(WIP)Test - Tyre Grip Tuning for the 500cc Varase....

[girlracerTracey]

Found quite an interesting article by Dennis Noyes. Thought this might be topical to this discussion.

"IT'S ALL KENNY ROBERTS' FAULT - For a quarter-century, dirt track was training ground for top-level Grand Prix racing."

http://www.cycleworld.com/2014/01/10/dirt-track-training-with-kenny-roberts-and-influence-on-top-level-grand-prix-racing/

Extracted quote:

Before Roberts, GP riders generally moved up through the classes, and 250s were the best preparation for the move to 500s. But after Roberts, classic 250cc style, based on corner speed and smoothness, was no longer the way to ride. Japanese team bosses no longer looked for future 500cc riders in the 250cc class. Winning at Springfield or DuQuoin on a four stroke 750cc twin became a better indication of potential success on a 500 than a 250cc title.
Brilliant 250cc riders like Carlos Lavado, Anton Mang, Christian Sarron, Sito Pons, and others were unable to adapt to 500s. Sarron, who had a single 500cc win, was brilliant as long as his tires were fresh. In 1988, he ran up a string of five-consecutive pole positions on a Yamaha 500 and finished fourth overall behind Eddie Lawson, Wayne Gardner, and Wayne Rainey. But Roberts, then in his first year as team owner of the Lucky Strike Yamaha team of Rainey and Kevin Magee, said in an interview that year, "That 250 style can get you on the pole, but when the tires are worn, you are f____d."

The proper 500cc style as practiced and later preached by Roberts, based on rear-wheel steering and sacrificing entry speed to fire the bike out of corners, crossed-up and spinning, was described by the brilliant Spanish engineer, the late Antonio Cobas (designer of the now-ubiquitous twin-spar frame), as "aberrant."
"The 500cc is, in itself, an aberration of motorcycle design...far too much power for the traction available, and so the rider must be constantly on the verge of crashing on corner exit," Cobas told me in an interview about Roberts' style after he has spent a session observing Roberts at the Bugatti left-hander at the Spanish Grand Prix at Jarama in the late '70s.
It became a given during the last 23 years of the 500cc class, from 1978 until Valentino Rossi's first premier-class title in 2001, coinciding with the last year of 500s before the introduction of big-bore MotoGP four-strokes, that the best way to learn to ride a 500 was to race dirt track.

We will never see that again. Traction control is never really going away and, even if it were banned, as in Formula 1, mapping options soften and spread and civilize four-stroke power. When a rider trusts traction control to save him and it, for one reason or another, isn't there, he will, to use the colorful Spanish description of a high-side crash "fly over the ears [of the horse] like a rag doll." We saw that in 2011 at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca when Jorge Lorenzo forgot, after performing a start following second practice, he had to downshift to activate TC on the Yamaha. We also saw it at Indianapolis last year when Ben Spies forgot that the Ducati must be shifted into second to activate TC, and we saw it most dramatically at Aragon when light contact between Marquez and Pedrosa cut the rear-wheel speed-sensor cable, leaving Pedrosa with 260 unfettered, unfiltered horsepower in his throttle hand. Over the ears like a rag doll.

Unquote

[HornetMaX]

I guess with the "varese" physics we are talking about mototorcycle performance figures that were based on the Cagiva grand prix bike from 1992/3 however?   

Well, the varese physics is ... for the varese, so yes, cagiva. Not comparable to rossi's 2011 2001 (sorry, typo).

This is becoming the same discussion all over again.
The 500 is shit around corners and it's terrible on small tracks. I want a bike that is fun to ride even if that means that it is a second faster than the real record.

Ride the 250, it's surely better for small tracks. Small tracks for a 500cc = no good.

But since you want to stick to the numbers and keep the outdated tyre and frame technology, how about somebody makes a Suter 500 which has up-to-date Moto2 chassis, brakes, suspension, tyres and a 200hp V4 (at 129 kg fully fueled) so that we can have WSS corner speeds (even faster actually) without interferring with the numbers.
To me this is unnecessary, just copy the NSR with higher corner speed and call it Suter 500.

Be my guest and do it, no problem with that.
You can even make it 100Kg for 250hp with 2035's technology tires if that's funnier for you. GPB is moddable, anyone can play with it.

MaX.

[EdouardB]

In real life, whilst a rear wheel slide was a challenging thing to control on a 500, I honestly think it would have been more controllable than it is in gpbikes.

