Buying advice please - Next Level v3 Motion Platform

[MarkR]

I'm looking for some advice and thoughts of other owners or people with good knowledge of the product, please.

I always said I'd buy myself a motion simulator if I could afford one and had the room available. Well, that day may have arrived. I'm impressed by what I've seen of the Next Level v3 Motion Platform

This seems to meet all my criteria:

+ Limited space requirements, I don't have room for a huge sim rig but this seems compact enough to work.
+ Works with Oculus Rift VR, that fixed head position setting solution is impressive
+ Great support and regular updates from the developers
+ Available in the UK
+ Works with my current Thrustmaster wheel and accessories.
+ Sub £3k for the full setup, I'm not a pro racer I'm not looking for a practice simulator this is just for fun so the cost/fun balance has to be right.

So help me do the man maths! Is it worth it?

Is there another similar product I should also look at? It would need to be reasonably compact, work with VR, available in the UK without too much hassle and in the same £3-5K price range.

Is there anywhere I can try one or even better several of the systems in the UK?

 

[Spinelli]

Well this really sucks. I drove 3 hours to go pick up my seat expecting to only have to drill the NLMv3 seat holes to make them wider (as shown here) since the NLMv3 doesn't use the "standard" seat dimensions. I come home and am ready to mount everything only to find out the entire base of my seat is too narrow... It's not even close. Wtf????

There must be a way to get this seat on here...Maybe some sort of brackets?

I know I've posted these seats in this thread 3 or 4 times now and don't mean to spam but here they are again: https://www.jegs.com/i/JEGS/555/70250K1/10002/-1

 

[Mascot]

Well this really sucks. I drove 3 hours to go pick up my seat expecting to only have to drill the NLMv3 seat holes to make them wider (as shown here) since the NLMv3 doesn't use the "standard" seat dimensions. I come home and am ready to mount everything only to find out the entire base of my seat is too narrow... It's not even close. Wtf????

There must be a way to get this seat on here...Maybe some sort of brackets?

I know I've posted these seats in this thread 3 or 4 times now and don't mean to spam but here they are again: https://www.jegs.com/i/JEGS/555/70250K1/10002/-1

That sucks, but is probably easily solved with a couple of bridging plates or a rectangle of plywood.
There's no technical info whatsoever about your seat dimensions on that website - what is the actual bolt pattern and thread size on the underside? Got any photos?
Look on the bright side - you should no longer have to drill/file your NLV3.

Also, why did you drive for three hours? They seem to offer free shipping over $99.

 

[Spinelli]

Ya, I got so fed up I just decided to use a piece of 3/4" plywood, lol. I mounted that to the seat, and then the plywood & seat to the NLM.

Ya, it's nice that I don't have to expand the holes on the NLM, your right.

I just found out that the Jegs seat cover I bought only comes with the female ends of the snaps. So I have to buy some male snaps now, lol. Why would it come with one end but not the other? We're talking like 60 cents of hardware. What is someone supposed to do with just female ends? Lol!

Jegs also claim same day shipping if ordered before 8 EST and I ordered about 5 hours before that yet didn't receive same day shipping. A day later is totally cool with me but it's a matter of principle - don't say you're going to do it if you're not.

Excuse me for being off-topic.

P.S. I drove 3 hours (1.5 each way) because I'm currently in Canada and will be here for a few months. It's normally 40 mins each way, I don't know why traffic was so heavy yesterday.

EDIT: I just saw the seat dimensions on the Jegs websbite. I missed that.

 

[Mascot]

Ya, I got so fed up I just decided to use a piece of 3/4" plywood, lol. I mounted that to the seat, and then the plywood & seat to the NLM.

Ya, it's nice that I don't have to expand the holes on the NLM, your right.

The Jegs website is terrible. No dimensions, screw depths, thread size, nothing. I even just found out that the seat cover I bought only comes with the female ends of the snaps. So I have to buy some male snaps now, lol. Why would it come with one end but not the other? What is someone supposed to do with just female ends? Lol.

They also claim same day shipping if ordered before 8 EST and I ordered about 5 hours before that yet didn't receive same day shipping. A day later is totally cool with me but it's a matter of principle - don't say you're going to do it if you're not.

Excuse me for being off-topic.

Photos?

 

[Spinelli]

I will when I get home from work later.

 

[Spinelli]

Question:
In the F301 in Automobilista I get full braking pitch even when not braking hard. When I adjusted brake power/pressure (car setup menu) to only 60%, the pitch would still dramantically go down under braking no different to when pressing my brake pedal all the way down with 100% brake pressure.

