Tire heat model and dirt model.

[Dethred]

The tire heat model is advanced and on the right track but I find myself having to "pussyfoot" a lap every 3-4 laps on the Road Super tires. I am not sure what they are comparable to in real life, but if its a performance radial, or drag radial simulation the tires get too hot too quickly, and don't ease up unless you practically stop for a few minutes.

I have driven several cars at the limit on closed courses and even an autoX, and no matter how hard I push the tires they don't overheat and turn into silly puddy like in LFS.

Heck, my friend's modded LT1 Formula has never gotten to an overheating stage of grip where its almost as bad as having water on the tires. They just seem to go into the red too easily, even with a high pressure setup made to resist the heat buildup. They also lose heat too slowly in my experienced opinion.

Also, the dirt model has the same problem. I spun my dad's GS300 a couple years ago after drifting around a few corners and got the rears in the grass, which was still damp. After a 5-second burnout and one more small slide the tires seemed back to normal. On LFS it seems to take forever and just seems unrealistic.

[AndroidXP]

Well, I don't have any heat problems at all, infact, the more I drift (lol pun) into the "zone" the cooler my tyres and the faster my laptimes get. Why? Because I'm driving much much smoother than normally or especially when trying to "push hard" which again hurts my laptimes more than it helps.

Maybe it's because in RL?™ you feel when the car is going to lose it and automatically drive much smoother than you do in LFS.

[Gunn]

The dirt on the tyres is not so innacurate as you say. But I do agree that Road Supers should be a little tougher.

[tristancliffe]

Because you can't feel the g-forces on the car, and because you cannot hurt yourself, you tend to drive a lot harder than you would in real life.

I rarely have problems with tyre heat - the worst one at the moment is the FOX at SO Town, but I'm sure I'll fix that. I don't even have a problem with the UFR/XFR normally, and they are considered the worst for tyre heat.

Just try driving smoother. You'll be quicker too.

[Woz]

Because you can't feel the g-forces on the car, and because you cannot hurt yourself, you tend to drive a lot harder than you would in real life.

I rarely have problems with tyre heat - the worst one at the moment is the FOX at SO Town, but I'm sure I'll fix that. I don't even have a problem with the UFR/XFR normally, and they are considered the worst for tyre heat.

Just try driving smoother. You'll be quicker too.

Yep its not hard to run a load of laps in the UFR on R2s without going in the red on temps.

Ages ago in RSC people said they couldn't wait for tire temps because many people would over cook their tires because of the way the drive. This is now proving to be true :)

[tristancliffe]

Yet people are now bursting into tears cos 'it's too hard'. That's why God invented NFS

[ColeusRattus]

That's why God invented NFS

I knew it! EA is God! He oughta have stopped all this creating business after seven days, that ol' bugger...

[tristancliffe]

LOL

EA certainly ACT's like God sometimes...

And EA spoke: "Let there be light", and there was. And you could see for bloody miles!

[Dethred]

The tire physics are almost like driving on water with racing wet tires, and with dirt on the tires its like driving on snow for a mile. Not only that but even if the tires are cold they pick up dirt that stays for 20-30 seconds. A simple burn out on any set of tires would rid it of practically all the dirt.

And the tires, with a decent setup that can hang with the best of em' will overheat too fast and not come down soon enough.

PS: Tristan, its not too hard, its too unrealistic. And no you're not the stig.

[tpa]

A simple burn out on any set of tires would rid it of practically all the dirt.



agreed!


And the tires, with a decent setup that can hang with the best of em' will overheat too fast and not come down soon enough.

not agreed!


PS: Tristan, [...] no you're not the stig.

agreed! :D

[AndroidXP]

A simple burn out on any set of tires would rid it of practically all the dirt.I dunno about normals or supers, but the mud/gravel literally sticks to warm slicks like flies on sh*t.

And the tires, with a decent setup that can hang with the best of em' will overheat too fast and not come down soon enough.Just accept that YOU are the reason this happens and that YOUR driving is too poor to race competitively (which means high speed, yet low stress on material) ;)

[Cue-Ball]

I just got done watching two different 20+ lap races with full grids (12+ cars) of GTR cars. Those cars all finished the race without overheating their tires and there were almost no crashes due to "slippery tires" or anything like that.

