Is there any travel at all with the load cell? I think I’d find it off-putting having no travel whatsoever
iRacing
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Yes, there is travel by default, about 1cm. It has clip things you can use to adjust the amount of travel. By default with 1cm of travel and the pressure set to about 50% it doesn’t feel that different to the default CSL Elite brake, that is until you really stamp on it. It’s actually easier to press the pedal fully than with the non load cell, because there is no spring/washer getting in the way and also you can adjust how much pressure is needed. I’m still getting used to it, I agree no travel at all would be weird, but it’s actually not like that. I have done no configuration to it at all, it has lots of spare bits and adjusters.
A good tip if you have a load cell in iRacing is to turn brake force factor to 0.0, as that gives you a completely linear mapping between the pedal and the brake axis.
Trying out an Android app I found that lets you view upcoming schedule and race times. Seems good so far, easier to use than the in game UI.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.vincendev.ischedule&hl=en_GB&gl=US
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I’ve been spending at least a couple of hours each night getting back up to speed. Starting to feel comfortable with it again, and with the new setup. We also caved on Quest 2 hardware this month (I still feel icky about Facebook but it’s such a good headset, especially stand alone), so I set that up via oculus link this afternoon and got it running at about 90 FPS.
It makes a big difference to me in terms of judging braking points, so I think I’ll stick with VR for my racing unless I really want to stream it. Took it to Nurburgring Nordschlieffe (Touristfahrten layout) and got an 8:10 out of the beemer. There’s more in there time-wise, but before Xmas I couldn’t get the bmw halfway round the ’ring. Definitely feel more in control of that car now. Very enjoyable to drive.
Then I tried an AI race at Okayama in the MX5 to test the frame rate with other cars in there. Ran fine, much to my surprise. And barring 2 laps where I was stuck behind an AI, I was banging in 1:49s every single time. I’ve never, ever been this consistent before. Really enjoying it.
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I’ve been in a similar position, getting up to speed with my racing seat and the load cell brake. I’m keen to start racing the single seaters. as I want to progress up to Formula 3. Apparently the F3 races often have real racing drivers, with people like Lando, Verstappen, Grosean and even Alonso regularly making appearance in public races. I would like to see just how fast they are compared with me.
My pedals were still moving around a lot, so in the end I bought some zip ties and tied them onto the racing seat frame, which seems to have done the trick. The pedals now feel really bolted to the floor and the frame does not move around much for me (it is weighed down with a decent amount of ballast 
)
Last night I did Brands Hatch in the Formula Renault 2.0. I managed to get within a couple of seconds of pole, but overall I kept making lots of small mistakes. I think Brands Hatch is not a great track to learn a new car, as it is very fast with no margin for error. It’s great fun though.
In the race I got clobbered from behind at the start (some guy completely missed his braking point). I then pitted to fix damage so I could use the race as an extended practice season. I ended up being lapped so only did 21 of the 22 laps.
Once thing that annoys me is iRacing’s draconian approach to track limits, which is way more severe than real life and can even flag you up if you have two wheels still on the track. It makes it hard to know what will be considered inside the track and what will not, I often get lots of little incidents for things I think will be OK.
Anyway, I’m slowly getting up to speed with these cars. I haven’t bought this week’s BMW track of Daytona as I feel I’ve spent enough on tracks lately!
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I did another FR2.0 race at Brands, which went better. I did still make some stupid mistakes, but managed to stop them from becoming very stupid mistakes. I did my fastest ever lap (1:24.224) on lap 18 of a 22 lap race, which must mean there’s a lot of time on the table.
Also, my new flat has fibre internet, so it took me three minutes to upload this video, as opposed to about thirty minutes it would have taken before. Expect a lot more videos in the future!
Did another PB during a race, a 1:23.895. Also finished fourth, despite a couple of scuffles. Getting better.
5 days later
Absolutely had it with the MX5s, impossible to get a clean race, just a bunch of crashers.
Note to self: if the series does not have a fixed setup then you might not have enough fuel to reach the end of the race.
I request privacy at this difficult time.
I take it back baby, I always loved you. 
https://members.iracing.com/membersite/member/EventResult.do?&subsessionid=37509285&custid=192552
Let’s never fight again.
Hahah, brilliant. Nice job. 
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Fastest lap in the MX5 from last night. 1:08:057.
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Interesting. I’m stuck in the high 1:08 - low 1:09 zone (still much better than last season, mind). I think the biggest difference I can see is fosters, where I tend to thump the kerb or try to straddle it, which is risky because of track penalties. Probably going to dive in this afternoon.
Ok, so…
1/ How did I survive that??
2/ I think I win the prize for the best “view from inside a pinball machine”. Hard to convey, but in VR those cars felt like they were solid, heavy machines.
Unsurprisingly, after that, I finished 3rd 
. I had a job on my hands maintaining the gap behind though, so it was still tough, and still kept me on my toes. Weird experience being in no man’s land, mind.
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My fastest lap ever at Oulton Park in lap 3 as well. So I was quite pleased. I was complaining that it felt like I had no grip, but really I was going like a scalded cat to get away from those crashy bastards behind me. 
Some good consistent times. 
