SimXperience Motion Sim Series Q+A Thread

[Brian Clancy]

This is the place for all your comments and questions on this great series:wink:

 

[Kris Vickers]

Hi Eric.

I think you`ll find everything you need here fella. Including all the racing you can shake a stick at when your rig is up and running

Get yourself licensed and get joined in.

 

[freand]

Definitely looking forward to the rest of this series
Do you have any idea when we can expect the next article?

 

[George Pilkington]

Berney, did you get my PM?
George

 

[windbar]

Hey guys...thanks for the warm welcome. The very first thing i do is start up my iRacing career, obtain my license...and get smoked by you guys...fun!

OK...a little off topic but it IS for the rig...what do you think of these pedals; I know theyre CST's, but...just wanted your input. The gentleman selling them says that he thinks the brake pedal needs a bit of work; Ive never had CST's but I imagine that they could be repaired, so that is only a minor concern. My big concern is that, even though its not that much money, its out of state and would be a leap of faith/trust purchase.

What do you think?

 

[windbar]

it would help if I included a link to the pedals:

http://lubbock.craigslist.org/vgm/2127966629.html

 

[Kris Vickers]

Hey guys...thanks for the warm welcome. The very first thing i do is start up my iRacing career, obtain my license...and get smoked by you guys...fun!

OK...a little off topic but it IS for the rig...what do you think of these pedals; I know theyre CST's, but...just wanted your input. The gentleman selling them says that he thinks the brake pedal needs a bit of work; Ive never had CST's but I imagine that they could be repaired, so that is only a minor concern. My big concern is that, even though its not that much money, its out of state and would be a leap of faith/trust purchase.

What do you think?

The brake issue will probably be because its a load cell and GT5 is crap. So it`s just that the game couldn`t recognise the load cell and therefore calibrate the brake pedal.

Damn good price though if he doesn`t change it. Those CST`s are dear.

 

[Berney Villers Jr]

I have CST pedals on my sim at the moment and have no complaints.

The guys here at RD are looking into some formatiing possibilities for the next article. I don't imagine it will be long until we arrivre at a solution and are able to get the next article up.

 

[Brian Clancy]

Ok Guys, second article is up and sorry for the dealy Enjoy......

 

[Jim Cole]

Am waiting to hear more about the differences between per car or general settings and what effects they have. I understand the concept of the per car idea as each car is different, but more detail will be nice.

 

[Brian Clancy]

Hi Jim

Were just doing an 'overview' to start, so that people with less knowledge can get up to speed first, it will get more in depth soon ........

 

[Paul Mullins]

Awesome article guys - many thanks for sharing your hard earned knowledge..!!:doublethumb:

Some things that I personally hope are going to be covered (aka suggestions)

- Theory of ideal position of pivot point for seat
- Theory of ideal position and angles for actuators
- Third actuator theory for yaw rate (ie. back end drift)
- Advantages/Disadvantages of different actuators (ie. SCN5 100mm, SCN5 150mm & SCN6 150mm)
- Advantages/Disadvantages of USB>RS485 interface versus SX-3000 motion control adapter


Looking forward to the next update..


Hoopstar

 

[eddiespag]

Great forum here gentleman. I'm a passionate sim racing enthusiast. I really think that this product and business has a great potential because of the seemingly top quality materials and not only good customer relations but customer interaction or should I say customer immersion? Ha, ha. Anyway, I have a Hyperstimulator chassis which is upgraded to use the G27 and Todd Cannon's amazing CST F1 pedals. So I had once thought about puting a D-Box system under my Hyper to create motion. Then reading through this post and SimX's philosophy on motion and it caused me not only to pause but put a screeching halt on this idea. Why? Two reasons. One, chassis flex and possible breakage ...two, and this is huge, possible latency lag (?) for the movement (actuator info and response).
So I too had reservations about leaving this type of system (static) and going to this type of motion rig system (SimX). My particular concerns were the lack of movement (these being left out) for the wheel, pedals and monitor, since they are an integral part of the driving chassis/vehicle. Is the brain fooled enough to not notice this? Also, another important point is the seating position. This SX rig seems to have a more of an office chair/GT car seating position. My Hyper has an F1/OpenWheel seating postion which I enjoy very much. So my questions are, is there an option to put (connect) the movement of the pedals/wheel/screen (and/or), and also is there a way to create a more laid back position of the seating with raising of the pedals, lowering of the seat and the seat itself not being so 'L' shaped but more open angled? I am a serious potential customer that really supports our community and those who 'take care' of us, like SimX, Todd Cannon, etc. Also a shout out to Leadfoot Mike Mikwilson! Hot simracing rig man! All the best to you all. Cheers, -Ed d'Agliano-Luna aka eddiespag

 

[driver74]

My particular concerns were the lack of movement (these being left out) for the wheel, pedals and monitor, since they are an integral part of the driving chassis/vehicle. Is the brain fooled enough to not notice this?

I've read a lot of people seem to have this concern. It takes somewhat of an understanding of the human proprioceptive system. If you drive your own car around some tight corners, you'll notice that most the gravitational sensations you feel begin in the seat of your pants and stomach, and are hardly noticed in your arms or legs. In a race car, the drivers are attached tightly to the seat, and the G forces they encounter could never even begin to be translated by what their arms or legs are feeling (aka driving by the seat of your pants.) Internal organs are the primary proprioceptive cue that people use to perceive this type of motion. Its not even really fooling the brain as much as it is stimulating the exact sense that is directly responsible for feeling it.

The inner ears also have much to do with motion perception, but the abrupt and stuttering movements of a car racing sim do not use nearly as much to this, as say a motion flight sim would, where you're dealing with gradual, yet far more dramatic sensations in pitch/yaw/elevation/roll. In those types of sims, A full motion platform is required to make it convincing.