I think the tires feel pretty realistic once you get a dialed-in setup (not the ones that the game ships with). If your tires are getting too hot you're either over-driving them or your setup needs some work. If they can last 20+ laps in the most powerful cars in the game, then the heat model must not be as extreme as some people here claim.

I would be curious to know how hot the track supposedly is though. Surely even though track temp doesn't change in-game, it must have some sort of effect on the tire temps.

[Gunn]

A simple burn out on any set of tires would rid it of practically all the dirt. Not true. In real life it takes some time for tyres to become clean again. Hot sticky slicks easily pick up stones, grass and dust. Debris becomes buried in the soft tyre, it doesn't just stick to the outside. If it was as easy as doing a simple burnout why can't the best drivers in the world manage to clean their tyres in a few seconds?

[Woz]

The tire physics are almost like driving on water with racing wet tires, and with dirt on the tires its like driving on snow for a mile. Not only that but even if the tires are cold they pick up dirt that stays for 20-30 seconds. A simple burn out on any set of tires would rid it of practically all the dirt.

And the tires, with a decent setup that can hang with the best of em' will overheat too fast and not come down soon enough.

PS: Tristan, its not too hard, its too unrealistic. And no you're not the stig.

You are driving the tires TOO HARD. Pushing into and beyond the slip angle for too long etc. If you ease off a few % they will not overheat. Its very easy to drive too hard in a sim where there is no risk to your live if you crash.

[Dethred]

Not true. In real life it takes some time for tyres to become clean again. Hot sticky slicks easily pick up stones, grass and dust. Debris becomes buried in the soft tyre, it doesn't just stick to the outside. If it was as easy as doing a simple burnout why can't the best drivers in the world manage to clean their tyres in a few seconds?

Because they don't do a burnout? Why don't real world drivers need to take about a lap to clean off the tires? It just seems to take too darn long, even from personal experiences.

And the tire heat... all the cars I have driven (mostly straight line drag races) have required a burn out to heat the tires, and launching withing about 20-30 seconds before they cool down all the way again, and that's on drag radials. Street performance tires usually take forever to overheat and even then its not like driving on an icy road like in LFS.

And when I am racing in LFS I take practically the exact line for each turn without pushing too hard, and they still overheat after 5-6 laps. On real tires you have to practically drift a lap or two to make the tires too hot.

The tires start off way too hot, the Slicks are the temperature of a hot day in the desert.

[sinbad]

Not true. In real life it takes some time for tyres to become clean again. Hot sticky slicks easily pick up stones, grass and dust. Debris becomes buried in the soft tyre, it doesn't just stick to the outside. If it was as easy as doing a simple burnout why can't the best drivers in the world manage to clean their tyres in a few seconds?

Yes, all true, but LFS is not right. In LFS the way the tyres pick up dirt is so uniform, so repetitive, for one thing.
Also, a puff of dust and you are on ice for the next corner, but the dust doesn't come off at a rate relative to the drop off in grip (after all, it's primarily the dust being cleaned off which makes the tyre slip).

Watching the WTCC at Oschers' highlights how over the top the dirt system really is in LFS. They aren't anywhere near as concerned about putting one wheel on the dirt as you HAVE to be in LFS. If those sticky slicks pick up dirt and keep dirt, but still slide on that dirt, in the same way as the tyres do in LFS, I cannot imagine that they would be cutting corners with such precision lap after lap, they'd be losing seconds per lap and position after position.

Not to mention the way that all the tyres in LFS from road to R1supersofthotslick pick up dirt in exactly the same way.

LFS isn't right, some significant changes have to be made, but the ingredients are there.

[Bob Smith]

I'm not particularly concerned about getting dirty tyres. If I'm on slicks in a RWD car then I take it a little easy for a couple of corners, otherwise I can carry on as normal.

I don't see what all the fuss is about.

[tristancliffe]

Same as Bob. Sure they get a bit dirty if you go on the grass for several seconds, but nothing that a bit of patience can't cope with. And touching dirt momentarily in chicanes and corner exits is virtually unoticable.

If anything, I think the tyres don't stay dirty quite long enough at times.