I don't know. In real life, on a 1992 TZ 250, I've been on the ground before I understood much of what happened with the rear wheel. I suspect it's probably worse on a 500 It went like this for me in about 0,2/0,3s: oh, my wheel is sliding, give less throttle, oh fuck I'm on my elbow already, SHRRRRRRR (insert bike sliding on the ground sound here).

To make it worse, I crashed in front of Christian Sarron.

By the way I disagree about what Dennis Noyes said about Christian: he was 3rd in the 500 overall twice so he adapted really good to the 500. He told me he would make the rear slide a lot. And his race endings with worn tyres were really good. His problem (he says it himself) is that he was a very very bad starter, and that he crashed too much. Really too much (17 crashes in 1 year once).

[EdouardB]

He's a really great guy. He crashed a TZ750 2 weeks ago in Dijon Prenois, too. Won't change

[EdouardB]

I think the question is this: how easy do we want the bike to be?

Because if you want to make it 100% realistic, I'm telling you right now, none of us should be able to have a controlled slide on a 500. None of us would have the skills for it in real life.

I'm glad the game is easier than real life. Otherwise it would be very frustrating with the lack of feedback.

But I think this debate shouldn't be about "how it was in real life and how to make the game closer to it" because it was impossible for an amateur like us in real life. The debate should be about "how unrealistic and easy do we want it to have a good realism/fun ratio".

[EdouardB]

Having said all that, I insist that the current difficulty is just fine

[girlracerTracey]

I don't know. In real life, on a 1992 TZ 250, I've been on the ground before I understood much of what happened with the rear wheel. I suspect it's probably worse on a 500 It went like this for me in about 0,2/0,3s: oh, my wheel is sliding, give less throttle, oh fuck I'm on my elbow already, SHRRRRRRR (insert bike sliding on the ground sound here).

To make it worse, I crashed in front of Christian Sarron.

By the way I disagree about what Dennis Royes said about Christian: he was 3rd in the 500 overall twice so he adapted really good to the 500. He told me he would make the rear slide a lot. And his race endings with worn tyres were really good. His problem (he says it himself) is that he was a very very bad starter, and that he crashed too much. Really too much (17 crashes in 1 year once).

Lol! That's quite a momento to have of the occasion Edouard! 

Christian Sarron is one of my absolute heroes. One of my all time favourites. I have watched pretty much all of his races on the 500 Gauloises Yamaha. Also I have watched videos of many of his 250cc races. Together with Patrick Pons I think they are two of the greatest heroes of European motorcycle racing. Christian really took the fight to the American riders in the '80's. He really made me laugh also..after taking out Freddie Spencer at Assen in the wet in 1985 I just loved the way he shrugged his shoulders cheekily to the camera in guilt..

I think he adapted to the 500s brilliantly as well. But he did only win one 500 grand prix and that was in the pouring rain at Hockenheim in 1985. I suppose that was what Dennis Noyes was alluding to really. And yes Christian did slide the rear because I have him doing it in an old video of my fathers..

So no need to defend Christian Sarron's reputation to me Edouard because I am a huge, huge fan!    He was one of the best..

Well, the varese physics is ... for the varese, so yes, cagiva. Not comparable to rossi's 2011 2001 (sorry, typo).

Yes of course. I suppose the point I was trying to make is that if we are talking about the "varese" physics here, which we are, then the gap in lap-times between the 1992 Cagiva and the modern SBK bikes is even bigger.  Mick Doohan's pole position time for the 1992 Jerez Grand Prix was 1:45.480. John Kocinski was 40 seconds behind Mick Doohan in the race..

So I guess if you translate this to gpbikes the gap between the respective lap times of the 500cc  bikes on the "varese" physics and an SBK bike round Jerez should be quite large..
Apologies Max I didn't phrase my comment very well in my earlier post. 

grT

[JamoZ]

Ok, a different question: Can anybody show me a long, consistent powerslide with a 4T in GPB?

I remember this video from Juju on Beta 1b. There was something in the physics that made the grip transition alot more graduate and more controllable. I miss those days...

http://vimeo.com/63787934

Also, i had a video (forgot to transfer it to my new youtube account ) with slow motion shots of corner entry & exit slides using the 990 & 500 in beta 3. I won`t say it`s easy cos it was not, but it`s not impossible. I haven`t tried such with the current beta as i`m not really not that active anymore online tbh. I`ll go for some similar footage this weekend, but not sure if it can be done with the current version.

