PC1 bManic's FFB experiment - Thrustmaster TX / T300

UPDATE! I changed Relative Adjust Bleed to 0.3 instead of 0.45 (which could cause some oddities)

UPDATE2!: More and more people with other wheel brands have tried the settings and it's starting to look as if these may work for quite a few wheels. T500 is confirmed as working pretty well, Fanatec GT2/GT3RS v2 also confirmed as working better than defaults and one Fanatec CSW v2 also happy.

UPDATE3!: There seems to be some confusion about Steering Arm Angle and what it is. It is NOT the same as Steering Ratio, which is a VEHICLE SETUP parameter. Arm Angle can be found in the car garage menu, under the Force Feedback Tab (it's the middle tab, between Vehicle and Summary tabs), the last option on the first page is called Arm Angle. This is the one I mean. Everything in this thread is about Force Feedback, not about vehicle setups!

Update4!: Brandon Wright noticed quite a bit of spikes and odd behavior which seems to be related to the Relative Adjust Bleed parameter. It is possible that my value of 0.3 is still too large so if any of you guys are suffering from these spikes then try a lower setting. You can go as low as 0.05 until you lose the benefit of the Relative Adjust processing block.


Hi guys,

So I finally had some time to play the game and I've spent the whole day experimenting with a new way to squeeze the massive FFB dynamic range into a range that our consumer wheels can tolerate while getting as much information as possible from the FFB (meaning: no hard clipping).

I would love it if you Thrustmaster TX and T300 owners would try these settings. NOTE: You must follow these instructions TO THE LETTER or the experience will be different to mine. Feedback that is provided without following every single point to the letter will be useless and thus ignored.

Why? Because the FFB system in pCars is extremely flexible and thus complex. It is also highly dynamic which means that a single tiny tweak of a crucial parameter (like tire force / master scale multiplier, spindle arm angle or the ratio of Fx, Fy, Fz and Mz) will alter the system. Thus, if you want stronger or weaker forces, use your Thrustmaster Control Panel program to control this! Do NOT change the in-game settings to achieve this!

These are my Thrustmaster Control Panel gain settings:

Overall strength of all forces = 75%
Constant = 100%
Periodic = 0%
Spring = 0%
Damper = 0%

Auto-center settings = by the game (recommended)

Step 1)

Set your Thrustmaster Control Panel settings. You can use my settings to start with. These result in fairly heavy forces. A good workout but not impossible to drive with. If you are a masochist, set the strength to 100%. I often drive longer races with the strength set to 60%.

Step 2)

Start Project CARS and reset your wheel then do the wheel calibration again as follows:

a) turn wheel FULLY LEFT AND RIGHT.. all the way! My TX wheel requires me to truly wrestle the wheel to get it 100%, otherwise it stops at 96%.

b) follow the 90 degree rotation to the letter.. this means you set your wheel so that it is physically pointing exactly 90 degrees to either left or right. Do NOT set it so that you get perfectly 900 or 1080 degrees here. Set it so that it is truly pointing 90 degrees to either side. For example, my wheel when set so that it is physically pointing 90 degrees results in a steering rotation of 882 degrees.

c) calibrate your pedals

d) configure your buttons

Step 3)

Make sure your FFB Strength in-game is set to 100/maximum! This is very important! It defaults to 75. Also make sure the FFB damping saturation setting is set to ZERO. It defaults to 25. (you find these options under the CONFIGURATION tab in the controls preferences)

Step 4)

Go into the "calibrate FFB" menu and set the following (parameters not mentioned should be left at default!):

Tire Force = 100

Deadzone Removal Range = 0.03
Deadzone Removal Falloff = 0.02

Relative Adjust Gain = 1.37 (sometimes it shows 137 and leaves the " . " out)
Relative Adjust Bleed = 0.30
Relative Adjust Clamp = 1.33 (sometimes it shows 133 and leaves the " . " out)

Scoop Knee = 0.12
Scoop Reduction = 0.08

Soft Clipping (Half Input) = 0.60
Soft Clipping (Full Output) = 1.79

Step 5)

Individual car setup FFB settings! I've only had time to test 3 cars but from these you can quickly extrapolate and get the general idea. The main idea is to have a Mz heavy setup and to set a good spindle arm angle and then to set a good Master Scale value so that the FFB "pushes" into the Relative Gain and Soft Clipping at proper levels. These usually end up in the 26 to 36 range, depending on how much down force the car produces or how heavy it is. Here are the settings for the 3 cars that tried:

<--- CAR SETUP - FFB TAB - --->

Lykan Hypersport:

Master Scale = 32

Fx = 68
Fy = 36
Fz = 74
Mz = 100

(note!! set all Fx, Fy, Fz, Mz smoothing to zero!!)

Steering Arm Angle = 2200

BMW Z4 GT3:

Master Scale = 28

Fx = 66
Fy = 44
Fz = 82
Mz = 100

(note!! set all Fx, Fy, Fz, Mz smoothing to zero!!)

Steering Arm Angle = 2000

Formula B:

Master Scale = 30

Fx = 68
Fy = 36
Fz = 74
Mz = 100

(note!! set all Fx, Fy, Fz, Mz smoothing to zero!!)

Steering Arm Angle = 2500
----------------------------------------------------------------------

That's it. You are done. Go into the game and enjoy pretty detailed FFB. To appreciate the full range of FFB I highly recommend turning off all driving aids. I'll add more cars to this thread once I have a chance to test some more.