[keiran]

What I suggest is get a hold of a racing kart with soft slicks on it, get them up to temperature and then go off into some gravel. Then you will see just how slippy it is, not only do you get debris on your tyres but they cool down and with the tyre being so hot the debris sticks to the tyre. Slicks are very sticky when hot, my Dad nealed down on my front tyre once when I pitted and ended up with a big patch of rubber stuck to his jeans :razz:

Keiran

[Gunn]

Why don't real world drivers need to take about a lap to clean off the tires? Well they do. Effects would vary between different vehicles and tyre types but it takes several corners to get some grip back and can take a lap or more to return to full grip (using an F1 car with F1 slicks as a real world example). Small stones, grass, paper, dust etc become imbedded in the rubber. Not only in the dirt but also on the dirty tarmac, off the racing line the tyres can pick up debris and lose their effectiveness.

But I agree with Bob Smith here. I often put a wheel (or 4) onto the dirt and manage to regain the tarmac without spinning and without losing much time. Throttle control and smooth steering is required for at least the next several corners (some cars are easier than others to handle, of course). Unless you leave your foot planted on the throttle it is usually quite easy to recover.
I used to struggle with the dirty tyres but it's not really an issue now.

[Chris_Kerry]

In my opinion, it's just common sense. Dirty tires = being conservative for a while.

I don't see the huge fuss with the physics full stop. I know its a simulator and the need to add as much realism as possible but I think we've got an awesome game now to be quite honest.

[sinbad]

I don't think anyone is saying that dirty tyres shouldn't make a difference, and of course if you've been into the gravel you can't just carry on as if nothing happened.
If this is as advanced and accurate as the dirt modelling is going to get though, I'm not well impressed. Watching a car need to brake 30 metres early, and trundle round a corner, because they got the outside front (loaded) tyre onto the grass for a split second exiting the previous corner bears little resemblance to the real thing (imo). But maybe I'm not watching the same stuff you all are. Heck, even motorbikes can run wide and still crank it right over for the next corner, without falling off on the ice sheet that is grass and dust on their extra sticky tyres.

[tailing]

I agree with you sinbad, the drop in grip is too dramatic from my pov.

[AndroidXP]

Something else I noticed regarding tyre damage:

Normally the tyre pops when you reach 200°C, but right now it looks like that only the average of ALL tyre patches (of the inner/middle/outer part) is used, instead of each patch seperately.

So if you do a lockup from 250 km/h until you stop, you may have 45 (15 sections * 3 sides) patches at normal temp and one section at 999°C. I think that is hot enough to make the tyre pop in RL ;)

[Dethred]

I am not complaining that you have to take it easy for a while, sheesh. I am stating that it takes too long to clear it off. Also, when you have the brown bar all the way up it takes forever to clear it off, even though the tire wouldn't be picking up a whole lot more dirt after a few rotation on the sand. The max slip should be lower a little bit, and the max amount of dirt shouldn't be more than if you went into a sand trap a few feet. If you go off and have to drive a hundred feet magically the tires are worse off than 10 feet, both of which will completely coat a sticky tire with sand.

And with the Road super, I have personal experience (from messing up big time) with getting both water and mud on the tires. After a small burn out there is no noticable effect, and when they were muddy it wasn't as bad as in LFS with a little dirt. I think this problem is slightly compounded by the physics problems, but that might be fixed.

Also, when I have been drag racing (admittedly on the street) in my buddy's modded LT1 Formula (300whp and 350 torque), his drag radials would pick up sand and dirt from the road after a burn out, and still launch like crazy barely spinning at all. There is a fundamental problem with the dirt model, as well as the grip for clean tires.

The heat model is very flawed. As you will see in F1 racing, during slow driving (i.e. yellow flag) the cars will drive side to side to maintain optimal temp. After spirited driving on the LFS cars, you can slowly drive a 4-6km lap and still have semi-optimal temps without swaying back and forth. The temps rise quickly, but don't drop fast enough.

PS: Whats up with tires starting off at 60*C ? Where on this earth is the temp ~60*C?

[ghengis]

PS: Whats up with tires starting off at 60*C ? Where on this earth is the temp ~60*C?

Preheated tires? As they use in formula 1.

