G27 Settings

[ls908]

Hi All,

I have tried setting up my G27 to use with Racer and am struggling to get it working. I know that my answer is somewhere in the documentation but I cant figure it out myself so my last resort is to ask here.

There are a couple of issues:
- for feedback (when working) seems very jagged/discontinuous and not smooth at all
- sometimes the steering wheel stops working while driving and I have to replug it before I can use it again
- as soon as I start driving after a few meters the wheel is forced into one direction or the other and is never released from this force (this might be the issue described here http://www.racer.nl/tutorial/howto_controls.htm#shimmy but I still cant fix it)

I don't really know what to do. For a start it would be great if it would just work on a basic level. Even without any force feedback at all. Just a steering wheel that moves freely without any forces on it. At the moment I struggle to even pass the first corner without

Do you have any suggestions of what I could do? Would anyone may be so kind and share their Logitech Profiler settings (already tried the ones in the documentation), the logitech_g25_racing_wheel_usb settings and the ingame settings (possibly even with a step by step guide on what I should do when I start the game)?

That would be incredibly helpful and very appreciated. Any other pointers would be more than welcome too of course.

Edit: I am using 0.8.37 and the Mercedes CLK DTM D2 in case that matters.

 

[Cosmo°]

The wheel FFB should not cut out or get stuck, so that's a slightly odd thing to happen. I can't remember anybody reporting this, nor did I experience it myself in the years I've used Racer so far. You definitely want to double check the status of the wheel in another sim or game to be sure it's working properly in general.

As for the setup process, most of us experienced users don't work with the ingame setup menu I believe, but it is a working feature and you should be able to get your wheel configured there easily. At the end of the day, you can start with the default G27 file which is fine and needs no tinkering apart from your preferred button layout.

The manual process would be to copy the logitech_g27_racing_wheel_usb.ini file from the data/controls/presets folder and put it into data/controls (up one folder). You can rename the file or leave it as it is, but you still need to tell Racer to use this particular file for your controller. To do that, open racer.ini from the main folder and scroll down just a few lines to ini.controls and enter your filename there. That's all you need to do.

I wouldn't recommend to use center_squeeze, because it's a crude and distracting feature in my opinion. A quick way to disable it is to raise the minimum velocity threshold to a larger number (it's in m/s unit, so something like 500 will do).

The actual FFB you get largely depends on the vehicle setup of course, some will shake more than others. I'd say you try out the above first though and if you get it working and come up with more questions, just ask then.

 

[ls908]

Thanks a lot for that reply.

Im starting to suspect there is a problem with the wheel. For example when I go to game controller properties in Windows and open the Logitech G27 Racing Wheel Properties screen and start to play around with the controls some funky things start happening. For example I can turn the wheel just fine, but as soon as I press one of the buttons on the wheel (doesnt matter whether it is one of the shifter paddles or red buttons) the wheel abruptly does some random motion (turns +120 degrees to the right, then back to around -20 and then all the way to around +400 where it boggles around a bit and then comes to a halt around +380). After that I can move it freely again.

Hmmm....seems like I need to sort the wheel out somehow. No idea whats going on there. Any ideas on how I could go about solving this?

 

[Cosmo°]

The "random motions" are normally intentional patterns - in older driver versions, Logitech used to label them tyre blow-out, wooden bridge, etc... they're just different effects to test the functionality of FFB in general.

Did you try out the preset G27 controller file yet? Does the ingame controller setup screen show the correct bars moving (all the way) when you test the controller there?
If you want to do a no-FFB test, you can obviously set total strength of effects to 0% in the Logitech Profiler's global settings.

And again, try the wheel in another title, on PC or PS if you have access to either.

Finally, it might be useful to know which Racer version and which vehicle and track you test with, just to be sure you haven't gotten an odd one there.

 

[ls908]

Ok. It seems to work now. I tried out the preset controller file and it still did weird things. Then I downloaded the LFS test version and it worked great. After that I went back to the profiler, set all effects to 0% and tried it in Racer. And it worked. I then set the settings to 100% and it still works. Great! Thanks a lot!

Although I must say the FFB effects are still a little jerky and not very smooth. For example when driving down the straight at Carlswood with the Mercedes CLK DTM I keep getting random jerks to the wheel (same in corners but not so strong). Now it might be trying to model bumps in the road or something but it doesn't feel very real. Can this be gotten rid off or smoothed in the settings? Or is it due to the track and/or car?

Finally do you have any recommendations on a nice car for Racer. I am looking for a racing car rather than a road car (there doesn't seem to be a lot out there though) with a narrow steering lock and good grip. The Murcielago for example has terrible oversteer and I really struggle with it. Saying all that the standard car in LFS wasnt too bad (albeit a bit slow, think it was called XF GTI or something) and the FFB felt great in LFS. Is there anyway to recreate a similar feeling/FFB/handling in Racer?

Thanks a lot for your help. I really appreciate it.

Edit: Basically I need a car that is relatively easy to drive yet realistic and fun (I am trying to build a program that teaches basic racing skills, i.e. correct racing line, brake point, acceleration etc. and plan to test it with inexperienced people so it has to handle kindly and should be relatively easy to keep on the road)

 

[Cosmo°]

Racecars aren't all that popular in Racer, funny enough - the CLK DTM you mentioned is an old model that falls right into the odd category because it uses a fishy steer.lock setting of 200° in car.ini. This line represents the visual amount of lock that the steering wheel model rotates ingame, but it also affects the FFB output. 200° isn't realistic for a DTM car anyway, maybe 540° is more likely. In any case, I wouldn't go much below 360° because that is the main reason why some vehicles produce heavy shaking at straight ahead steer (the FFB output "can't decide" between going left or right).

If you're willing to read up and learn how to tweak the handling of vehicles yourself, there's actually quite a selection of different racecars available for Racer. Most of them are just a bit older and need a bit of TLC to get going properly, as Racer is constantly evolving and things eventually get left behind.
A more recent example is the Gr. A E30 M3 you can find here. Other than that, Tracciontrasera has a majority of the releases for download.

 

[Ian Strom]

Also keep this in mind before you crank everything up.
http://www.racedepartment.com/forum/threads/like-your-ffb-strong-think-again.30763/

 

[ls908]

Thanks for the heads up to both of you.

Ive searched Tracciontrasera already and found some cars on there that look interesting, and that BMW looks great too (so does the Sierra). But how do I get these cars to work in the newer versions of Racer? I suspect it has something to do with most content not being updated to the CG versions of racer, so how can I get this content to work in 0.8.37 or 0.8.38? So far my only way of ensuring that the cars are compatible is by downloading just the ones that were released within the last year (and even some of those dont work). Is it possible to get older releases working in the newer versions of Racer? Is there any more information on this other than the "From old content to new content" page on racer.nl? What is the "TLC" you refer to?

Edit: Actually just saw that the BMW thread explains how to get that car working in the newer versions, does that apply to all older cars or is it not possible to generalise it in that way? Also do you have any general advice on how to make the most of Racer's graphics capabilities?

 

[Cosmo°]

This thread is a good guideline on how to update for current beta versions. You can update pretty much any content ever made for Racer, there's no technical restriction in that sense.

TLC as in Tender Loving Care, so just an expression I used, because while generally not difficult, it will take some effort to get into the swing of things

 

[ls908]

Just what I was looking for. Thanks a lot.