Niels Heusinkveld Physics Tools, Aerodynamics Improvements & Reiza

Paul Jeffrey · Mar 1, 2017

Reiza Studios Niels Heusinkveld produces yet another interesting live stream, this time focusing on the more technical aspects of physics development.

Following on from his recent videos showing off the new ACR Camaro and Adelaide released on Saturday for Automobilista, Niels Heusinkveld has again put his mini streaming exodus during 2017 behind him with a short but informative video showing recent developments to his Reiza aero physics spreadsheet, as well as sharing some interesting insights into how Reiza process physics developments for Automobilista.

Now I appreciate many readers here probably won't be interested in this video, however I still think it contains some key insights and is worth sharing with those of you of a more technical nature. Watching footage like this from Heusinkveld never fails to impress me how much detail the people behind the physics for sim racing games have to go into in order to provide a realistic racing experience for players of their games. Hopefully in releasing this short 40 minute video Heusinkveld can achieve his aim of shining some light on the often dark and mysterious science that is car creation for a modern racing simulator.

Automobilista is a PC exclusive racing game from Reiza Studios available to purchase right now.

The Automobilista sub forum here at RaceDepartment is the place to go for the very latest news and discussions regarding the simulation. Hang out with fellow community members, download a mod or two or simply enjoy the great online racing in one of our Racing Club and League events. The Automobilista forum here at RaceDepartment is the place to go!

Did you enjoy the latest Heusinkveld video? Let us know in the comments section below!

Boby Kim · Mar 1, 2017

Havent watched it yet but i'll surely give it a try

. This is also why i love Reiza...they share their passion with the community no matter how deep and technical the info is. In the real world physics are fixed to rules but to translate physics from a 3D - 4 dimensional world into a 2D matrix is a neverending search for satusfaction: Niels....artists are tortured souls.
Thanks Niels and Reiza. I love AMS and i love Reiza

Kurupt CDN · Mar 1, 2017

Niels is a physics guru!!!!
Hope one day he will find the time to create a ffb clipping tool so i can dial in my wheel settings

Paulo Gomes · Mar 1, 2017

Its always nice to spend some time and view this "virtual" engineering videos from Neils. I will leave here some other interesting videos and links about vehicle dynamics,

In this video from minute 8/10 prof. David Limebeer explains that a tyre model should a good balance of simplification and preservation of model accuracy, and maybe that's why Neils probably prefers to work with the tyre model based in rf1 and not rf2, at least is the idea I have.

And thanks to the internet, nowadays founding informating is not the problem, but selecting the correct information is. So from this video you can find a good and interesting 32 lessons videos from Dr.R.Krishnakumar about veicule dynamics in general, for someone that wants to be a better guru about this subject is a fast way to get some knowledge, from the standpoint that a engineering degree takes some good years of studing.

This one is about tire modeling simulation by formula student teams, and very interesting for "our" world, and again, simplicity of the model is a very huge part for creating a good/reliable simulation.

Jriv012 · Mar 1, 2017

1. I solemnly declare I watched the whole thing
2. Due to enough background, I understood a lot of it
3. It is the first time ever in my life I spend 45m watching you tube of a spreadsheet...

What I found fascinating the most was Niels' ability to reconnect with reality half through a complex analysis of numbers, and keeping it down to earthy behavior of a car, avoiding letting the numbers separating him from the reality he is trying to represent or replicate.

I also think his humility, engineering humility I should say, is pretty cool in describing the process and the limitations of simulating real life in computer programming.

Since I had the opportunity to drive the boxer cups quite a bit during the weekend, getting ready for the change, and the new physics yesterday, this is sweet; I try to understand the feeling I got driving the new ones based on his explanation of changes.

All very cool, and my respect for these guys -sim racing developers- in general, and for Reiza as a professional team, has growth even more.

In the end, though, they continue to be Crusaders, looking for the Holy Grail of the perfect representation of a real life car in a computer screen; which we all know they will probably never achieve, but heck it's fun to see how hard they try, and to enjoy the product of their work.

Thanks, Niels, and RD for sharing.