What Are Your Favorite Small Additions To Your Sim Racing Rig?

Have Your Say What Are Your Favorite Small Additions To Your Rig.jpg
Sim racing gear can easily break the bank, as anyone who has come into contact with virtual racing likely knows. However, small additions can make life in the rig not only easier, but also more enjoyable while allowing your piggy bank to see the light of another day – even simple things like being able to customize the buttons on a steering wheel.

It is not just expensive high-end gear Fanatec has on offer. Recently, I stumbled upon their Button Caps & Sticker set. This set allows you to individually label a multitude of differently colored button caps and use them with your Fanatec wheels. As someone who frequently switches between a Clubsport Formula V2.5X and the Porsche GT3 wheel, this is a simple but welcome addition to my sim racing gear – remembering what function is where on the different wheels sometimes is a more of a task than I would like to admit.

The principle is extremely simple: A total of 50 button caps in different colors, circular stickers in various other colors and more circular, clear stickers with functions in black or white on them allow the user to create the exact button layout they like. There are even rectangular stickers with the functions on them to put directly on the wheel as an extra addition – all while making your wheel look like it belonged in a real race car even more. The set is available via the RaceDepartment Store if you want to take a look yourself.

Fanatec Button Caps and Sticker Set.jpg


Your favorite small additions?​

Of course, this is by far not the only small addition to a rig one can make. 3D-printed holders to use old phones as dash displays, LED strips to add nice lighting effects, self-built button boxes or even just a sticker of your favorite race car manufacturer or racing team – the possibilities are near endless.

RaceDepartment wants to know: What are your favorite small additions that make your sim racing life more enjoyable? Feel free to let us know in the comments – and post pictures, too, as DIY solutions are always an inspiration to other sim racers.
About author
Yannik Haustein
Lifelong motorsport enthusiast and sim racing aficionado, walking racing history encyclopedia.

Sim racing editor, streamer and one half of the SimRacing Buddies podcast (warning, German!).

Heel & Toe Gang 4 life :D

Comments

I love the cellphone holder that attaches to my Thrustmaster wheelbase, it allows me to run the Dash app that displays rev limiter gears fuel temps etc. basically an MFD on my wheelbase since i don't have LED read out on any of my wheels.
 
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It's not exactly a small addition but let me explain.

My man cave has a linoleum floor - quite common in older swiss apartments/flats. Unfortunately I noticed that my sim rig was having a negative effect on the flooring with dents appearing where the sim rig made contact with the floor.

So the solution was to buy a desktop - a literal wooden desktop of around 150 cm by 80 cm by 2.5 cm thick, then lie that flat on the floor, and then place my sim rig on top of that.

That evenly distributed the weight on the floor meaning no more dents, and as bonus it made my sim rig absolutely rock solid as well.
 
Powered USB hub. A covienient place ro plug my wheel pedal a other controllers into. It beats plugging directly into the ports on the PC.
That is a very good thing. I have my game controllers in a powered USB hub with on/off switch for each port. Very simple, quick and clean way of turning them on/off. Just have to memorize the order.
 
It's not exactly a small addition but let me explain.

My man cave has a linoleum floor - quite common in older swiss apartments/flats. Unfortunately I noticed that my sim rig was having a negative effect on the flooring with dents appearing where the sim rig made contact with the floor.

So the solution was to buy a desktop - a literal wooden desktop of around 150 cm by 80 cm by 2.5 cm thick, then lie that flat on the floor, and then place my sim rig on top of that.

That evenly distributed the weight on the floor meaning no more dents, and as bonus it made my sim rig absolutely rock solid as well.
He could have just written: "I put my rig on a baseplate so it wouldn't ruin my floor" but no, he took his time to describe in detail, materials and measurements...I like that! :D
 
Premium
Of course, that depends on whether we class "small" as financial cost or physical size?
For the former - constructing a rig from scrap wood and MDF offcuts, and finished off with a Mercedes C180 seat from eBay for £10
For the latter - a foot rest for the left (clutch) foot and a second hand Fire 7 to display SimHub HUD data.
 
