You can see here how this thing is built: https://www.asetek.com/simsports/knowledge-base/forte-swapping-elastomers/
My initial assumption was the following: the brake pedal pushes into the elastomer and the elastomer pushes into the load cell, which measures the exact force (up to 180 kg) that your foot acts upon the brake pedal. The elastomer is mainly there to provide a softer feel. The little spring inside the elastomer is there to simulate the "soft" part of braking, before the calipers touch the disk.
Now I figured out this is NOT the case. The elastomer is NOT pushing against a load cell, it's pushing against a solid wall. The spring within the elastomer however IS pushing against a very small and much weaker load cell. If you remove the spring, your braking inputs will not register. If you remove the elastomer the brake will be very soft and register almost linearly throughout all 50mm of travel. So essentially, you are squeezing an elastomer with your pedal. The further you squeeze the elastomer the stronger you will push the spring into the load cell.
Everyone knows that the strength required to compress any object increases exponentially in respect to distance travelled, which is exactly what you get with this pedal. You push the pedal with a force of 2kg to get 25% braking power, you push maybe 10kg to get 50%, you push your entire bodyweight to get 75%, and 100% will require a metric ton of force. Of course you can recalibrate it, so it only works from 0-10kg, but that doesn't take away the exponential nature of it.
Also, the elastomer has some kind of memory effect. It decompresses rather slowly towards the end. If you push the brake pedal with maximal force for about 5 seconds and release it, the braking force goes from 100% down to 5% instantly and then very, very slowly begins to creep down to 0% and stays there. In a racing scenario you'd have to shift your deadzone to compensate for that, else you'd be accelerating out of every corner with the brakes applied 2-3%.
I am new to the sim racing scene, however having a very good grasp on physics and having an engineers mindset I would allow myself to call this pedal broken. Not only broken, but an absolute scam. The fact that the manufacturer lies to his customer about how the brakes function makes it infinitely worse. This is what it says in the manual:
The brake cylinder features a load cell sensor (up to 180 kg of pedal
force) detecting actual changes in force on the pedal plate,
which makes it the closest you will come to a realistic brake
experience.
False. The force on the pedal plate and the force on the load cell are not linearly correlated.
The load-cell ensures accurate and precise measurement in
kilos, and measures force rather than travel.
False. The load-cell measures compression of the spring which compresses in unison with the elastomer. To be precise: it measures force exerted by a small spring, however, since springs have a linear relationship between force and displacement, it directly translates into measuring travel of the squeezed elastomer, not force.
As mentioned in Section
4.2.3, the elastomer does not make a difference to pedal travel.
Only how much force is required to get through the “soft stage”
and enter the “hard stage”.
This is a bold faced lie. The elastomer determines pedal travel. Remove it, and you have 50mm pedal travel. This is sickening. I have never witnessed such a malignant marketing lie. Somebody should sue them.
The manual: https://www.asetek.com/simsports/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Forte-S-Series-Manual-v01-1.pdf
My initial assumption was the following: the brake pedal pushes into the elastomer and the elastomer pushes into the load cell, which measures the exact force (up to 180 kg) that your foot acts upon the brake pedal. The elastomer is mainly there to provide a softer feel. The little spring inside the elastomer is there to simulate the "soft" part of braking, before the calipers touch the disk.
Now I figured out this is NOT the case. The elastomer is NOT pushing against a load cell, it's pushing against a solid wall. The spring within the elastomer however IS pushing against a very small and much weaker load cell. If you remove the spring, your braking inputs will not register. If you remove the elastomer the brake will be very soft and register almost linearly throughout all 50mm of travel. So essentially, you are squeezing an elastomer with your pedal. The further you squeeze the elastomer the stronger you will push the spring into the load cell.
Everyone knows that the strength required to compress any object increases exponentially in respect to distance travelled, which is exactly what you get with this pedal. You push the pedal with a force of 2kg to get 25% braking power, you push maybe 10kg to get 50%, you push your entire bodyweight to get 75%, and 100% will require a metric ton of force. Of course you can recalibrate it, so it only works from 0-10kg, but that doesn't take away the exponential nature of it.
Also, the elastomer has some kind of memory effect. It decompresses rather slowly towards the end. If you push the brake pedal with maximal force for about 5 seconds and release it, the braking force goes from 100% down to 5% instantly and then very, very slowly begins to creep down to 0% and stays there. In a racing scenario you'd have to shift your deadzone to compensate for that, else you'd be accelerating out of every corner with the brakes applied 2-3%.
I am new to the sim racing scene, however having a very good grasp on physics and having an engineers mindset I would allow myself to call this pedal broken. Not only broken, but an absolute scam. The fact that the manufacturer lies to his customer about how the brakes function makes it infinitely worse. This is what it says in the manual:
The brake cylinder features a load cell sensor (up to 180 kg of pedal
force) detecting actual changes in force on the pedal plate,
which makes it the closest you will come to a realistic brake
experience.
False. The force on the pedal plate and the force on the load cell are not linearly correlated.
The load-cell ensures accurate and precise measurement in
kilos, and measures force rather than travel.
False. The load-cell measures compression of the spring which compresses in unison with the elastomer. To be precise: it measures force exerted by a small spring, however, since springs have a linear relationship between force and displacement, it directly translates into measuring travel of the squeezed elastomer, not force.
As mentioned in Section
4.2.3, the elastomer does not make a difference to pedal travel.
Only how much force is required to get through the “soft stage”
and enter the “hard stage”.
This is a bold faced lie. The elastomer determines pedal travel. Remove it, and you have 50mm pedal travel. This is sickening. I have never witnessed such a malignant marketing lie. Somebody should sue them.
The manual: https://www.asetek.com/simsports/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Forte-S-Series-Manual-v01-1.pdf