

The driver section is pretty well sorted though. I mainly use either the first tab with the telemetry or the one with the big driving line map to compare the lines in detail.

 

[JoelK]

Didn't want to put the questions into my long story post...

Would you share the worksheet with us or did you or the creator put too much work in to share it with anyone?
I got some worksheets and had a play with all kinds of stuff on my own but I'd be very interested to have a look at how others do it!
Maybe I could fix the channels and math for AC and send it back to you at the end of my holidays

Would you or @JoelK be willing to post a mini-crash-course for us about how to read the data and what to do?
Not really about the knowledge you'd get from engineering books. More like what actually means what.
Only the AC specific stuff...
Like what ride height value actually means the floor touching the tarmac and what the toe values translate to.
Edit: like with camber, where 0° doesn't mean the tyre being vertically but instead you have this weird equation of body roll angle and camber angle relative to the chassis. And then in AC a vertical tyre not meaning maximum grip but instead you have another equation that determines the "perfect angle" that you can't see in motec but have to use a live session and camber extravaganza...

Examples:
Looking at a lap I did during some holidays in March 2021 after a Donington Race where I practiced and worked on my setup until I would've gotten pole in that race:

Do you guys spot anything that looks "wrong" instantly? I gave up looking for info on this after some point and concentrated on having fun and getting a better driver.. But the itch is there!

View attachment 581531
View attachment 581532
View attachment 581533

And since you should always give something when asking for something:
Setup is attached, MoTeC file is in my dropbox:

Dropbox

www.dropbox.com

First thing what I always check is the damper histogram, and how I've understood it is that:

1. It needs to be somewhat symmetrical (''In a theoretically ideal setup, the high-speed compression and rebound numbers are identical, and the low-speed compression and rebound numbers are identical.'')

2. Is to graph too peak-y or not ?

(you get the point )

In AC, from my experience, you just gotta find the ratio where the dampers work nicely together. Then when you wanna adjust, for example the rear rebound, then you adjust the bump accordingly.

(I've always found best having bump 1-3 clicks lower than the rebound at the rear, front can sometimes be the other way around. So when I wanna stiffen the rear rebound 2 clicks and they're 6-8 before, then I'll go for 8-10 or 7-10 and that usually does the job)

For FST dampers same principles apply, usually in AC they're way too soft, so I'll stiffen then up a bunch.

Second thing I check, if the ride height match the settings I've set them at.

Most important thing is the transitions, so do I have way too much front dip on the brakes (can cause either lift-off oversteer or just general under-stability under braking)
or do I have the car squatting (explained in the post above).

Quick fix for the dip is to stiffen the front bump or reduce the front suspension travel to where it kinda rides the bumpstops under braking. Quick fix for the squat is explained above. For F1/LMP1 you can manage these issues by adjusting the heave springs/dampers.

I've still yet to find a way to see where the car bottoms out completely through telemetry and for that I've always went by feeling it. Maybe @Enzo Fazzi has solution for this.

For the Toe settings, I only check if they're roughly where I set them at.

If you have a soft car it can affect especially the front toe at the straights when front is lifting up a bit, so then that causes the front negative toe to increasing a bit.
This can affect (very) minimally to top speed, and fixing this issue can ruin the balance of the car elsewhere, so generally my advice is to not pay attention to it.
I just want to have the rear toe where I want it, and it doesn't fluctuate as much as the front does. Little increase/decrease in the rear also affects the handling way more than the front toe, so that's why I focus more on that (and It's a lot easier to check)

But yeah, as a big disclaimer: I'm in no means an engineer or try to pretend like one, these are just things I've learned over the years by reading some stuff, watching some videos and talking to people who have invested more time into learning these things more properly than I've did (Like Tariq for example, that dude is a walking engineering book even though he also isn't a mechanical engineer).
Take everything I say with a grain of salt.

 

[Kek700]

I know this is a pretty much pointless statement, I much prefer bar chart for the damper settings.
Just changed it, it gives a better instantaneous view rather than the average bell graph, I can see better where there is an instantaneous effect.
I lower the individual bars to 3.
Now if it is just a placebo, I would not be surprised.

When I have time I intended to clarify what is what in AC and MoTeC with respect to my most used cars.

I am under the illusion at present that toe really works, I say that because I noticed that you run positive toe with the Nissan, I run negative, it helps with the initial understeer on some higher radius corner entry
I will also do a lap of Donington, so I can compare apples to apples.