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Premium
It's not exactly a small addition but let me explain.

My man cave has a linoleum floor - quite common in older swiss apartments/flats. Unfortunately I noticed that my sim rig was having a negative effect on the flooring with dents appearing where the sim rig made contact with the floor.

So the solution was to buy a desktop - a literal wooden desktop of around 150 cm by 80 cm by 2.5 cm thick, then lie that flat on the floor, and then place my sim rig on top of that.

That evenly distributed the weight on the floor meaning no more dents, and as bonus it made my sim rig absolutely rock solid as well.
Also makes it a bit higher off the floor which you appreciate the older you get.
 
Premium
Powered USB hub. A covienient place ro plug my wheel pedal a other controllers into. It beats plugging directly into the ports on the PC.
I have 2 USB hubs daisy-chained. This way, I can power everything on/off with a button near my keyboard. I don't like to leave my wheel running all the time, so this helps with that. Also, for some reason AC doesn't like my cheap knock-off handbrake, so being able to power off that single connection is helpful without having to do a lot of plugging/unplugging.

As I type this, I realize that all of this really epitomizes first-world problems.
 
The one I use most often is the Pikatea Macropad mounted with magnets to the underside corner of my desk. Volume knob, play/pause, fwd, reverse, full screen video, play/pause video is how mine is programmed. Since the rig sits next to the desk, I always have a physical volume knob within reach at all times and I can find it in VR, no problem. You can order them custom with thousands of color options or they sell a DIY kit.

 
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SimHub to make my own overlays to replace the ludicrously pathetic standard versions provided by sims such as rF2.

Cheap tactile transducers for some rumble.

Fans mounted on my 8020 rig.
SimHub is a great dashboard/overlay creation tool, that's for sure! ;) I have a few game HUD ideas to re-create in SimHub, like the new GRID game HUDs, maybe Forza too...
 
Powered USB hub. A covienient place ro plug my wheel pedal a other controllers into. It beats plugging directly into the ports on the PC.
I might have to get one of those... I have my wheel setup, but I also have a wired Xbox One controller. When both are plugged in at the same time, my wheel doesn't work. I'll probably look for a hub with individual on-off switches like @Peter Kerényi said
 
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Amen! Ordered from Amazon on Saturday at 9 AM and had it delivered by 11 AM the same day. I have a Sparco seat and replaced the lower back pad with the same one you showed. It fit perfect, like it was made for the seat.
Do you have a link to the lumbar support that can replace the Sparco seat padding? Thanks
 
As a Logitech G920 user I not only modified the rubber at the brake pedal but I'm also running the app Logitech DIView which is great to tune the pedals sensibility. Now is very rare to have wheel locks!
You can run alongside Ghub with no issue.
Strongly recommended!
 
I might have to get one of those... I have my wheel setup, but I also have a wired Xbox One controller. When both are plugged in at the same time, my wheel doesn't work. I'll probably look for a hub with individual on-off switches like @Peter Kerényi said
-- Check what your inputs are for the wheel. When you set it up, it may have been joy1 and joy2. If the joystick is getting recognized first by windows, then the wheel's inputs would change to joy2 & joy3. Test by going to the assign page and note the exact name of any button or pedal/wheel axis.
The try to assign it again to the same button or pedal. i.e. the Throttle. It may be something like Joy1X+ If, when you re-assign the throttle it changes to Joy2X+, then you know the order that windows has assigned each device has changed.
Two ways to correct this: 1. Re-assign all the commands, essentially make a new wheel profile and save it under a new name.
2. Unplug the joystick. Reboot windows and wait until after windows has found your wheel. Then plug in your joystick and it should become the last in line.
 
Hooked a small subwoofer from a soundbar I had up to simhub...put it against the back of my seat (dyi seat from a Mazda 3) only use it for shift thud and a little bit of riad feel and honestly, I like it better than my friends transducers he has in the back of his rig....and mine was a free:)....I'm completely enjoying doing my rig mostly dyi, I get some satisfaction from doing it myself
 

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