 

[eddiespag]

driver74, you know what? Thank you. The 'light bulb' just went off. Now I'm really excited about this system. Cheers!

 

[driver74]

No prob, anything I can do to help. Some things are kind of hard to comprehend just by explanation. I honestly wouldn't have had much of an understanding of this principal myself, had it not been beaten into my head during the aeromedical training I went through a few years ago during pilot training, as well as the time I have spent in some commercial flight training simulators.

I have done a ton of research, and I think the SimXperience is leaps and bounds beyond anything else offered right now. If my career didn't have me moving to new locations in the world every few years, I would have one in my game room right now. I hate having to wait, but I only know its gonna get even better with each stage. That Berney guy really knows what he is doing.

 

[George Pilkington]

+1 There Driver74. : )

 

[driver74]

There will never be a way to TRULY replicate the G-forces associated with driving race cars, as sitting stationary and turning your body in different degrees still only amounts to the G-force being equal to the weight of your body in a stationary environment. The greatest forces encountered in a race car are the lateral forces during acceleration, braking, and turning. On tracks with varying inclines, longitudinal forces also come into effect.

An increase in G-force requires your body to move at a sudden and high rate of speed; that its your weight force actually increases. This cannot be fully duplicated in a sim. This feeling can be compared to when you're sitting in a jet passenger plane, right after it throttles up the engines for take-off. Notice most of that feeling is in your stomach. That feeling of acceleration is still not even anywhere near the feeling a fighter pilot or a race car driver gets. The closest driving simulators that can now even replicate this are multi-million dollar simulators, where the entire simulator pod accelerates laterally across the floor on tracks at high enough abrupt speeds for the user to actually notice an increase in those lateral G-forces. Even those simulators cannot sustain this sensation for a long amount of time, or the simulator pod itself would end up going beyond its limits and crashing through a wall.

The best that can be done for the home enthusiast is to simulate the same forces through proprioceptive cues, but obviously under a (limited to) 1:1 G condition.

Visual cues are the biggest part of a good simulator. New graphics technology is making simulations run at a nearly accurate visual rate. With these visual cues in place, then next focus is how to efficiently add the right proprioceptive cues. A good driving motion simulator will utilize quick and responsive actuators that will translate the movement in the simulator to instantaneous varying movements in the seat. A seat actuator jerking hard left and then hard right at high speed under an s-turn corner may not be giving the user a great extent of those lateral G's, but it will be exerting the varying abrupt and typical forces that will be felt as proprioceptive pressure in the torso, in the same "seat-of pants" manner that a race car driver feels. With these movements going on, along with good visual cues, it will improve the sense of realism dramatically.

If there's any confusion over this concept, I'll be glad to explain further and offer more examples.

 

[eddiespag]

...and thus proprioceptively giving one a 'connection' to the car on track, creating an increased level of immersion? I think I'm starting to really get it. ...after reading your write-ups twice, hee, hee. Thanks again.

p.s. so this the distillation? Because we cannot recreate the exact real physical forces, it's not important to have stronger, bigger movement, but the accuracy is? ie. the timing and the correct percentage/ratio of the movements that form the 'whole'? For example, like a high end 1:16 model recreation of a race car (GMP or Exxoto eg.) that is balanced with high details in materials and quality accross the board, to compared say a 1:16 of one that maybe is so, so, but hey it has a real life sized tire or steering wheel (1:1), ha, ha.

 

[Jim Cole]

If everything that driver74 says is true, then his statements are a little off in my opinion. I say this because for a 2 dimensional sim like a racing sim it is easier to simulate the g-forces mainly because you are not having to simulate an extended banked turn like an aircraft or something like that.

To simulate stronger G's of a turn or braking, the body can be fooled by an increased angle of attack either rolling the chassis to the side for turns or rolling the chassis forward or back for braking or acceleration. The body would interpret the angle along with the visual cue's to "feel" the G forces better as long as you are focused on the visual. If you take a hard left hander in a car that is capable of exceeding 1 G, the sim need only tilt the entire chassis to the right while still giving little bumps etc to make you feel that you are really making that turn yourself at over 1 G.

 

[driver74]

If everything that driver74 says is true, then his statements are a little off in my opinion. I say this because for a 2 dimensional sim like a racing sim it is easier to simulate the g-forces mainly because you are not having to simulate an extended banked turn like an aircraft or something like that.

I'm not sure where you're disagreeing with me; it sounds like you're pretty much saying the same thing I said earlier regarding aviation vs. driving sims. Like we've both mentioned, driving G-forces are far easier to simulate than the sustained levels required in an aviation sim. In aircraft, the vestibular system begins to come way more into play, and that's a whole diffferent topic.

I'm simply stating is that the levels of "simulated" G forces encountered in the driving sim cannot be replicated to the same extent of the high G forces encountered by an actual driver on a track. You would have to somehow instantly gain many lbs of body weight in a split second to feel it to that extent.

Accurately simulating the rolling/pitching angles at varying degrees will definitely give the proprioceptive cues of accelerating and turning (just not quite to the same extent as they would be felt at say, 130 mph in a sweeper turn in a race car). For the average Joe who doesn't regularly race a high speed race car with very sticky tires, these sensations are plenty convincing and immersive.

Where the simXperience comes in is all the time and research that has been done to reproduce all of these pitch/roll (and even yaw forces) as effectively and accurately as possible, given the aforementioned limitations.

Sorry all, I did not mean in any way to hijack this thread. I am fascinated by this technology, and by the fact that it is now affordable to the average person, and I see it going a long way.