F1 2010 Acceleration and cornering in manual problem

[Craig Whitmore]

I have been slowly progressing my skill at F1 by removing the assists one by one. I now use ABS and Braking off, while TC is on either medium or full and have just started using manual gears, this is where my issue is.

I did some TT's at budapest, I did a couple of laps and got a 1:18:7xx just to get a lap in for something to aim to beat. I am using Bram's or Evil Eye's setup, however, I can't seem to out accelerate the auto gears.

I change gear when it gets to about 1/3 - 1/2 of the way along the last rev section.

A typical corner for me, I slam the brakes on as late as possible, trying leave a bit of pressure on the accelerator. When the corner appears, I start to turn in and then release the brake, but not fully, perhaps have about 10-20% braking with about 40% acceleration. When on my way out of the corner, I slowly ease the accelerator to full while releasing the brake fully and also shift to the next get as soon as the revs get to about 1/3 of the last bar.

I notice that I can't brake at all while turning, even just a very slight amount, as my car stops turning and I go off the track (is my car locking up? do I need to brake even less still?). While turning, I always try to leave a little bit of acceleration but this only helps slightly.

The best lap time I can do against auto gears, with manual is just under 2s slower. I'm thinking that I am doing something wrong, as I have watched some video's of 1:15's and they are taking corners much faster.

 

[Paul Lock]

You need to lose the TC as it will be reducing your power when exiting the corners. Braking whilst turning will naturally cause the car to understeer. I think most drivers would have their braking done before entering the turn.

Im no expert, but im not sure that braking and accelerating at the same time in corners is advantagous compared to braking before the turn, carrying as much speed into the apex and then bringing in the power on the exit, controlling the throttle or even short shifting if the wheels start losing traction.

Maybe you need to consider tweaking the setups to suit your driving better, just because a setup is fast for one person, doesnt make it the same for you.

 

[Craig Whitmore]

I tend not to brake during the turn, as you have said, as I get understeer, most of it is done before and I lose some speed due to shifting down the gears and turning.

Generally, what ever braking I do, I always try to keep some power applied.

Is the TC really making me lose so much time out of each corner?

How is the short shifting done, I'm assuming that I just down shift the gears when I want to slow, using the engine at above maximum revs to slow? Down shifting too much causes the car to spin right?

 

[Paul Lock]

Short shifting is normally done to control the back end on acceleration up through the gears, not downwards.
TC allows you to bury your foot and it cuts the power to stop wheel spin. Without TC, you obviously get constant power to the back wheels, and If you can learn to feather the throttle so the wheels dont spin, then you get away quicker than you would with TC. It takes a long time to master, but ultimately you will feel a lot more control over the car.

With regard to slowing down, as long as you are braking and not going all the way to 1st gear, you shouldnt find the car spinning. If it is, then you probably need to revisit your setups.

Maybe try watching some of the videos on here and listen to the engines to see what the guys are doing.

Videos by Steve Stoop and Piet Dekimpe would be a good place to start.

 

[James Chant]

When changing gear, I wait for the rev counter to just turn red, any later you hit the limiter, any earlier It has no guts

 

[Roman5]

When changing up through gears, change at about my yellow mark, don't let the engine scream.

 

[Dan Holland]

Keep TC at medium - you need to let your rear wheels be on the verge of slipping to get the best corner exit speeds, and TC being on does not allow you to do that as it keeps you too safe. When you get used to it at medium then turn it off completely. Don't worry if you are spinning, because if you are not spinning then you are not testing the car enough. However be careful if practicing on TT as the grip levels there are immense compared to tyre sim being on.

Change up as roman says. I typically aim to change up just before the final purple light comes on. Changing when you do is very slow as you are under-revving the engine in the higher gear which dampens your acceleration a lot, and lengthening the gear. You see many people doing this at the start of races.

One advantage you have of manual gears when driving with medium / no TC is when you have over-revved and the back end feels like it is about to step out. Many times you cannot brake here as you are in the corner, so you can shift up to bring the rear wheels back under control. You do lose time due to poor exit acceleration, but you lose more if you are in the wall. Final corner of Australia is a typical place you might do this if your tyres are wearing and catching you out.


The big advantage of manual brakes is in deceleration. You should seek to drop your gears as quickly as possible. In the game you don't have any chance of damaging your gearbox or engine, so punish it as much as possible. From 7th you want to drop to 3rd as quickly as possible (dropping to 2nd seizes the rear wheels for me and makes me spin) and then after a second make the drop to 2nd or 1st depending on what you need for the corner. Watch youtube vids from fast drivers and listen to the engine revs and you will see how late this can let you brake.

All braking should be completed before turn in. F1 2010 basically will never let your front wheels lock unless you are turning, when even a small amount will cause a hard lock. For this reason I always set turning dampening to 5% as street circuits in particular can feel quite twitchy. Don't try to use brakes to control over-acceleration on exit, just practice with less TC. As soon as you can control the car on medium TC go straight to no TC as the only way to learn how to do it is to play on that level. You'll never learn to control a car well with no TC when playing on medium TC, so switch up as soon as you stop being frustrated with yourself.

 

[Paul Lock]

In the game you don't have any chance of damaging your gearbox or engine, so punish it as much as possible.

