SimRacing.org.uk

(https://i.postimg.cc/VkX3MJnr/Bikernieki-test-race.png)

Many of you will be aware I've been trying to get these raced for some time now - well now's my chance ;)

For those who haven't driven (or heard of) Formula Easter cars they are a Soviet Formula dating back to the late 1960's- essentially the Lada powered equivalent to Formula Ford except they were allowed Slicks and Wings.
They may not be powerful but they achieve very good lap times and make for fantastic close racing

All cars use the same 4 speed gearbox and 1.3l Lada engine with the various manufacturers then free to build what they want within the rules, given that nearly all cars from the period were built in garages the engineering done was fairly unbelievable if you compare the Soviet budgets with western race series!

All car makes in the mod lap at pretty much the same speed, but to simplify things while I learn my way around the server this race only uses the MTX1-03 cars. You'll find a big selection of them on the server due to the way this car mod was designed - they're all the same physics but have different wheel designs. Unfortunatley this means the setups are saved in different folders for the different car variants.
I recommend learning where the setups are saved and copying what you choose to run with between all of the 1-03 setup folders for incase your choice is fully taken on race night.

If successful I'll plan a further test race using all of the cars and allowing people to choose cars/paint jobs to ensure I get that right if we run a series.

Over to the race announcement:

Password: see above (#post_event_password)

Practice: 19:30 (45 mins)
Qual: 20:15 (15 mins)
Race: 20:30  (2x 20 mins - 2nd race is reversed grid)
(20mins plus 1 lap)

Cars allowed:
Metalex MTX1-03 (B & C)

Download link: https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/metalex-mtx1-03.11851/



Track: Bikernieki Circuit of Speed

Download link: https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/bikernieki-race-track.17186/


Live Timing: stracker.simracing.org.uk:50041/lapstat (http://stracker.simracing.org.uk:50041/lapstat)

Time of Day Setting: 14:30
Weather: Mid-clear
Start: Standing
Tyre wear: Normal
Fuel consumption: Normal
Pit-stops: Not required

Server track settings:
SESSION_START=100
RANDOMNESS=0
LAP_GAIN=0
SESSION_TRANSFER=N/a

Damage: 60%

Password: see above (#post_event_password)

PLP App - Not used in this series. Cutting will be monitored on replay and penalties issued for excessive cutting.




Here's a link to a test race against the AI to give you an idea :)

https://youtu.be/1OzXZafLkns (https://youtu.be/1OzXZafLkns)

looks good,  not tried formula easter but its single make / identical cars?

For this race yes - for the series no.
All cars have almost the same performance but different handling I found. At Bikernieki I have the entire line up lapping within 0.2 or so of a second on tuned setups.

With a good grid they won't disappoint 8)

not sure I can make this one. Ive signed up for an ACC race Tuesday and got the GTLegends race Thursday, so trying to fit a new car and new track combo between the two is a big ask  :-\ not to mention causing marital strife of 3 nights consecutive races  :P

If I can find some time i'll try and be there.

edit: that track convert looks amazing on the download page video  8)

Charade GTlegends race is 2 weeks away - stop making excuses :P

oh is it? didn't realise it was a bi-weekly series. in that case see you Wednesday  ;D

I want to try it, been playing a lot of ACC lately trying to "git gud" at that,  but nothing beats a good historic with some AC VR lovin... 

Any setup pointers? Gearing was completely off on default, so I assume the rest is as well :).

Never had this much fun anything with Lada engine, can't wait 4 racing.... My lap times sucks but they always do.  ;D

I see a good number of times popping up now  :)

Lots of you are opting for the 3b r3 I've got my time set in.
Just to reiterate - all 3b chassis have the same physics, they just have different physical wheel models.
Reading the description it suggests the 3c's are faster, although my own testing has never shown a difference (and I normally prefer the RAF80 anyway ;))

I've now chucked a race setup together which I'll share in a bit.  Many of you won't like the handling, but it'll give you a decent gear set, the right fuel load, and a direction for your own tuning.

If the test race process popular I'll run these as my 2nd series to get as much time as possible to attract a decent grid!

This is my current race setup.
It's good for the 20mins +1 lap I have each race set to on the server, and has much better gearing than the stock setup.
1st is only needed at the start - remember these are old 8 valve engines so have tonnes of torque to do the hairpin in 2nd ;)

I have a lot of lift off over steer - to reduce that you can try upping the coast % for the differential or adding more wing. The latter will obviously cost you in speed though.

