Analyze your tires

[Blackout]

If LFS is going to be realistic some day we need to get rid of that F9 option where you can see how the tires are doing. Turning off all the unrealistic options, the uber-realistic mode like someone could say.


What Im suggesting is that when you pit you could examine your tires you used, one by one you could rotate them around with your mouse (similar to F9 could be there) see how many flatspots you really did make. There would be offcourse temperatures and pressure. Would add some realism, you could exam your tires in the pits...you should take them off the car but yeah. Did someone understand what I mean? And what do you think...if you did understand/do thinking :D

edit. And offcourse if/when visible tire wear is modelled you could see flatspots.

[bobvanvliet]

True.

For the lesser cars at least, but wouldn't a car like the FO8 already have some sort of telemetry system? Then the F-menus could be seen as a replacement for the pitcrew telling you stuff.

[Blackout]

Well I think even the F1 wizards cant see the tire temperatures when car is moving, this is about tires, and if you really would crash FO8 or an F1 you would feel it and wouldnt need someone to show it to you or tell it that your suspension is damaged :P

[axus]

Fair enough, I think... +1

[Becky Rose]

Enable visual effects on the tyres before disabling it though - the most valuable information I get on the state of my tyres and the pressures on my kart is by looking at those two little front wheels spinning away mercilessly, you can tell if the pressures are right in an instant by looking whilst you are driving, but in LFS the tyre guage gives you less of the vital information that can be used to change things. LFS doesnt have any indication of wear though, it would be nice to bring a tyre into the pits and check how worn out it was.

[colcob]

LFS doesnt have any indication of wear though, it would be nice to bring a tyre into the pits and check how worn out it was.

You've obviously not stayed out long enough :). The thick line showing the temperature in the F9 view gets thinner and thinner as the tire gets worn.

[Becky Rose]

That's interesting, i'm going to have to look on my next long run. Thank you.

[Viper93]

Yep they go thinner and thinner, until the tire pops, thats always interesting. Its good to be able to see the tire temps in the game. There comes a point though when you can guess your tire temps. Least I can to an extent, aswell as my buddies in Muroc.

It would be nice to have it for league races. there are drivers out there that check other people's tires going down the straits. Maybe have an option to disable changing camera to other cars while racing also?

[GT Touring]

live pressure and temperature sensore for tyres already exist, pressure monitors are standard in Toyota cars (avalon, lexus brand car...) so you can F9 for pressure (and active pressure may be used in F1 according to Max mosley) so a temperature sensor is simply piggy backs on the pressure apparatus- so F9 can work as a 'real' option, ofcourse it is hyperexpensive to get the reading we get here, and F1 or megacorporate technology, but it exists and in the LFS world all us racers have unlimited budgets for Data aqcuisition, repair cars whenever they break, a flawless pit crew, and zero transportation costs to the tracks, and no fuel price to deal with-

so with given technology IRL we can use F9, just irl we really don't have money to do this to our club race cars, or even semipro, or even pro touring or FIA GT, but some leeway is given, if Sir Richard Branson decided to go racing and had this installed, no one we think it unreal, he has the money to hook up any elctrics and sensors he wants. Now tele pitting should go
they should havea towtruck come rescue you and cause a local yellow, and pull you onto track and you have to limp to the pits...

[Hyperactive]

Automatic tire pressure "visual information show unit-system" isn't anything new but if you can check your tire temperatures while driving is totally something new. I remember seeing something like this that the tires had some kind of radio transmitters and "probes" but they were there to see how much tread there is left (not for the temperatures). And the tire pressure watching thingie was invented because many people don't check their tire pressures at all.

All in all, in real life money is the limiter. This should be the case in LFS as well. UF1 and all the modern telemetry available lol :)

EDIT: I am not saying that there should be some kind of money system in LFS. Just common sense on some things like this.

[Dygear]

It think that was only going to be in the alpha and beta, to help the devs along with the work on the tires. I could of gotten the wrong empression tho.

[bobvanvliet]

Although I'm all for realism, I'd really miss it when endu-testing :D :tilt:.

Not to mention the "jeez, that's some harcore sim"-factor when you show these parts of the game to friends. :smileypul

Nevertheless I still think restricting the readout to certain cars and only in the pits would be a Good Thing. :thumb:

[Vain]

I also think that the F9-menus add a lot of trust into the physical depth of LFS. If F9 wasn't there we wouldn't see the simulation-data and most of the users would fail to even notice this feature.
So what to do?
My suggestion is a serverside sim-mode that disables F9, F10, resetting and most camera-positions. But if every server-side option was included that is suggested on these forums the manual for the dedicated server would be like 20 pages long. ;)

Vain

[Gimpster]

Accualy they do now have real time tire telemetry. You can even buy systems for your personal car. Now I just need to find the link again.

Ok here it is...
http://www.smartire.com/index.html
Only monitors Temp and Pressure.