Apart from in career mode where high engine temps do gradually cause engine performance drop.

F1 2010 basically will never let your front wheels lock unless you are turning....

Not sure that is correct!

 

[Ivan Gjorgjievski]

Most of the time i am braking in a straight line, and try my best to get every brakepoint right.. But in a turn if somehow i go off line and have to break, i usually turn the wheel for a brief sec to natural position and hit brakes hard, so it takes me out of turn a bit, but never lose track under wheels..

As for the locking of wheels, the front wheels do lock, but not as in real, because it is a game, and the brake pressure grow exponentially as opposed to real world where your braking power depends on how far or hard you press the brake pedal.

But mainly, you should enter a track, and practice some turn that you are not good with so much untill you find the most comfortable condition for perfect line (speed, angle, slipping, hiting the apex etc). I know that is what i do.

I lower the flag rules, and go backwards and forwards on a turn, until i get it right... or just go out from the pits on a specific section and work one section at a time... it is time consuming, but it is well learned lesson from downhill bike riding, where you have to know the best line and hit it every time you ride...

 

[Dan Holland]

Apart from in career mode where high engine temps do gradually cause engine performance drop.

Even in career mode you have to really be top revving to do that sort of damage - at least in my experience. But engine heat is usually easy to correct.

Not sure that is correct!

Again this is in my experience. It does happen to me if you brake hard with a damaged front wing weirdly, but even stamping quite hard on the brakes seems to never lock it up unless i am turning in. Of course different controllers may give different results but it's not something that I ever encounter outside of turning / front wing damage.

 

[Ivan Gjorgjievski]

You get a performance drop in career mode, as your engines goes down on efficiency with time.. so more engine overheating, the percent on the engine usage is lowering per track.. i've noticed this when i was starting on manual gearing, i usually did so much overheating, and now, when i drive , i can see that the engine performance percentage is going down much slower

 

[Makiciel]

Hi,

About engine performance, I am doing my first season, so I am not an expert at all and mostly over rev the engine. In Valencia, in the last lap of the race (full race length), my engine start making a strange noise, I lost power and I couldn't go faster than 120 kph (and no it is not the pit lane speed limiter). Don't know if it is "normal" or a bug or if I did something wrong.

 

[Ivan Gjorgjievski]

is it possible that you lost fuel?

 

[Makiciel]

I didn't think about that, but yes maybe. In this case I got no warning.
That's a good idea Ivan, I will try to test it in GP mode.

 

[James Chant]

Could be out of fuel? Dd you see the fuel light on in the osd? There have been reports from some people about running out of fuel when running engine on fast map.

 

[Makiciel]

I did not pay attention about a fuel light, even did not know there is one, but next time I will check. Thanks.

 

[Paul Lock]

It can be hard to notice the warning light, but I would bet you ran out of fuel. Has happend to me at Valencia when I ran Fast engine map too much.

 

[Andrew Bortz]

The big advantage of manual brakes is in deceleration. You should seek to drop your gears as quickly as possible. In the game you don't have any chance of damaging your gearbox or engine, so punish it as much as possible. From 7th you want to drop to 3rd as quickly as possible (dropping to 2nd seizes the rear wheels for me and makes me spin) and then after a second make the drop to 2nd or 1st depending on what you need for the corner. Watch youtube vids from fast drivers and listen to the engine revs and you will see how late this can let you brake.

This basicaly sums it right up exactly how I do it.

Hi,

About engine performance, I am doing my first season, so I am not an expert at all and mostly over rev the engine. In Valencia, in the last lap of the race (full race length), my engine start making a strange noise, I lost power and I couldn't go faster than 120 kph (and no it is not the pit lane speed limiter). Don't know if it is "normal" or a bug or if I did something wrong.

Yup you were running to low on fuel you get about a quarter of a lap on Valencia when this starts to happen then you totally run out and have to coast the rest doing 100kph/60mph mostly. I have never seen a fuel warning light in the cockpit only in T-cam and external views and also the rear view (which I use to check fuel at the end of races)

 

[Makiciel]

Yup you were running to low on fuel you get about a quarter of a lap on Valencia when this starts to happen then you totally run out and have to coast the rest doing 100kph/60mph mostly. I have never seen a fuel warning light in the cockpit only in T-cam and external views and also the rear view (which I use to check fuel at the end of races)

Good to know. I always drive in cockpit view and always set my engine map to fast. I know now why there is also a standard and slow map.

 

[Peter Hooper]

Have to agree with everyone here in that I think your problem was a lack of fuel. It happened to me about a third of the way around the last lap of a 100% online race at Bahrain. I had run pretty much the whole race on the fast map setting and got the ol' dodgy engine sound as I turn onto the back straight. Just about got over the line without losing a place but it taught me to be a bit more conservative on fuel after that. I have never seen any fuel indicator in the cockpit so it's interesting to hear that you can see it from the other views.. bit of a strange omission from the cockpit isn’t it!!

Interested to see the comments about late braking.. this is an area that I really struggle with. If I brake anywhere near where the fast guys do then I have no chance of making the corner at all. So what exactly is the best late braking technique…. are you going down the gears at the same time as braking or down the gears and then hit the brakes?