NOTE!: I will NOT be providing FFB .xml files because they do not seem to work as expected. This is a complete system where every individual setting feeds into one another and thus becomes a quite complex thing. The general signal flow is like this (at least it used to be like this right before release):

Tire Force * Master Scale -> Fx, Fy, Fz, Mz -> Spindle Arm Angle -> Relative Gain -> Soft Clipping -> Scoop -> Tighten Center

As I've understood it, Relative Gain and Soft Clipping are non-linear functions and thus quite complex in nature. Even small input variations can cause quite a different feel in the wheel. Because there are two of these functions after one another and they feed an inherently non-linear device (your consumer wheel) you can probably appreciate how quickly things get complicated. You'll easily notice this by simply tweaking the Master Scale of each car or change the Fx, Fy, Fz, Mz relative ratios. Like I said in the beginning of the post, the main point is to squeeze as much "useful" information into the limited dynamic range of our consumer wheels and this means compressing the heck out of it.


You lucky s.o.b's with direct drive wheels can ignore all this and simply set pCars as fully linear and have a ridiculously awesome experience. You may still want to adjust the Fx, Fy, Fz and Mz settings like I have them above but disregard everything else (remove all soft clip and all relative gain and scoop stuff. Heck, I'd even remove tighten center).

Cheers!
bManic
 
Last edited:
There's a bug introduced in 1.4 apparently. These are the steps to get it working again, but keep in mind I have NOT tried it myself. Only read a possible solution at the official forums:

IMPORTANT, do these steps IN CORRECT ORDER.

1) Delete any and all FFB tweaker .xml files you have in your project cars or other directory (make 100% sure no FFB tweaker .xml files are found by the game)

2) RESET your wheel in the pCars controller preferences

3) Re-calibrate everything and assign all your controls again

4) Insert my settings as per original post

5) Copy any FFB tweaker files you want to use back into pCars folder / or wherever they are supposed to be. If you use Jack Spades tweakers, make sure you get his latest updated version!

The bug seems to be that after applying the 1.4 patch the FFB gets doubled up when FFB tweaker files are used. There may also be a problem with the soft clip that was introduced but this is uncertain. Anyhow, you can not have any FFB tweaker files installed when resetting the wheel or applying patch 1.4 (which happens automatically on the steam version).. The bug is apparently found and has been squashed. It'll be fixed with the next 1.5 patch which should arrive as soon as it goes through validation but the above information is a good work around for the moment.
 
There's a bug introduced in 1.4 apparently. These are the steps to get it working again, but keep in mind I have NOT tried it myself. Only read a possible solution at the official forums:

IMPORTANT, do these steps IN CORRECT ORDER.

1) Delete any and all FFB tweaker .xml files you have in your project cars or other directory (make 100% sure no FFB tweaker .xml files are found by the game)

2) RESET your wheel in the pCars controller preferences

3) Re-calibrate everything and assign all your controls again

4) Insert my settings as per original post

5) Copy any FFB tweaker files you want to use back into pCars folder / or wherever they are supposed to be. If you use Jack Spades tweakers, make sure you get his latest updated version!

The bug seems to be that after applying the 1.4 patch the FFB gets doubled up when FFB tweaker files are used. There may also be a problem with the soft clip that was introduced but this is uncertain. Anyhow, you can not have any FFB tweaker files installed when resetting the wheel or applying patch 1.4 (which happens automatically on the steam version).. The bug is apparently found and has been squashed. It'll be fixed with the next 1.5 patch which should arrive as soon as it goes through validation but the above information is a good work around for the moment.

Is this just for PC or does it apply to consoles as well?
 
hey bmanic, great work! So I stumbled upon this thread as i just got a T300, and was not happy with it in P Car, mostly. I have a CSR too, and really not totally happy with that in P Cars either. Anyway, I applied your settings and Its WAY WAY better!! thanks. i still tweak alittle from car to car, but this gives a great foundation/starting point. Really good JOB! - guess ya need and Engineering degree to calibrate the wheel in P Cars. :)

Gonna try this with the CSR too - im very optomistic.
Thanks again!!
 
Will try this. Tried fiddling around like crazy with the GT3s but I just can´t get anything decent with my TX. In desperation I plugged in my G27 and it was better from the beginning! Stronger more detailed feedback and just mind gobbling after spending hours with different ffb settings for my TX. Maybe my TX is worn down what do I know but it calibrate as well still feels fine in rFactor 2 and test forces is good.

I then tried raceroom and has never had better ffb not tweaking whatsoever lol. I am seriously confuzzled due to this abnormal discoveries.
 
Dont have it in The tuning setup is it for consoles?
Par, use the up/down keys when cycling through the menus in tuning. If you're using the mouse when moving down the list to get to Steering Arm Angle you won't be able to get to it. Another bug that ends up hiding a critical tuning option. It would be comical if it wasn't maddeningly frustrating. As matter of fact, many of the mouse movements in this UI are jittery and inaccurate. Basic sh*t that should not happen.
 
Par, I believe what you're looking for is here:
Tuning->FFB->Spindle (scroll to bottom using down key on keyboard, it is inaccessible with mouse wheel :O_o:)->Arm Angle (set to your liking, 2000 is a good starting point on most cars, IMO)
 

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