Bye Bye Fanatec Podium Back To Simucube!

SCORE: FANATEC=5/10 – SimuCUBE1=9/10

Hi,

Here at EKSIMRacing Lab we’re currently finishing a prototype of motion simulator 2DOF+ZTLS (I will talk about the DIY 2DOF simulator with the Zappadoc Traction Loss System soon…) with a steering wheel based on SimuCUBE 1 and WOW!!!!!!!!

Based on the simple Mige motor OSW KIT from SimRacingBay ( I strongly recommend to shop your SC from SRB) but far better than a Podium DD (we have the latest available FW version 1.0.25, we dropped MMOS), I really love this feeling more close to a real racing car.

For those who have a Podium DDx and an unused SC1 MIGE taking dust… I strongly suggest to install back the SC, update the FW (adjust your game settings ) and compare!

no weird noises of the base or/and the power supply,
no weird behaviors of driver,
super stable and reliable,
super responsive,
no flexy QR,
clear feeling of the track surface,
no longer feeling disconnected from car,
very accurate during all session (no loosing ffb accuracy after a session of more than one hour),
strong enough (anything stronger than small MIGE is NOT for you but real trained racing driver, if someone tells you that you need a more powerful motor, that’s pure bullshit ).
cheaper,
nice and recommended!

Start with this simple, neutral and clean SC1 setup below (using 900° or 1080°) which is suitable in 90% of cases and preferably mod the ffb settings of each game, the games today have plenty ffb settings and you need rarely to change your SC1 default. Get into the habit of returning the steering wheel to the center after turning off the PC (or simply check the wheel center after PC startup).

 

Now after that I would love to give the small SC2 a try… even if there’s no gain to expect in terms of pure driving (DD2/SC2 is more about marketing than real improvement related to direct drive technology and minus all other redundant (useless for me) features like wireless, direct button/axe management, integrated shifter and pedals set management, etc. )…

The Fanatec “ecosystem” is outstanding but keeping backward compatibility with old hardware on Podium series was a big mistake and leads to more complex software driver/firmware and electronics making the podium series unreliable, IMHO.

Cheers,
z

 

DiRT Rally 2.0 FFB Patch, Fanatec Podium DD And Simucube DD

Hi,

Codemasters just released the most anticipated patch! so is theFFB fixed or not? Well I’m not going to reply to this question cause it depends on your driving skill level and obviously on your hardware.

For now, I’m just going to say FFB of latest DR2.0 build is now acceptable to PRO or serious sim racer if it’s associated with a 6DOF motion simulator (or a 3DOF+TL simulator) and obviously if it’s correctly setup. Alone, so without a motion simulator, the implementation of the FFB suffers from a huge lack of information. The default FFB game settings/preset of DR2 is really bad for direct drive, do not use it ever!

 

Device type and id consideration:

Read my post to fully activate the support of the Simucube DD to Dirt Rally 2.0, here.

For Fanatec install the High-Torque dongle.

Then be sure to add official=”false” in the corresponding line of your direct drive device to get access to all FFB parameters of DR2.

The line in input/devices/device_type.xml file should looks like this:

For Fanatec DD, be sure to set the SEN to AUTO and keep in mind the Fanatec DD full rotation is 1080° not 900°.

Run the game and select your direct drive device in the input settings and start to calibrate the steering wheel. Calibrating is important to enable the softlock in game.

During the calibration, when the game asking you to turn back the wheel at 90° simply turn gently the wheel until your reach the 900° (attention for Fanatec DD it’s 1080°).

Then go to FFB settings and set params using the values below. These params are a good base for quickly get started with the DD and can be tweaked to suit your needs.

The “self aligning torque” in game settings should not be decreased to much to get the perfect “weight” feeling of the steering wheel, decrease the FF value from the Fanatec wheel or in the Simucube settings instead if needed.

 

The 6DOF FREX motion platform with MotionMax 6DOF software complete nicely your experience and immersion. This is a “must have” with latest DiRT Rally 2.0 to get a complete driving feeling, a good balance between forces and movements to avoid exaggerations that “disconnect” you from the road and for a more natural driving.

 

 

The MotionMax DiRT Rally 2 profile is a very good base and should be used to get started, then I suggest to reduce the TL effect a bit and increase the smoother effect.