[mrodgers]

The problem I see in the dirt model is as follows. I was running the LX6 at FE Green practicing on road super tires. I would loose a corner often and run fully through the grass/sand and pick up a lot of dirt, brown bars almost full. This could be on the first lap or after 10 laps. Then some folks joined the server and started running the GTR cars so I pitted and grabbed my FZR to run a few laps. Again just as in the LX6, I ran into the grass (fully through grass, not just clipping it with 2 tires, both cars). I would not pick up near as much dirt on the R2's hot or cold as I did with the road supers on the LX6. It also took a lot less to rid of the dirt in the GTR car than it did with the road car. I think it needs to be reversed there, the slicks need to pick up more dirt than the road tires. I was not driving either car hard, temps were cool (a light green).

As for the temperature complaints, it is simple, you are driving too hard. Tire pressures need to be adjusted to get the tires running cooler also. I read here complaints about cooking the road super tires. I can't even get them heated up. In the LX6, it takes me about 10 laps to get them warmed up at FE Green. I'm not the greatest in the LX6 or at FE Green, I'm just learning that track, but I spin, light the tires up on accelleration, lock up on braking and I still can't get the tires heated up. As for the GTR cars, I do over heat the tires on the FZR alot as I try to drive it too hard. And that is why, because I'm driving too hard.

[5th Earth]

Preheated tires? As they use in formula 1.

Indeed, the tires are preheated. Just sit around on the start line for 5 minutes without moving, and your tires will cool off--blue is not ambient temperature, BLACK is ambient, which is why the center of the tire goes black when you blow it out.

At any rate, when I'm driving my best, I usually have trouble with my tires being too cold--the only time they overheat on me is when I'm driving poorly. Of course, that just means I'm not very good at driving "at the edge".

Anyway, watch a really good driver, and s/he can keep the tires a full perfect green until the tread literally wears completely off. I've seen it happen.

[Bob Smith]

Yeah I've not sussed that out myself. They must be using lower tyre pressure and driving conservatively to begin with until the tread starts to thin.

[tristancliffe]

I can keep tyres at optimum until the tread is about 20% thick, then the tyre slowly starts to cool.

I can counteract this by driving harder (sliding the car more, using throttle, brakes and steering less smoothly), but my lap times are slower than optimum, and the chances of me making a mistake go through the roof.

[sinbad]

I can keep tyres at optimum until the tread is about 20% thick, then the tyre slowly starts to cool.

I can counteract this by driving harder (sliding the car more, using throttle, brakes and steering less smoothly), but my lap times are slower than optimum, and the chances of me making a mistake go through the roof.

You can keep the surface of R2s cool, at a properly quick pace, for that long, in a car like the UFR?
Must be playing a different game to me :)

[tristancliffe]

XFR yes (mostly, it obviously depends on the exact setup and mood etc), but yes, the UFR is very hard to look after the tyres. But thats a good thing - it shows different cars abuse the tyres in different ways, and that weight transfer, CoG's etc DO affect tyre wear/temp.

But then, I'm not as fast as you :P

[5th Earth]

Well, the XFR and UFR and kind of special cases. They frankly have too much power for their own good, and racing them without frying the tires requires about as much throttle control as the FO8 ;)

That said, it's possible to keep their tires under control, for a relatively short race at least. An endurance race with these cars would be... interesting.

[Uncle Rooster]

The tire physics are almost like driving on water with racing wet tires, and with dirt on the tires its like driving on snow for a mile. Not only that but even if the tires are cold they pick up dirt that stays for 20-30 seconds. A simple burn out on any set of tires would rid it of practically all the dirt.

And the tires, with a decent setup that can hang with the best of em' will overheat too fast and not come down soon enough.

PS: Tristan, its not too hard, its too unrealistic. And no you're not the stig.

+1

The physics makes the game hard to play for sure but about realism.... I have a friend of mine (witch used to drive a rally and a race car in a real life, let's say he knows how to drive) came home for dinner yesterday and I had him try the game... after 20 minutes he was still unable to make a lap without incidents on blackwood with RB4 ... how can a "so realistic" game could be so hard to master?.......... ho, he also pilots small planes and had no problems landing a cessna (with style) in Flight Simulator X on the first try...... does that mean FSX's an arcade game?