It's almost as if the NLMv3's software/firmware is looking at brake pedal position/travel rather than how much braking force is truley happening with the car's physics. How can I fix this? I'd like to globally set, let's say, full brake-pitch of the NLMv3 to 5 in-game Gs, full throttle-pitch to 2gs, and full roll to, let's say, 3.5s

 

[anton_Chez]

Never had a problem with the sims giving a reading like that. Everything I have felt has been totally natural. Braking at 60% would not feel that much different to full braking force, considering coming off throttle from full speed already pitches you forward and the force from 60% to 100% would most likely come from sustained forces, something that the platform is not designed for / capable of. The only unnatural feeling I got was range of the throw, too much for my liking. I prefer to set higher gain and less throw for a more motion cue based feeling, with more intensity, within reason.

 

[Mascot]

@AntoN_CheZ , have you tweaked your settings yet? Interested to try your profile now that you are in a solid rig.

 

[anton_Chez]

@Mascot Hey mate, I've driven a little bit with the standard non formula setting for a bit and haven't really felt a great need to lower it. Maybe a touch, but I haven't driven motion for so long that I probably just need to get used to it again. I am going to play with it a little over the weekend, haven't had the time or urge to drive much the past week. Bit over all the testing and tuning tbh and just wanted a break from it. I'll jump back in tomorrow, need to test the new rFactor GTE pack and tune some more OSW settings for R3E which I am not happy with.

I do second your opinion (I think it was you?) on the force being more direct in the 80/20 chassis. It does feel better than the Next Level cockpit.

 

[Mascot]

@Mascot Hey mate, I've driven a little bit with the standard non formula setting for a bit and haven't really felt a great need to lower it. Maybe a touch, but I haven't driven motion for so long that I probably just need to get used to it again. I am going to play with it a little over the weekend, haven't had the time or urge to drive much the past week. Bit over all the testing and tuning tbh and just wanted a break from it. I'll jump back in tomorrow, need to test the new rFactor GTE pack and tune some more OSW settings for R3E which I am not happy with.

I do second your opinion (I think it was you?) on the force being more direct in the 80/20 chassis. It does feel better than the Next Level cockpit.

I'd been playing with my NLV3 settings and turned everything down low for some 1980s F1 testing. Then I didn't use my rig for a few days and forgot I was on an F1 profile. It was only last night that I realised everything felt a little too subtle and I'd been driving GT cars with my F1 profile. D'oh! Swapped to the correct profile and WOW. It was amazing again.

 

[anton_Chez]

Yeah that's why I have two presets. GT settings with formula cars is to intense. If you run the GT cars a little higher to get a bit more feeling, it completely throws the open wheel cars off.

 

[Spinelli]

Never had a problem with the sims giving a reading like that. Everything I have felt has been totally natural. Braking at 60% would not feel that much different to full braking force, considering coming off throttle from full speed already pitches you forward and the force from 60% to 100% would most likely come from sustained forces, something that the platform is not designed for / capable of. The only unnatural feeling I got was range of the throw, too much for my liking. I prefer to set higher gain and less throw for a more motion cue based feeling, with more intensity, within reason.

Braking at 60% is a huge difference from braking at 100%. Also, why would you set your seat pitch to clip at 60%? If my unit pitches downwards the full 10 degrees under, let's say, 5gs of braking, why would I want it to stay at that same 10 degrees at 2.5gs? Less vehicle deceleration = less vehicle deceleration g-force = (should equal) less NLMv3 pitch. Maybe you're thinking about car body roll/pitch but I'm talking about g-force...

 

[anton_Chez]

You moving more forward does not simlulate G-force. It's the speed and intensity at which you pitch forward that is going to feel more believable and immersive than your nose touching the steering wheel at 100% brake force.

 

[Spinelli]

I don't agree. I, as well as many reviewers, feel that the nlmv3 tricks the brain into feeling g-forces. In fact, I've even seen quite a few in this very thread mention this (especially when discussing seat mover vs whole platform mover).

If I'm slamming the brakes for a super heavy braking zone, for eg. China's 2nd last corner (at the end of the long back straight), where is the logic in having the nlmv3 brake with the same pitch as that corner but for a corner that doesn't require as heavy braking? Why wouldn't the nlmv3 simply pitch in accordance with deceleration? Seems simple and logical to me.

On the other hand, I am, or at least seem to be getting the desired result for turns. I get much more left/right lean/"yaw" for high g-force corners like turns 1 and 2 @ Automobilista's Buenos Aires #9 circuit than I do for slower / lower g-force corners. And, perhaps more importantly, I feel that lean slowly straighten-out or adjust as that g-force unwinds unlike the braking which feels more on/off and does not slowly straighten out as I slowly lift off the brake as I'm trailbraking into the corner.