External/Surface Temp and Tred Depth can be monitored with other sensors.

[CH33TAH]

+1

Awesome idea. Not only that, but show what kind of damage (if any) is also on the tire. Roll over wear as well as flatspots. Again, very awesome idea

[ORION]

I like it as its now, because it allows the user to see what is actually going on, not like in all the other "simulations" where the whole behaviour seems mostly random.

[oophus]

No, the F9 option must be there. Thats becouse in real life, you would be able to feel the flat spots in the tire in the vibriations in your car when you drive on the track. And therefore know if you have flatspots on your tires or not. Like we know now by pressing F9. And we do that becouse we dont feel the vibrations in the car.

[Michael Denham]

A compromise could be to allow us to view it in replays not live....

[Blackout]

What kind of idiot suggests things like this?

[ajp71]

Good suggestion, but lets get rid of the rotating the tire and looking at it BS. There was a program for GPL that made nice representations of tire wear by showing the contact patch as a 2D object with colour coding.

[Jamexing]

A silly idea. These days, you can get telemetry for just about anything from tire temps to oil pressure to suspension travel... Annyone who follows cutting edge motorsport tech knows. And deleting F9? Welcome to the dark ages where everything was done with trial and error. If you don't like it, there's no obligation to turn it on!

Well, even the average weekend racer could get a set of infrared detectors to guage tire surface pressures these days. TPMS is soon to be compulsory in at least some parts of the USA. To eliminate live telemetry in LFS is like returning to horsedrawn wagons.

[Takumi_Project.d]

doesn't LFS only calculate tyre wear/temp/flatspotting across 3 seperate areas of the tyre anyway?

[Blackout]

Yesyes, but in would be still good to be able to see your last set. With any style, 2d thing sounds excelent. And removing F9 with the roadcars woulnd't be that bad. And flatspot vibrations should me modelled, if they come trought the wheel irl.

[Becky Rose]

doesn't LFS only calculate tyre wear/temp/flatspotting across 3 seperate areas of the tyre anyway?
3 width sections but loads more along the circumferance of the tyre, in all about 96 zones or something like that.

removing F9 with the roadcars woulnd't be that bad. And flatspot vibrations should me modelled, if they come trought the wheel irl.
I will let the devs remove F9 when:

I can see the texture on the tyre change to show my contact patch
I can touch the tyres with a guage to feel how hot they are in any section
I can inspect the full roll of the tyre and see blisters
I can measure the tell-tales for wear

Because with no budget for the fancy sensors you despite at all these two methods are what I use to setup my go kart - and it's what you would do in racing without those fancy tools ... but until LFS can give me those things I need an alternative to find out the same information because regardless of class tyre wear and contact patch are vitally important settings - we tend to think of contact patch as temperature in LFS as they are side effects of each other, but when you are racing the contact patch is clearly visible on the tyre as a mcuh darker area of tyre.

[Jamexing]

I understand your point, Becky Rose. However, RL sensorless analysis methods are currently impossible to implement in LFS, so F9 remains a required fearture. Well, even the notoriously low tech NASCARS running TPMS, both for setup and safety reasons(imagine blowouts at 200mph! NOT FUN). Besides, anyone with any genuine aspirations (and budgets) for racetrack success would definitely spend on all useful sensors allowed by the racing rules.

Conclusion: F9 removal gets -infinity from me.

And Becky, there are all sorts of sensorless and effective RL tire analysis methods that will take us too much time and trouble to explain.

[Blackout]

But before S2 I think there was talk that F9 would be disabled in races, is it realistic to see the thickness of the tire middle of the race? Specially in the roadcars. And I think adding a featrure where you could see your last set like in F9, and roll the tires so you could avoid measuring temps from your flatspots would be good to have in the pits. It does not need removal of F9 in game. You should pretty much ignore the 1st post, I think thats one of those visions you get middle of the night when you can't sleep.

[Becky Rose]

And Becky, there are all sorts of sensorless and effective RL tire analysis methods that will take us too much time and trouble to explain.
Is there a way to tell if your flatspotted?

A problem I had once is my brother flatspotted a set of tyres and when I took over (I do endurance) the vibrations where so sickening I was having trouble keeping my lunch down let alone be competetive. Unfortunately my brother denied all knowledge of ever having made a mistake, like his hand scrubbing of the tyres (likely where the flatspot came from), and said it was just the brand of tyre (he didn't like them) and made me start the next race with the same problem too.

In F1 flatspots seem to show up more with that tell-tale dark line, but I couldn't see anything like that when it happened to me. It occurs to me that a subtle flatspot isn't that hard to spot on the surface of a tyre - but the effects are still quite catastrophic and produce more vibration than a pair of AA batteries, so any tips you have of spotting flatspots would be greatly appreciated ! :)

Having experienced it I think LFS is not really right in not having the effects of a flatspot travel through the steering arm, there is perpetual vibration throughout the vehicle and the wheel isn't necessarily vibrating in sync to the rest of the chasis.