[Jakg]

I'd like to point out that atm if you put a MM of tyre on the dirt the WHOLE tire is coated in dirt. This is why getting dirt on a tyre makes such an effect on the car...

[sinbad]

+1

The physics makes the game hard to play for sure but about realism.... I have a friend of mine (witch used to drive a rally and a race car in a real life, let's say he knows how to drive) came home for dinner yesterday and I had him try the game... after 20 minutes he was still unable to make a lap without incidents on blackwood with RB4 ... how can a "so realistic" game could be so hard to master?.......... ho, he also pilots small planes and had no problems landing a cessna (with style) in Flight Simulator X on the first try...... does that mean FSX's an arcade game?

I think it's a case (for most people that struggle initially) of them not being aware of the car's speed, the sharpness of the corner, or the true level of input which you are making. Those are the things that real world experience doesn't help you with, and in relation to your FSX comparison, in a flight sim there isn't really an equivalent of the first two obstacles which I mentioned.

[Uncle Rooster]

.....I think it's a case (for most people that struggle initially) of them not being aware of the car's speed, the sharpness of the corner, .....

should we conclude that the less realistic part is "what is being drawn on the screen VS what's really happening" ?

[sinbad]

should we conclude that the less realistic part is "what is being drawn on the screen VS what's really happening" ?

No, what happens on screen is what is happening. The difficulty is that speed isn't easy to judge on a 17" monitor, corners are hard to judge on a 17" monitor, and you don't feel the severity or violence of your inputs because your chair is motionless.

My point is that your friend is struggling not because LFS is wrong or unrealistic, but because he cannot adjust what he expects to see and feel in a real car to the limitations that LFS has to work with (screen and no g-force).

For the record, I'm not arguing that LFS is perfect physics-wise. But it isn't as bad as......"after 20 minutes he was still unable to make a lap without incidents on blackwood with RB4 ... how can a "so realistic" game could be so hard to master?" ........suggests it might be.

[Uncle Rooster]

I wonder what the inverse situation would look like..... I mean to teach someone (who never drove a car) how to drive on this game for many years then throw him on a real car to see what would happen :)

[AndroidXP]

Sim and RL driving are still two completely different things, because the forces felt through the body and the much higher field of view in RL alone make a huge difference. Even if you somehow manage to get absolute physics realism, it will never be the same as driving a real car, at least not with today's computer interfaces.

However, if you let somebody practice LFS with a G25 for a few months and then put him into a real car, he'll probably still stall the first few tries and still brake too hard at the beginning, but he'll pick up much quicker because the most troubling aspect of driving a manual - the hand/foot coordination - will already be second nature for him.

[tristancliffe]

I wonder what the inverse situation would look like..... I mean to teach someone (who never drove a car) how to drive on this game for many years then throw him on a real car to see what would happen :)

You mean pretty much what I did? Okay, so I had driven on race tracks before LFS, and had passed my road test years before I first played LFS, but LFS is still responsible for enhancing and fine tuning most of my real racing skills. And whilst I won't claim to be a professional in any sense, I seem to have reasonable car control, sliding F3 cars about more than happily.

The reverse, when real drivers try to play sims but fail to do well due to a lack of real feedback through forces, is why I don't think any sim should ever be pro driver endorsed - they haven't got a clue about sims, and shouldn't try to make statements about them being realistic (unless they play a lot of sims over many years and are okay at them compared to the general sim playing public, which won't happen because no pro driver would dedicate themselves to anything other than real driving).

[Bluebird B B]

Does anyone watch races?
Today a1gp drivers with thier 550Hp formule like cars, on a very tight track with lots of corners which in lfs would burn your tyres up in two laps.
Drivers all did the same on braking, and let te rear slide a bit to the oudside so the had very nice turn-in on the corners. Also in corners minimal slides all over, because these cars are apparently very nice to drive om the limit.

What did i say sliding?? Hmm according to many lfs people any type of pushing, driving fast etc. is not realistic and the cause of tyre-heat. So convinced it is also not possible in reality, because lfs changes reality. :bowdown:


I think it is a very simple problem, tyres temps and dirt-effect just needs some adjustments in lfs and all will be fine and lfs will be even more great.
I get a bit annoyed that people with real live experience, real racing drivers are told they are driving wrong,They are more or less told told: "Lfs can never be wrong.", You must be doing something wrong.