I think it's just a matter of telling the nlm to base more of it's output on actual g-forces. The nlm is "connected" to the games' physics/telemetry so this should be doable.

 

[wijnants_d]

I'm looking to buy a motion rig, but drowning in the possibilities...
What's the main reason you choose the NLR above the Reality P3?

 

[Mascot]

I'm looking to buy a motion rig, but drowning in the possibilities...
What's the main reason you choose the NLR above the Reality P3?

For me it was a few things.

• The NLV3 receives almost universal glowing reviews, whereas I'd read about a couple of nightmare stories about the DOF Reality unit on specialist forums (some cheap components used, eg the taction loss wheels - now fixed, apparently).
• The comfort of buying from Amazon in the UK as opposed to a small company in Eastern Europe, and the geographical ease of resolving any issues that may occur.
• At this level of investment/tech a seat mover is more appropriate than a fully mobile rig (less weight to shift around).
• The DOF Reality unit wasn't as cheap as it first appeared once currency conversion and import duty were added.
• The NLV3 software is easy to use, powerful and flexible.
• I wanted an 80/20 rig for future expansion/motion capability, the DOF Reality unit tied me into their sub-frame.
• Traction loss was a big draw of the DR but the NLV3 does a fantastic job of fooling your brain about this, especially in VR.

I got my NLV3 for about £1,800 in the end and haven't regretted it once. I'm sure there are a lot of satisfied DR customers too. Both seem to be great, affordable options so the choice is all down to personal preference really.

 

[Jeremy Ford]

I'm looking to buy a motion rig, but drowning in the possibilities...
What's the main reason you choose the NLR above the Reality P3?

I have a NLV3 mounted on aluminium profile. It's great, but I may not have bought the NLV3 if my sim cockpit developed differently. The NLV3 is a perfect match for aluminium profile, but wouldn't work easily on another off the self sim rig outside of the *Next Level cockpit. Be aware the NLV3 bias is due to a few us on the forum with aluminium profile cockpits.

*The current Next Level cockpit is trash by the way, they do have a more sturdy one coming later this year.

If I planned to go with motion and had a incompatible cockpit to start with I would have seriously considered a ProSimu motion setup which is a complete build which avoids the hassle of working out a custom mounting solution and non-standard seat mounting holes on the NLV3. I'm not dissing the NLV3, I'm totally happy with mine and recommend it too as long as you avoid the current NL cockpit. But then that begs the question of aluminium profile and getting past the mounting part.

What I'm eluding too is it may depend on where you're currently at with your current sim rig if you even have one.

 

[RobertR1]

The ProSimu videos I've seen are quite noisy which would be a major concern for me as I would only play after the kids are asleep.

 

[Mascot]

The ProSimu videos I've seen are quite noisy which would be a major concern for me as I would only play after the kids are asleep.

Yeah, the chirping really put me off when I was researching, but I *think* they have new budgie-free actuators now.

 

[anton_Chez]

I second the opinions of the fella's above. I am in Australia so getting anything here is a hassle. Next Level has a local distributor here and made getting into motion totally easy. I had a Next Level cockpit from when I decided I'd like to get into sim racing and it just flowed from there. The static rig I had was actually better than the one that comes bundled with the V3 because it has less moving parts and adjustments.

It's a great piece of kit and does exactly what it's designed to do and marketed as doing. It's clean, good looking, quiet, powerful and easy to use. With the plates that come with the bundled cockpit, it wouldn't be too hard to retrofit the platform to an existing wheel stand or even a semi desk setup, although I wouldn't recommend it. First is a good quality chassis before motion, definitely. You're going to get a poor motion experience if you have a substandard chassis, so look after that part first and go from there. Luckily, the best and most versatile (to me, and many others) chassis you can build is one out of 80 / 20 profile, which the V3 works well with. You have many examples here at RD if you need help to mount one. This type of chassis suits static as well as seat mover AND full chassis motion with little effort to chop and change between once you have the core built. It also is capable of housing high end equipment with many mounting options and all the strength and rigidity you could hope for. When considering motion, it's only natural to also consider high end equipment in the future, if you haven't got some of it already.

I think the more appropriate question when looking for a seat mover is, which companies aluminium profile chassis should I choose to combine with my V3, or should I build one myself. The jump from static to motion is great but it's only as good as what it's connected to. In my opinion.