On second thoughts will run the 911, needed some tweaks, but managed a 27-0.2
which is a miracle for me, soft too, not really any worse for me than most mid-engined cars.

Dropbox - File Deleted - Simplify your life

www.dropbox.com

Dropbox - File Deleted - Simplify your life

www.dropbox.com

So far I just look for suspension travel and check for bottoming out. not sure about the rear and rake and bump stops, I have a feeling that is immaterial for AC, but who knows??

I use the bump stops to help with that on gt3 cars, I look at travel, give myself a tolerance then lower front bump stops, hopefully, it matches,
front minimum travel 8 mm left, I then put in 40mm of bump stop.
(911)

My Disclaimer is your disclaimer Joel, I am a learner, not a knower.
I have always learnt more by being wrong, thinking you are right is a big hindrance.

PS
just had a really good look at your work sheet, more comprehensive, with a lot more useful detail. Thankyou.

 

[HF2000]

Ok. This looks all very interesting. I never used ACTI/Motec and I haven't got a clue how.
But are we talking about a gain of say 0.2s or could this really help me to get Ernie who is about 0,5 - 0,8s quicker on average?

EDIT: Ernie, don't bother to answer. I won't believe you.

 

[JoelK]

Ok. This looks all very interesting. I never used ACTI/Motec and I haven't got a clue how.
But are we talking about a gain of say 0.2s or could this really help me to get Ernie who is about 0,5 - 0,8s quicker on average?

EDIT: Ernie, don't bother to answer. I won't believe you.

For me, dampers(and the rest of the settings) is all about setting car to be comfortable, being able to push to your limits comfortably lap after lap like Rasmus said earlier.

If car feels good to you, with a setup that's feels fine, there's not much to gained diving into Motec trying to find the Pandora's box. Most times it just goes worse by changing things for the sake of changing things.

Usually when a setup feels nice, then the telemetry just confirms it.

But of course there's little to gained even when the car feels nice, for example by stalling the car on the straight and that way reducing drag, but that can gain (at best) maybe 0.05-0.1s.

 

[RasmusP]

But are we talking about a gain of say 0.2s or could this really help me to get Ernie who is about 0,5 - 0,8s quicker on average?

The setup stuff isn't the most important if you're already comfortable with the car from my experience.
If you can push a bad setup to its limit, a good setup will often only give a few tenths.

It can really help if the car feels bad and you have no idea where to start though.

I personally don't really use motec for setup (yet).
I mostly use it to compare driver inputs!

The issue with this is that you either need to have have some faster mini-sectors in your own laps or have a faster lap from someone else with the same car or better, same setup.

That's why I'm very happy to pay for the coach dave stuff for acc. It's not about the setups, it's about the telemetry I get with them.

So if Ernie would send you his telemetry, you could efficiently fix the parts where you're losing the time.


Back when I started to use motec, I got my benchmark laps from Matteo Caruso. Some of you might still know him.
The great thing about AC is that the game GPS coordinates are stored in the telemetry so you can compare the driving line together with the inputs down to the millimetres!
(ACC sadly doesn't have GPS coordinates)

I remember being extremely frustrated from the BMW 235i, which we used for some rookie races.
I couldn't feel the car, I didn't get faster and he was 3s quicker than me.
Luckily he had the time to help me out. I helped him with learning about setups and computer stuff

Anyway, by the 3rd week I got 2s faster in that car! Replays didn't really show what I was doing wrong but in motec it got very clear and I could improve corner by corner until I was a lot faster!
At the next track, I didn't have to go through all of that again. I already learnt how to drive that car and the telemetry only got me 1s quicker, not 3s.


I would always be up for sharing my data with anyone of you! Setups with anyone of the regulars.
For me, these clubraces are about battling with as many drivers as possible, preferably over the whole race duration.

If we are all more comfortable with the setup and do similar things with the wheel and pedals, we probably end up having better fights on the track instead of widening any pace gaps


One thing though:
On tracks with a lot of full throttle parts, the setup can make a way bigger difference. Or when you can go across kerbs a lot better.
Tracks for that would be monza, brands hatch and nordschleife.

 

[Kek700]

Beware….

The below is mostly pointless waffling

Great words Rasmus, I totally agree, I can never be an alien, for me setup’s for are really just away of getting a 100% from 90%, that’s it in nutshell.

I use MoTeC a lot, if that makes any difference, I would not know.

Areas I have problems with are fast damping, slow damping I can utilise..
I have never been able to make a car ride kerbs and bumps, at least not without using springs slow dampers and Arb, these then totally mess the car up for the rest of the circuit.