 

If you’ve more than one device and app to connect in UDP to your Codemasters game (or any other game using UDP network protocol) I suggest to use the Sim Racing Proxy Server (SRPS), it’s 100% free.
For example, sharing UDP communication from the game with the motion simulator and a device display or a virtual dash using SLIMax Mgr Pro and MotionMax apps is easy. Read the SRPS web page for more info, here.

Cheers,
z

 

DiRT Rally 2.0 build v1 How To Improve FFB With Your OSW Direct Drive

 

NOTICE: The first time I give the trick to the sim racing community on how to use the Simucube direct drive was with DiRT 4 June 09, 2017 and now with DIRT Rally 2.0.

Do not be fooled by the guys around who don’t know what they are talking about and who don’t give you the correct information. Read the original and reliable information on EKSIMRacing, see the link below.

 

 

Hi,

Read carefully my tutorial to be able to use your OSW Simucube (native firmware or MMOS version) with DiRT Rally 2.0 build v1

REMINDER: Choose the corresponding TAB MMOS or Simucube and apply the recommendation scrupulously or the improvement below will not working.

Click to read how to use the Simucube with DiRT 4 and DiRT Rally 2.0

 

Okay, now everything is correctly installed and waiting for the FFB patch from Codemasters here is how to improve greatly and very easily the feeling of the road surface which is seriously lacking in the current version.

First you have to load the settings for DIRT Rally 1.0 on the Simucube FW or the MMOS and change the MAX FORCE to 100% FFB

then apply the settings below

ATTENTION: Tyre Slip and Engine are grayed BUT PERFECTLY USABLE with the sliders

 

Now go on track and turn the wheel to test the force and go back to the game settings to adjust the “Self Aligning Torque” parameter, if your MMOS or Simucube FW is correctly setup at 100% MAX Force you should get a good FFB with a value between 18 and 25. Collision value should be around 20.

This is simple you ask DR2 to send the max FFB values to your DD so you pass the full control to your MMOS / Simucube FW filter settings (which must be good obviously). Only the “Self Aligning Torque” of the game parameters is retained to control (decrease) the value to obtain the proper balance of FFB force.

That’s It!

Cheers,
z

 

 

French video tutorial by Fanconen

Fanatec Conversion Kit From S.R.M. (use Fanatec rim on OSW)

Hi,
A cool and well manufactured /packaged Fanatec Conversion Kit (version 2) from Sim Racing Machines (https://www.simracingmachines.com/) is available.

It is based on Teensy LC controller and as such 100% compatible with SLIMax Manager Pro and 100% FREE with your Fanatec hardware.
Another great addition to your Direct Drive OSW Simucube sim rig!
Cheers,
z

SLIMax Manager Pro Do More Things Than You Think!


SLIMax Manager Pro v3.4 is a major version with a ton of improvements, if you still use an old version of the game devices manager  (since 2009 a lot of things have been changed 😉  ) then it’s strongly recommended to download the latest version (download the full installer).

SLIMax Manager Pro main features

– management of LED of your display including: RPM Shiftlights, Marshal/Warning/External LEDs, Shift-points feedback, KERS/ERS/DRS feedback, Pit-limiter feedback
– management of DIGITS of your display including: gear digits, left/right panels 6 x 7 segments digits, left/right panels 4×14 seg. digits, central Fanatec panel 3×7 seg. digits
– including a device and emulator SETUPS Management, hundreds of default setups already included + the possibility to create your own setup up to 300 custom setups per device/emulator
– management of information displayed on digits panels, more than 100 functions available (speed, rpm, fuel, temp, press, current/last/best laptime, sector, delta time, etc.)
– management of a PRO DELTA TIME to improve your PB based on database of partials (portion of track)
– management of DELTA TIME clipping tool to fine tune your delta time
– contains almost all F1/GT Steering wheel behaviors (PIT-LIMITER, ENGINE STALL, BRAKE BIAS, BOOST/OVERDRIVE, DIFF.IN/MID/OUT, ARBR/L, Throttle shape, MIX, etc.)
– including a game/simulation Plugins Manager (more than 60 games/simulations supported)
– management of mapping your display controller buttons, switches, encoders to keystrokes sequence (macro) to drive your simulation/game
– management of mapping your steering wheel buttons, axes, encoders to keystrokes sequence (macro) to drive your simulation/game
– management of mapping your buttons, axes, encoders to keystrokes sequence (macro) to drive your simulation/game of your DSD Buttonbox and you Virtual ButtonBox integrated with VDASH-EMU
– management of your pedals set motors/axes
– management of your wheel angle or D.O.R. (max Degree Of Rotation) for each car of your Fanatec, Logitech and Thrustmaster steering wheel
– laps telemetry dump, to analyze and compare your laps
– test your devices / emulators quickly
– include an AUTO-UPDATER to keep your installation up to date (software, setups and plugins updates management)
– management of proxy applications for Codemasters titles to use multiple sim racing device simultaneously (like OSW direct drive, CXC/X-SIM/SimXperience motion simulator platform, Buttkicker, SimVibe, etc.)
– management of bridge applications for PS4 / XBOX ONE to use your display/emulators with your Console games
NOTES: All information managed by SLIMax Manager Pro are not available in all games/simulations it depends of the the amount of telemetry available in their A.P.I. (Application Programming interface).

