Spinelli, I watched most of the video but I can't say that I have felt what you are describing. Also went form Argon OSW 2500, the 5000 20Nm mige encoder to sc1 with 30Nm Mige and Biss C to the SC2 pro. I believe that they are torque driven as it is, the position is only used for feedback to the game to get steering angle. Position is also internally used inside the controller as far as I know but to calculate effects, not to try and move the wheel to a position.
You also describe how it is unrealistic how the wheel behaves and then show footage from a formula car. I can't say that what I am seeing looks completely unrealistic. You put some lock on a wheel and let it go on an openwheeler like that and it's going to bounce back at you, driven by the speed of the front tires centering. It seems to be trying to demonstrate something as unrealistic by driving in a way that wouldn't be done. To me, from accidents I have seen footage from, a wheel snapping like that on that kind of vehicle is not uncommon. If it is unrealistic, who drives like that to care? Perhaps the sims are not modelling resistence in the steering rack then yes, perhaps it goes faster than it would but it's still a use case that shouldnt worry the majority of us.
You're not getting it. I'm only letting go of the wheel to try and show the insane immediacy of the wheel. You don't drive around cars and have the wheel automatically correct the car for you at practically the speed of light. The driver needs to apply the inputs and use his/her own skill to correct the car. Yes, of course the wheel does this automatically too in real-life but nothing like in our sims. Also, it's not just the immediacy of the wheel, it's the constant force also which can't be seen in the video (but I tried describing in the first 2 minutes). It's nothing like a real car. I don't know how anyone could even begin to think that's even close to realistic. Just because the rear of a car slides away from you doesn't mean your wheel should want to snap with the force of a thousand bears as if you just smashed into the wall. Yes, the wheel snap like that from accidents is realistic, you're right, from
accidents - smashing into a wall - not from normal driving.
I remember doing a test where I set the wheel to only 7 Nm (give or take 1 Nm) and drove the Abarth Fiat 500 in Assetto Corsa and it was ridiculous how overly powerful the SAT on that car was relative to all the other forces. My friend owns the identical car and it's like 15% as powerful in that regard (SAT) as in the game with a DD wheel. The problem is if you lower overall FFB forces to make the SAT forces much more realistic then you'll be driving with way, way too low overall forces.
A big thing is the constant force being applied in the opposite lock direction but this can't be seen in the video. The constant overly powerful force being applied wanting to rotate the wheel all the way to the end stops while the car/driver is in a state of holding and playing with slip-angles is incredibly unrealistic. You can even see this slightly in some moments in the video when the wheel does fully turn all the way to lock and is bouncing off the lock with finger-snapping power. Sliding a car in real-life doesn't mean the wheel wants to rotate with the power to crush your fingers into a pancake. There have even been times where I felt it was best to fully let go of the wheel - exactly like what you do in a bad accident - just because I got to the point where I realized I couldn't save the car anymore and was going to spin because of the insanely disproportionately powerful force.
Another thing that's incredibly unrealistic is how the FFB is always so "springy." In real life, just because it may take a lot of effort to turn the wheel from angle x to angle y doesn't necessarily mean that the wheel should then want to return back to angle x at the same speed & power - it simply doesn't work like that in real-life. In-game though, you always have this insane force wanting to return to centre. I've driven old cars as well as race cars that required tons of force to turn the wheel but there wasn't anywhere near that same amount of force trying to "spring" the wheel back to centre; however, in our games, it always seems to be the same (or thereabouts) both in both ways. I've never been able to replicate this anywhere near realistic with games and DD-wheels.
FFB tech is prehistoric and fundamentally flawed:
- Microsoft Direct Input tech alone is a limitation with regards to FFB potential. Even the iRacing guys know this, even the Simucube 2 guys know this, and many other "FFB gurus" in the simracing scene that I've spoken to. Microsoft D.I. is 1990s tech and barely touched since and was never intended to be used with such highly advanced and powerful machinery like DD wheels.
- Aside from Microsoft D.I., fundamental FFB is simply flawed as it is also due to the other 2 points I mentioned above (torque-based motor control VS velocity and/or position based, passive/reactive steering system VS active). Implementing these would be extremely complex but it's yet 2 more fundamentals of steering of game FFB that are flawed relative to real-life "FFB"
- I also suggest reading the fundamental flaws of FFB that Leo Bodnar himself wrote in an article years back (available in PDF somewhere on this site I think).
- Furthermore, of that, basically every real life driver I've ever seen or heard about trying DD wheels always said they needed to lower the power from the apparent "realistic" power setting as the overall behavior is overly aggressive, powerful and simply unrealistic.
- Also,, real life steering systems have way, way, way, way more mass and inertia than our systems. Software inertia filters help but it's not the same.
- Finally, what happens in our powerful DD systems if we put a heavier wheel on? Does the FFB simply slow down and react softer, slower, etc. because of the added weight like it should and would in real life? No. What
actually happens is the wheel applies
more power to try and make up for that extra weight (unless you're in a power/torque clipping situation) because the wheel is trying to get to a certain point in a certain amount of time. This fundamental logic itself is the
complete opposite to real-life...Just this point
alone shows how flawed and unrealistic FFB tech is before even getting to all the other things mentioned.
I still wouldn't ever give rid of my DD wheel, don't get me wrong
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