Rake, not happy with that, apart from what Joel said about stalling, this I know works, if rake make much difference,I have my doubts.

Some things may be only noticeable to aliens, where they just make those extra 1 or 2 mph, right at the limit we’re that extra bit of down force tells. An area that “alien” to me.

Generally speaking I can find, with a setup, assuming a car physically allows that, a way of sorting out the problems, that cause me problems.

I never thought I would be able to lap at my competitive pace a 911 on softs, which I now can. If you put your mind to it there is enough adjustment in some cars to solve most problems, unfortunately not eliminate them entirely.

The rest of the setup parameters are a bit confusing sometimes as to their importance, negative toe in one car at one circuit produces very positive results, another car, no effect.

I use all parameters, but I think it would be much easier with a very good driver, and not me, I could then change parameters to a very consistent driver with out any placebo effect or my improvement as I lap masking the whole process.

Often, I have gone 1 second quicker in setup and practice combined, only to find on race day I have lost 1 second. I know exactly why, I have forgotten my learnt lines from the previous few days.

I am hoping I learn some more tools from this process, there must be tons of information available if only you know where, how and why. I have discovered much so far. Probably just the tip of the iceberg.

The end of waffling.

 

[RasmusP]

Thanks to Joel and Ernie for the "waffling" hehe.
I'll get more into this again from next week onwards!

For Han a little example of how I use Motec for getting faster now that I'm back at the PC.

This is a full lap around Barcelona in ACC. Coach Dave Lap is coloured, I'm white. And yes, I'm solid 2 seconds slower

As you can see, I'm already losing 0.5s in the first 3 flowing turns. I've marked the most important bits that you can easily spot from looking at the full lap. Speed difference is quite massive, throttle applications is very different and I'm steering too much or at the wrong time.

And here's a detail view:
That's the righthand 90° before the hairpin. I'm way too late on the throttle and I'm also giving it some weird short throttle push at the entry.
CDA's throttle spike is the downshift-blip. I was faster when clipping the limiter in 3rd for a moment instead of upshifting and instantly downshifting again.
I'm also very slightly braking at the entry...

Anyway, this results in a 14.4 km/h difference at the exit and therefore another 4 tenths lost down the straight...

For some weird reason CDA is touching the brakes by about 5% mid corner. I'm not sure if that's actually planned...

Now I would note down "NO braking, NO little throttle pushes, WAY earlier back on throttle! Adjust steering and line until it works".

That's the nice thing about simracing. You can just try to do the same as the faster driver and if you flip into the barrier, no one cares

 

[JoelK]

Thanks to Joel and Ernie for the "waffling" hehe.
I'll get more into this again from next week onwards!

For Han a little example of how I use Motec for getting faster now that I'm back at the PC.

This is a full lap around Barcelona in ACC. Coach Dave Lap is coloured, I'm white. And yes, I'm solid 2 seconds slower

As you can see, I'm already losing 0.5s in the first 3 flowing turns. I've marked the most important bits that you can easily spot from looking at the full lap. Speed difference is quite massive, throttle applications is very different and I'm steering too much or at the wrong time.

View attachment 581771

And here's a detail view:
That's the righthand 90° before the hairpin. I'm way too late on the throttle and I'm also giving it some weird short throttle push at the entry.
CDA's throttle spike is the downshift-blip. I was faster when clipping the limiter in 3rd for a moment instead of upshifting and instantly downshifting again.
I'm also very slightly braking at the entry...

Anyway, this results in a 14.4 km/h difference at the exit and therefore another 4 tenths lost down the straight...

For some weird reason CDA is touching the brakes by about 5% mid corner. I'm not sure if that's actually planned...

Now I would note down "NO braking, NO little throttle pushes, WAY earlier back on throttle! Adjust steering and line until it works".View attachment 581772

That's the nice thing about simracing. You can just try to do the same as the faster driver and if you flip into the barrier, no one cares

These for sure interesting comparisons, and really teaches you fast where the critical mistakes are made

I would (almost) pay big money for Dimitri's telemetry from sunday to figure out where I lost that 4 tenths in the last sector, when the other sectors were maybe at most a tenth apart...