This setup will work in any MTX1-03b and should work just as well in the 3c's as I'm not aware of any differences in setup options :)

https://www.dropbox.com/s/4q0q38miwkcqz2m/mtx103%20bikernieki.rar?dl=0 (https://www.dropbox.com/s/4q0q38miwkcqz2m/mtx103%20bikernieki.rar?dl=0)

With no prospect of any work for at least the next few months, I'm hoping to spend more time on track.

These seem like a lot of fun but my lap times are way off decent. Thanks for the setup FMG I'll give it a go  :thumbup1:

well I was going to practice but the server went where?

I was on it at 8:55 this evening so it was there.

n/m then...

You were right FMG. These are better suited for racing than the Formula Ford's. These can be thrown around as a kart. Pretty nice indeed.

I made just few laps with almost default setup to get the feeling of it.
Nice handling indeed, they have some sort of karty feeling, I like it.

Looking forward for tomorrow.

Well I found the server tonight,  IDK what the heck was up last night but I looked several times and it just never appeared in the list for me using the .org.uk seach :-(


Anyway, I was sucking and not fast so far but I'll race anyway, I think I just need to adapt to the cars  :)

Now I did some more laps, fiddled with the setup to make it more to my liking and got to the lower half of the 23s,  so I guess that'll do for tonight.


BTW,  did anyone else notice a weird FFB vibration, if you spin off and then start moving really slow I get a horrid vibration until the speed gets up a bit.  Its not engine speed as dipping the clutch does nothing.  Lucky it only does it in those rare circumstances so I'm just going to ignore it...



edit: lol, 33s is bad, 23s!

Yes, I have also these weird vibrations.

I have no clue on how to setup those little things, but I'll try to make a tourist visit tonight.

Check page 1 - I've got my setup uploaded there  :)

Gosh, wish I was only 1 second of the pace  :-[ :-[

Is it me or password doesn't work ?

Same for me

Server is up. Password should be the same as above?

I'll go double check the server file, but that was copied in when I set the race up..

Sorry. my mistake - fat fingers :-[

Server restarted

Ok now it works for me

Sorry, cant race. Another Windows failure here... >:(

Hi all,

Fun races, especially race 1 fighting against Peter.

Race 2 was a bit of a mess, I was surprised by some cars going slow on last corner and I saw maybe a bit of too optimistic gap there. As said on race's chat sorry for that.

Car was fun, the short circuit allows also to have a tight pack. What I noticed is that car are larger than you think and therefore not so easy to overtake on Bikernieki.

cheers

eeehh,  not sure what happened but my good setup from offline testing turned into a understeering pig in qually / race 1, leading to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0TqAA_AK7s
so I tweaked the front ARB for race 2 and it all went much better,  although it did feel a bit like cheating starting 7th after my poor race 1 result...


Definitely would race them more, they are fun but challenging cars, totally not what I normally like as they don't like a loose turn in type setup which I prefer but ok,  there's always space to learn something new.  Preferably not on any really tight tracks though, T1 at biker was a nightmare, either grip or die with not much in between - slightly faster turns were good!

yeah i hated turn 1 last night, the car was always trying to spin me out there and did on two occasions. Tried a variety of ARB settings to dial it out but it still didnt like that turn much.

Cars were good fun when dueling in a pack or chasing someone. I didnt like them at first as felt slow compared to the f1 '75 cars but my mind adjusted to them more for the 2nd race. As long as a decent grid like last night then would be fun racing them. The problem is that as they are 'momentum' cars like a Kart, you have to follow the car ahead within inches and if they hesitate or brake when you dont expect it then contacts can occur, so might see more of that in a series. There was a bit of chopping going on last night too so some drivers need to be aware of that to avoid incidents.

Never got a chance to try any car other than the one i chose, dont know what differences there are between them all?

Really enjoyed these cars, though a little wary with other cars around as with all single seaters. First race was clean and enjoyable, found I was on good pace until the last few corners which I struggled to get right, so was losing a little time there at the end of each lap.


I was being cautious there on the first lap with many cars around, but no worries. Soon after that I got caught up in another incident and lost a lot of time, and eventually retired after beaching myself on a kerb.. Would happily race these again though.

Congrats podiums, and virtual handshake to Maxime - many years since we last raced together, nice to see you on track again my friend.

First of all sry guys in 2nd race : I had attacked Jari turn 4 or 5, it was a bit of a torpedoe attack even if I was a bit ahead when he got on the apex (didn't see me I guess) but overall my try was quite opimistic... ^^ We got a rather strong side by side contact, I kept control but he lost some time due to that. Then i wanted to let him pass, started to slow down while checking my mirrors, I wasn't sure which car I had to let pass, so that my driving was messy,, it was a bad choice from me, I'd better had waited for the S/L.  Sorry all !