Sorry i disagree, to those people: Its on telly, youtube etc. see for yourself, real tyres dont overheat so fast and are not as bad with some dirt on it(althougt dirt certainly changes grips levels).

[tristancliffe]

Sliding a single seater in such a way as to remain fast isn't how the majority of people drive in LFS - they just hurl the car about, randomly steering too much, and asking the car to not cope very well. The fast people in LFS will get 20 times more mileage out of ANY tyre than the slow people.

The people you watch on TV are rather better drivers than us (otherwise WE'd be on TV), and have rather better (more realistic) setups than us too. It's not entirely fair to compare the worse drivers tyre lives with good real life drivers, now is it?

[Woz]

Sorry i disagree, to those people: Its on telly, youtube etc. see for yourself, real tyres dont overheat so fast and are not as bad with some dirt on it(althougt dirt certainly changes grips levels).

How can you compare what you see in a vid directly to LFS, you have not frame of reference. You cant SEE..


how much G they are pulling.
how much loading they have on the tyres.
their exact control inputs.
what setup they have.
how they are nursing their tyres.As Trist said, IRL you NEVER push as hard and as far into slip as many people do in LFS. The lack of G force, the slight lag in FF coupled with no fear of pain, damage or death from a crash means IRL you would never run laps at LFS "race pace".

Real life racing is actually about speed + mechanical sympathy. Most LFS players appear to believe its all about speed and nothing else. In LFS too many people run at "qualify pace" and then wonder why they have melted tyres.

If you could find a vid that allows a REAL comparission it would help but in the end tyre data if more valid than a vid.

No the tyres are not perfect, as Scawen has stated, but they are not bad.

[Bluebird B B]

No? Two examples of drivers at Nordschleife
Here you go
http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwBJ8SHB42U

and
(jusy ignore the annoying music)
http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=QiWQl4Eb_jM

Have fun

[Woz]

No? Two examples of drivers at Nordschleife
Here you go
http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwBJ8SHB42U

and
(jusy ignore the annoying music)
http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=QiWQl4Eb_jM

Have fun

Can't really see the feet in the vids or know the cars setup/config etc but the first vid shows it well enough. The driver pushes the car until the tyres SCRUB but NO FURTHER. He is smooooth with power feed in etc.

Now compare that to how MOST appear to push LFS, they push harder and faster. Its a fact of sim racing because your feedback lags slightly, no direct G feedback that you get IRL

[tristancliffe]

I'd also bet he's using either very high performance road tyres (like road supers, which are almost impossible to melt in LFS, but better) or medium compound racing tyres. I doubt he's using the equivalent of sprint tyres.

Please compare like for like. Random videos of quite skilled drivers is not a fair comparison to how most people in LFS drive. Personally, I don't have a problem with melting tyres - in some cars it's a real struggle when I INTEND to melt them.

[Hyperactive]

First of all, this thread is from 2005 when the tire temp issue was more visible than it is now.

And isn't it already accepted fact that the LFS tire heat modelling isn't that good and right? I mean, from what I've seen the main issues are that tires don't cool down enough quickly (try Ky2 with fz50), the tires mostly heat up from sliding and not from tire deformation and the tires lose too much grip when the temperatures start rising. And to add that, the cars still like to slide around "a lot" (which kinda makes the LFS feel;)) which with the sliding/heating "problem" makes them heat quickly unless you nurse them, more with some cars less with some others.

The heating isn't imho all that big issue and the road cars are pretty decent with current situation. It is just small fine tuning and some new features implemented and the tires could be little better again.

[tristancliffe]

Yeah, they're not perfect. But nowhere near as bad as some people were trying to make out up there ^

I see it more as a fine-tuning exercise to improve them, but why bother until brake temps come and muddy the water (assuming high brake temps alter wheel/tyre temps). And if rain is going to come then maybe a rethink of the base model needs to be done to work with puddles/rain/aquaplaning, so it would make sense to leave temp issues relatively alone until these changes are carried out - we're not a million miles from #correct#, and other factors, like aero, are more limiting.