 

[Kek700]

Sorry to waffle on again, I had exactly the same with the Bentley, got a setup from Dave with telemetry. Managed 1-42 -0.2 in the Bentley, about a second off, which I was happy with.
Had exactly the same problem, I will say , cannot remember, but it was funnily about 14 km/h at the exit of turn 1 at Imola, for the life of me I could not understand why.
I even did a kamikaze for turn 1 , and I still never got anywhere that speed, at that point I gave up with ACC.
Thought I would just say in support of your statement above.

 

[RasmusP]

I would (almost) pay big money for Dimitri's telemetry from sunday to figure out where I lost that 4 tenths in the last sector, when the other sectors were maybe at most a tenth apart...

Haha yeah me too!! Or for one of the world record laps from Chris in the McLaren!

I had exactly the same with the Bentley, got a setup from Dave with telemetry. Managed 1-42 -0.2 in the Bentley, about a second off, which I was happy with.
Had exactly the same problem, I will say , cannot remember, but it was funnily about 14 km/h at the exit of turn 1 at Imola, for the life of me I could not understand why.
I even did a kamikaze for turn 1 , and I still never got anywhere that speed, at that point I gave up with ACC.

Yeah it describes it very well
I double checked that the ACC version and conditions were identical. Sadly they were...
But you know, looking at the pace and consistency of the top 8 from the ACC club, the Coach Dave stuff made me battle for the top positions within a few weeks when I was nowhere without it.
I just had a quick look at SGP and your 1-42.2 would've been pole position in the ACC race in April 2021. So no reason to give up with ACC

 

[The Almighty Snark]

I've gone so wrong with setups before haha! Didn't know you could glance this much info from MoTeC!

Maybe we should continue this discussion in the Mugello thread so that we all can apply our data on the upcoming race?

 

[JamKart22]

Anyone have any idea why my track report seems out of sync with the data? The image shows the redbull ring but the braking points don't match up. I used Rasmus's workspace but it's the same in the workspace that comes with the acti pack. Lap data is here. Cheers

 

[Kek700]

had the exactly same problem, that is why I never use the track map for anything but a rough guide.
I think I asked Rasmus that same question a while back

 

[JamKart22]

Another dumb question but I can't seem to find a way to save a workspace that contains my data. If I "save as" another workspace then it just loads empty. Is there a save project that I'm missing somewhere?

 

[RasmusP]

Anyone have any idea why my track report seems out of sync with the data? The image shows the redbull ring but the braking points don't match up. I used Rasmus's workspace but it's the same in the workspace that comes with the acti pack. Lap data is here. Cheers

View attachment 581815

I think I asked Rasmus that same question a while back

Yes I did, luckily I've found out what's the issue by now

You need to right click on the track map -> track editor -> at the bottom left: Generate Track -> Method: Lateral G & Speed

It's set to "GPS" and every time I go there it's set to GPS again, but once you generate it with Lateral G & Speed, it should stay okay for that track forever.

GPS:

Lateral G & Speed:

Btw even with Lateral G & Speed you can have weird errors like a totally deformed track map.
In that case, you need to select a different lap for the generating process!
Here's how it looks when Motec picks a lap that should normally not even in the log since you teleported back to the pits. But due to the pitlane being after the start/finish line, you get a 30s laptime for Spa marked as best lap:

 

[JoelK]

That'll do it

 

[RasmusP]

Another dumb question but I can't seem to find a way to save a workspace that contains my data. If I "save as" another workspace then it just loads empty. Is there a save project that I'm missing somewhere?

View attachment 581821

What do you mean by "containing your data"?
Workspaces and loaded log files are independent from each other.
So you can load the same log file in different workspaces.

What exactly do you want to do?
If you just want to load the last used workspace and keep the loaded log files opened too, then go to:
Tools -> Options -> General:
-> Startup: Load previous Log Files
-> Workspace: Load previous Workspace on Startup

 

[JoelK]

Yes I did, luckily I've found out what's the issue by now

You need to right click on the track map -> track editor -> at the bottom left: Generate Track -> Method: Lateral G & Speed

It's set to "GPS" every time I go there it's set to GPS again, but once you generate it with Lateral G & Speed, it should stay okay for that track forever.

GPS:
View attachment 581819

Lateral G & Speed:
View attachment 581820

Btw even with Lateral G & Speed you can have weird errors like a totally deformed track map.
In that case, you need to select a different lap for the generating process!
Here's how it looks when Motec picks a lap that should normally not even in the log since you teleported back to the pits. But due to the pitlane being after the start/finish line, you get a 30s laptime for Spa marked as best lap:
View attachment 581828

I was too slow

 

[RasmusP]

I was too slow

Your drawing is awesome though