Racing is a bit like strapping a jet engine to a dart, sitting on the dart, and lighting the blue touch paper. Racing with a flatspot is a bit like strapping a jet engine to a vibrator, sitting on the ....

[Blackout]

So was this in a kart or in a bigger car?

It would be nice to see better flatspot modelling/simulation. The flatspots lock up nicely at the moment and eventually can lead to blowing up your tire but you cant really feel it. So before devs can even consider removing F9 from races, there should be a way feeling them trought the wheel. But from what you said....wouldn't it be guite bad for FFB (or should we just get ourself jet powered vibrators? :p)? And do they effect in handling in other ways than that the tires lock up more easily?

[Jamexing]

Unfrotunately, without looking and touching the tire you said about myself, it's rather hard to draw any conclusions. I assume that you felt a vibration through your steering that gets faster with increasing speed, since frequency of tire rotation increases with speed. I also assumed that you weren't just feeling road surface induced vibration if it is as extreme as you claim. And you don't need a go kart direct steering system to feel the vibrations. In road cars, the flat spot would be particularly obvious at certain speeds due to resonance, though the exact frequency is very case dependant.

Well, IRL, flat spot induced vibrations tend to show up very well even for road cars. The reason flatpots are obvious is the fact that they cause tires to get out of round, so a flat spoted car basically sxperiences a constant rise and fall cycle that's speed dependent.

[ayrton senna 87]

Is there a way to tell if your flatspotted?

A problem I had once is my brother flatspotted a set of tyres and when I took over (I do endurance) the vibrations where so sickening I was having trouble keeping my lunch down let alone be competetive. Unfortunately my brother denied all knowledge of ever having made a mistake, like his hand scrubbing of the tyres (likely where the flatspot came from), and said it was just the brand of tyre (he didn't like them) and made me start the next race with the same problem too.


i thought u raced karts?

when i drive my kart i come FLYING into the pits and do a huge lock up for 10 or 20m as to not oil my engine up, and i never feel the flatspots, and this is with tyres so soft that get so hot that it hurts to touch them after a session.
http://www.karting1.co.uk/karting-lockups.htm
i bet this lot above didnt have trouble 'holding their lunch down' and they are a bit faster than a 55mph pro kart!

and on a pro kart the tyres are so hard that even if u skidded them 5 times on the same spot i doubt u could feel it...



I love the idea of removing F9, its simply not possible to tell the temps from computer as u drive. i bet even the mechs in F1 cant tell the tyre temps. When teams do tyre testing, they have a big stick with heat sensors on that goes over the tyre.

[Becky Rose]

I assume that you felt a vibration through your steering that gets faster with increasing speed
Well i've only done two race stints (~1hr each) and a practice session with a flatspot so i'm hardly experienced in the matter, and yes karts have direct link steering so it may be different for cars - i'm just not prepared to trash tyres for experimentation! :) From recollection I dont think it got any better or worse at different speeds though, it was just on like one of those Gillette razors with the button held down. EDIT: Perhaps at very low speed, but the speed of racing ensured that the vibration was well and truly in it's pitch range.

In FF terms I dont think it would need to be strong, for example I didnt feel that my hands where being controlled by the vibration of the wheel, but certainly holding the wheel steady was a lot more work. A USB vibrator build into the chair would also be a good simulation aid, as the chasis vibration was the most extreme part and is what made me feel so sick driving it.

[Captain Slow]

A USB vibrator build into the chair would also be a good simulation aid

erm, excuse me? :D

[Jakg]

you should of seen that coming becky...

[Captain Slow]

lol dont worry i jus couldnt help makin a comment on it.

[Breizh]

Tire temperature can be monitored realtime. See Gimpster's post.
I've seen raceday MGP or AMA bikes fitted with laser thermometers pointed at the tires.

[Blackout]

Orly? But do you fit them in to your UF?

[ayrton senna 87]

to say u can get flatspots on karts is rediculous

[Breizh]

Blackout: why not? You're in a club that meets 24/7 on tens of different track configurations, totaling 2,120,866 laps from all its members. Considering the amount of fuel and tires used, yeah, it's a worthwhile expense.

While I agree it's not much use in practice, I don't see why it should be altogether forbidden either.

[Becky Rose]

to say u can get flatspots on karts is rediculous
Not out of habbit no, thank god. It can happen though, as I mentioned previously I think the most likely cause was actually my brother's insistence on hand scrubbing the tyres, rather than during an actual lock up. Different cause, same effect.

[micha1980de]

I'm not that familiar with "your" kart models.
I've only seen and used these low end "free-time" 3, 5, 7bhp karts.
But these have rear brakes only, may be different from the karts you use.

regards