I don`t give a rats ass about all the technical yap yap in here, the solution to all your crying is simpler then you think,  just revert the tire grip transition to what it was before beta 4, it was almost perfect at one point, so it can be done again. And i care even less if it`s not right in the "numbers" It just felt good and i had alot more fun & feeling of realism than i have now on the 500 & 990. I can`t really say i started to enjoy the game more after beta 3...

[girlracerTracey]

Well I've never played beta 1, 1b, 2 or 3 but to my mind the fault, if there is a fault , so clearly lies with the "grip transition" of the rear tyre.

I am curious is there anywhere I can download gpbikes beta 1, 2 or 3?

Also as a very cheeky and "tongue in cheek" comment which is meant in good humour to Edouard would Christian Sarron or Kevin McCoy be able to rear wheel steer a 500cc bike in gpbikes beta 4? 

Joking apart I can see both sides of this argument if I am honest. I do want realism. Absolutely I do. As far as realism is possible in a "simulation".   

grT

[Vini]

That is what I am saying, the bike is supposed to be fun to ride and not match the real-world data.

So, where can I get beta3?

Anyway, slides like these are still possible.
But, in my opinion these are more "highside-saves". For me, powerslides are what they are doing in MotoGP out of every corner: Smoothely roll on the throttle and let the rear wheel slide from the apex to the exit of the turn without releasing the throttle and smoothely letting the rear wheel kick in again. Most of the time you don't even notice it, until you see the black lines they put on the track.

[JamoZ]

That is what I am saying, the bike is supposed to be fun to ride and not match the real-world data.

So, where can I get beta3?

Anyway, slides like these are still possible.
But, in my opinion these are more "highside-saves". For me, powerslides are what they are doing in MotoGP out of every corner: Smoothely roll on the throttle and let the rear wheel slide from the apex to the exit of the turn without releasing the throttle and smoothely letting the rear wheel kick in again. Most of the time you don't even notice it, until you see the black lines they put on the track.

100% raw real world data can never work as long as the physics engine isn`t 100% accurate. SMS did the same thing in pCARS with the BAC mono. They factory supplied them with all the data they needed and they put the numbers into the physics engine, which made for very strange behaviour of the car sometimes, so they had to play around with the numbers in able to make it feel convincing. Nothing wrong with that, noone`s physics engine can be perfect...yet.

[Hawk]

Maybe we should not exaggerate the possibility to slide that much....looking into older race videos....only some riders slide and they are doing it not that much....

Sorry mate I totally disagree..... I have seen it with my own eyes at race meets back in the 1980's. Only the very talented/gifted riders seemed to be able to do it at will, others talked about it at the time as though these guys were something very special to be able to do such things with a motorcycle. I think the reason we are finding it hard to find videos of these acts is because it was so long ago and only a very few top guys could ever do it at the time. These days everyone can do it because it's not real, it's all done with massive help from the TC and electronics. Looks great, but it is certainly not an indication of true seat of your pants talent to race a motorcycle. The only guys of the modern era that have impressed me with their natural talent have been Rossi and Stoner... Marquez? Well he's got a long way to go before I'll put him in the same league, impressive though he seems. 

But the point is, these GP riders of that era talk about having to be so careful feeding in that brute power through the corners or you be thrown into space with a high side; so what does that indicate to you? To me it indicates that you cannot just open the throttle in a corner and stay sat in your seat, That makes this 500 Varase we have in GPB sound like an absolute lame duck! And that is being kind! Lol.

@Hawk
Sorry could not get you more infos on the tyres, did not test that much with it due to lack of time and other projects.

No probs mate, but thank you for taking the time to investigate this power slide issue and provide the information you already have.... Appreciate it, C. 

HawK.

[Hawk]

P.S. I have to say though I did like Hawk's looser rear end that I tried last night..if you'll pardon the expression..

Hehe 

Seems people want a bigger experience.... I'll have to loosen the rear end more later tonight to allow it to slide more easily.   

Hawk.

[BOBR6 84]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlnTvfap4fo

[EdouardB]

Also as a very cheeky and "tongue in cheek" comment which is meant in good humour to Edouard

Don't start this Tracey. I like this kind of comments too much. Just don't.