EMUlator Supported:

Virtual Racing Dash Emulator* (Download VDASH-EMU),
SIM Race F1 Emulator** (SRF1-EMU),
SLI-PRO Emulator*** (SLIPRO-EMU)

*  Android, Windows and Linux version available
** FREE for SRF1-EMU, no license needed (only for Android)
*** only for Android

Hardware Devices Supported:

From SIM Display:
SIM Race LCD,
SIM Race GT,
SIM Race F1,
SIM Race Deluxe,
SIM Race PRO
From Leo Bodnar:
SLI-F1,
SLI-PRO,
SLI-M,
BU0710*,
All controllers (BUXXXXX)
*FREE for BU0710, no license needed
All Fanatec Hardware*:
Fanatec ClubSport Wheel Base,

Fanatec ClubSport Wheel Base v2,
Fanatec ClubSport Wheel Base v2.5,
Fanatec ClubSport Pedals Set v1,
Fanatec ClubSport Pedals Set v2,
Fanatec ClubSport Pedals Set v3,
Fanatec ClubSport Pedals Set v3i,
Fanatec CSL Elite (including Pedals Set),
Fanatec CSR,
Fanatec Porsche Turbo,
Fanatec Porsche Carrera,
Fanatec Porsche 911 Turbo S,
Fanatec Porsche 911 GT2,
Fanatec Porsche 911 GT3 v2,
Fanatec ClubSport Shifter,
Fanatec ClubSport Handbrake
*FREE, no license needed, Tested with latest Fanatec driver and firmware. Fully supported (leds, digits, controls, motors, wheel angle,…)
All Thrustmaster Hardware*:
Thrustmaster RGT
Thrustmaster T100
Thrustmaster T500 RS
Thrustmaster T300 Ferrari
Thrustmaster T300 Ferrari GTE
Thrustmaster T300 Ferrari Int
Thrustmaster T300 RS
Thrustmaster T300 RS GT
Thrustmaster T150
Thrustmaster T150 Pro
Thrustmaster TS-PC Racer
Thrustmaster TX 458
Thrustmaster TX Leather
Thrustmaster 458 Spider
Thrustmaster TMX
Thrustmaster TMX Pro
Thrustmaster TS-Xbox
Thrustmaster TS-XW Racer
Thrustmaster TH8A
Thrustmaster TH8 RS Shifter
Thrustmaster T3PA Pedals

* FREE, no license needed. Tested with latest Thrustmaster driver and firmware. A shiftlights Interface or an EMU must be connected to use your Thrustmaster hardware with SLIMax Mgr Pro. Fully supported (leds, controls, wheel angle,…)

All Logitech:
G25,
G27*,
G29*,
G920

* FREE, no license needed. Fully supported (leds, controls, wheel angle,…)

Steelseries:
SRW-S1*
* LED, buttons and the 3 switches are fully supported

Any HID Compliant hardware:
any buttons-box like the famous Derek Speare Designs (DSD) devices,
any buttons and encoders controllers,
joystick,
gamepad,
shifter,

The application can manage all devices simultaneously.