1st race was a nice surprise as I found a bit of pace. Thank you Tim for your setup, but I didn't try it more than a couple laps as it was horrible in my hands, that's funny how we can setup our cars that differently. :)

And yes it was very nice to drive with you again Frex, after all those years.  8) ;)

A interesting car, maybe more close to a kart than a car, having a very direct steering. I like the car because it is very unstable and reactive, so much lift-off oversteer, almost with my setup (I had wing 2).

Race 1: I started well but did some mistake at turn one so I lost some positions. Then I was behind Maxime, but he was very hard to pass, a real ice-man.  8)

Race 2: a bit of mess on first 2 laps, I took the second position and and kept it until the end.

I was surprised how my car control was improved so much since the first day of testing. As soon as I tested the car it seemed almost undriveable; however, especially in the race, I did several huge oversteers in exit (mostly in the fast right corner Kinostudija).

Not normally a fan of historic cars but this car is fun especially as it is similar to a kart. FMG what are your thoughts on trying it on a track like Brands Hatch Indy?

Speaking from the experience of having driven, spun, and narrowly avoiding crashing Formula Fords I would describe these as pretty kind in single seater terms :D
If there's any interest then I can run the Formula Ford stuff for a test round and you'll see what I mean, when I tried it I thought the author had nailed the handling it's so sharp and unforgiving.

Circuit-wise I have a very suitable line up for these, but some I'll need to test on the server first to make sure they work properly - should do as AI races work...

The cars in this race were all the same Chassis, the only difference between them was the wheel style. It's possible the 03c's were faster than the 03b's as they were in real life, but in my experience they've always been identical in AC.

For the full series I'll be running all of the makes from the mod, as listed below - these have different characteristics and date from differing time periods but in testing I've done over the past few years they give almost identical laptimes around Bikernieki and some of the other soviet tracks I've lined up for you all. Again, I'll want to run some off line car Vs car tests before the series kicks off to ensure none of the cars suddenly gain an advantage on any of the faster or twistier circuits (Biker is mid-way I'd say).



I'm not adverse to a fun race there (maybe when I allow you all to chose from the full line up of cars), but I already have a full calender of 'Soviet' circuits ready ;)

All the cars are as follows - my only comment for when we head into the series proper (it'll be the 2nd one I run as I want to try and get a decent sized grid and not mess it up) is that the Avia AE2 should only be used by the slowest drivers. It isn't actually faster than the other cars, but the base setup was the closest to being fast out of the box so would give a fast guy an advantage - that said as no-one can drive my setups it might actually be rubbish for the rest of you ;D.

Avia AE2                          = https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/avia-ae2.11850/ (https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/avia-ae2.11850/)

Estonia 20 (conventional)    = https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/estonia-20.15375/ (https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/estonia-20.15375/)

Estonia 21 (ground effects) = https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/estonia-21.13405/ (https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/estonia-21.13405/)

Metalex MTX1-03              = https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/metalex-mtx1-03.11851/ (https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/metalex-mtx1-03.11851/)

Metalex MTX1-06              = https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/metalex-mtx1-06.20176/ (https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/metalex-mtx1-06.20176/)

Melkus MT77                    = https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/melkus-mt77.18908/ (https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/melkus-mt77.18908/)

RAF 80                            = https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/raf-80.19563/ (https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/raf-80.19563/)


Feel free to try them all out, maybe do so at Brands Indy - I'll use SRW's suggestion for the next test race in them - that way you won't waste any setups you create :) Brands will be timed so it doesn't coincide with a GTlegends race, just so you don't have any excuses :P


If there's any other feedback then please let me have it - biggest I think is regarding race format. I think the 2x 20 minute races worked really well, as these are single seaters people mostly seemed to be more careful than in previous series on the 2nd race which led to some great action. My worry is these could be boring over 40odd minutes once the field breaks up so I'm not too sure about longer single races..


* edited to remove Avia AF87 as it's a 1.6

I agree on the 2x20, any longer would be boring unless you had 30 car whizzing around to keep the action going.

agreed, 2x20 works perfectly for these cars, and reverse grid for race 2 always adds some fun to it  :)


I may be being overly critical of the slow turn behaviour, but damn that's a small window for error, the tiniest over-rotation = clumsy spin, yet  slightly faster turns you can easily get away with it. It wont stop me racing them though  ;)

I would imagine a much tighter diff + softer rear ARB + maybe softer rear springs would help.
But then it'd be a pig in the fast stuff without some serious work to the toe ;)

It's the torque that does it in these, it's much harder to spin at high revs in 1st on that corner - but also much slower due to the extra gearchange and having to feather the throttle.

I like it - makes me have to think about driving properly :)