️
I’m struggling a little with the FR2.0, although I am improving. I think that next season I might go for something a little easier in terms of single seaters, I’m looking at the USF 2000 and the Pure Driving School. Either that or Skip Barber. The USF 2000 looks interesting as it has a couple of ovals as well, which would make a change, although I think I might need to improve my ovals rating, not sure.
I’ve heard good things about the Skippies as a starter open-wheeler.
I got a promo code in the mail for 25% off a two year subscription if anyone wants it.
I’ve timestamped it, but the good stuff (me using the replay to figure out what the hell happened on corner 1) is at 28:20.
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Just the fastest lap from my TT session today. I don’t have a clue if I’m on the pace or not, but I felt like I was at the stage where I’d have to work at it for a lot longer to get much quicker.
I had no idea that there was an even shorter version of Oran Park. Loads of fun to drive though. Races must be murder because it’s pretty much 90% corners and braking zones, a proper rollercoaster. in VR too. You can feel the car getting unsettled everywhere except the start/finish straight, which is the only brief respite on a very short lap.
It did boost my safety rating way higher than I expected. I jumped up just under .5 of a rating point. I’ll maybe give a race a try at the weekend but I suspect it’ll thump that rating.
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You can go a bit faster.
46.877 from my race (lap 13 of 15).
I find these days I only go fast when I’m being chased.
Wow yeah. You’re using way more kerb. I was wary of getting a penalty. Will dive back in tomorrow 
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Ignore the kerb tbh, that was the difference between a 46.9 and a 46.8. Comparing mine to yours you can go way faster through the middle of the lap, it almost looks like you’re coasting in places. You can carry a lot more speed through the corners than you think, except for the first and last corners where it’s better to take a tighter line.
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Here is my first full race upload (thank you fast internet). It’s MX5’s at Oran Park. I keep forgetting to turn video recording on during the races, so instead it’s recorded from the replay. Anyway, this was a pretty good race, I am fast here and make few mistakes, except one big one which is obvious. Still raging. Anyway, reasonably happy with the outcome.
Right, finally recorded a race while actually racing. It goes pretty well.
Nicely done! The first half was good harrying, seemed like you managed to pressure half the field into spinning off ;]
Good solid laps after that.
You were right btw. I’m down to mid 47s now. That’s my limit for now. Decent enough for a race I think.
Couple of fun races today. I threw away all my progress in race one by getting the rear right on the gravel ( not even enough to get a 1x penalty) which then spun me out into the grass in the middle of the track. Penultimate lap 
Second race was better. I qualified back in 9th but fought my way through to 6th with a couple of decent overtakes and one point where I could see an accident was going to happen and just waited for my moment).
From that point it was just trying to maintain the gaps behind me as the midfield fight had allowed the front runners to get too far ahead.
I really enjoy this track, it feels like Knockhill to me, but man I’m finding it hard to not get penalties. It throws you around so constantly that I really struggle to keep it consistent. Not to mention I feel like the track limits are really inconsistent on that track specifically.
I had a 1x off track penalty when I still had two wheels on the black stuff in the same lap that it let me get all 4 wheels on the kerb.
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Yeah, I really like this track too.
Inconsistent track limits is one of my big issues with iRacing, you never know what’s going to trigger it. In my mind it should just be two wheels on track at all times, but in iRacing you can get penalties with two wheels still on track, and there are other places where you can go way off without triggering it. It makes it very hard to judge, you just have to learn where you can or can’t go off.
Laguna Seca on Tuesday \o/
I’m going to stop racing at Oran and start working on that today
Leguna Seca is the BMW track as well, which should be fun.
Max Verstappen’s Bathurst 12H pole lap. He takes pole by almost half a second.
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Highlights of my weekend’s racing. Going to start cutting these videos right down to under 20 minutes, hopefully, more like 15 as from next week.
Timestamped. as usual.
Yeah after this weekend I agree. I think any loss of grip I’ve experienced in previous races is more down to me panicking and overdriving to stay ahead of folk. It’s more that it feels alien to my general driving style. Which gives me hope for the more tyre dependent, endurance formulae . It’s what makes the cars so much fun to drive though. I started to enjoy kicking out the back end once I stopped worrying about preserving tyres.
I do think it might be an issue this week potentially. Even at just ten laps, around Laguna Seca that’s going to be a long race.
re: video editing. I use Davinci Resolve. I have access to Adobe software but I just prefer Resolve’s way of doing things. They’re also still the Hollywood standard for colour work, so the fact that they have such a powerful free option is mind-blowing.
The new version is 17 and is technically still beta and a bit buggy. However, as long as you turn on Live Save in preferences, you’ll never lose work if it crashes. To be fair, it doesn’t crash all that much anymore. I’ve had one crash recently and that’s it.
I also recommend watching tutorial videos by a guy called Casey Faris. Probably the best communicator of the lot in the Resolve tutorial niche on Youtube. He’s great at explaining the basics in a manageable way. He’s also quite camp, can be very funny and generally just makes the process fun, when it could be very, very dry indeed.
The lad gets to feature in two threads this week! At least he hit the apexes at Andretti Hairpin this time
Brave that’s so funny I thought the same about the apexes when I saw the first video in the other thread 