PCARS Project Cars PS4 FFB settings discussion

Hi all!

I would like to discuss force feedback on your wheel (ffb from now on). I feel this is one of the most important settings to get right as many of you know that a steering wheel is not cheap, but quite a rather steep investment. I'm not just talking about getting the ffb to feel good. There are a million threads saying what settings to use to get an amazing feeling wheel. Believe me, I have read most of em. What I want to make sure you do is to get a wheel setting that does not overwork your wheel. The last thing you want is your precious man toy going the way of the Dodo and leaving an empty space on your desk, empty pockets and a sad little man/women crying in the fetal position. I have seen quite a few wheels pack up and leave like a disgruntled wife with PMS. (Which is never a pretty sight.)
So I will provide my research, findings, suggestions along with all the helpful threads and links that has gotten me to this point on how to set up your wheel so it lasts the distance and feels like a million bucks.

This will be quite the long read but I promise you it will be worth the time you put in.

Note: I'm on the PS4 and I use a Thrustmaster T300 and all my opinions will be based around that wheel on the PS4. So please keep that in mind as some settings may not suit other wheels or PC. But fret not, these settings I feel will also carry over very nicely on other lofi wheels (aka normal retail wheels) such as Logitech g27, Fanatecs,Thrustmasters etc.

If you have an AccuForce, Leo Bodnar or comparable steering wheel, then you can be on your merry way you little trooper you as these wheels can take anything you throw at them. ( Also I hate you )





Get ready for an INFOSPLOSION!
(Skip to page 378 if you just want cold hard settings)
(Stick around if you like magical stories of heartache and amazing triumph!)


Ok backstory - Since the launch of Project CARS I have been searching for the perfect ffb setting. The original default setting (which is now called classic) felt wooden, dull and numb. But at the time still fun as heck as I knew nothing better. Then I a fella named Jack Spade came up with global settings and a formula that produced per car ffb settings. Jack and everybody else reinforcing that Force feedback must be bumped up to 100 to have the desired effects and a suggested tire force setting of 100 and other little tweaks. I tried them and instantly my wheel came alive!
I cannot describe how big a goofy grin I had as I was flying around Bathurst in stupid fast cars. It was bliss. But every now and then my wheel would get really really weak and light with very off putting oscillation/vibration. I put it down as either the wheel having a bit of a hiccup or the game was sending odd signals due to a glitch/bug.

Restarting the game or ps4 would fix the issues I was having, but sure enough an hour later my wheel would lose it's strength and I would have to go through the process again or just deal with it and continue on driving (bad idea).
Slowly these occurrences would start happening earlier and earlier in my driving sessions, to the point that by the third lap in a league race I was getting the issues. I was not a happy camper. Something was wrong and I blamed it on a dodgy wheel or my game patches were not installed properly.

Changes would have to be made, so I decided that it be best to see if I could fix it myself. Watching the ffb telemetry while I drove showed me I was not clipping. Not even on big impacts or curb hits. So again I thought it was the wheel not playing nice. A reinstall of a wheel update from Thrustmaster on PC and a complete reinstall of Project CARS still had no positive effects.
*Rolls up sleeves

Ok, lets try the master force feedback.
90..... still issues
85....more issues
80....there still there
70.... Hello there, I've been driving all night and haven't had a single issue.

But with the ffb so low, Jack Spade's per car settings were not having much effect on the ffb feel and low forces were very minute away. The wheel felt too light and just didn't have the same dynamic feel. Ok we are getting somewhere though.
During the same weekend I stumbled upon a post that someone was having the same problems. A person replied back that once a Thrustmaster wheel reaches a certain motor temperature it goes into "safe mode" and drastically drops it's motor forces to help cool the motor and if temperatures don't improve after a certain amount of the time the wheel will self shutdown with only the fan staying on to cool the motor.

Ding! This makes total sense now. It was neither the game nor the wheel that was malfunctioning, it was the settings that I applied that were causing the issues. The wheel was just struggling to keep up with the work load and would just enter it's "safe mode" every time I reached the critical temperature. This would explain the many people that were getting dead wheel syndrome and the many broken wheel threads and topics popping up.

But now I'm back to square one. My ffb is in no mans land, and it's just not feeling good. So thus began the epic search for other global setups that could compliment Jack Spade's per car ffb settings (as I felt they were spot on) and be safe to use on my wheel without it entering safe mode. Many a different setting were tried and discarded. Almost every time I turned the game on, I had a new setting that I wanted to try. Many people would ask me what I was doing as I drove around a track endlessly. I would say "I'm tuning my setup." They think I'm tuning the car for a perfect setup for the next league race. NOPE, just trying to get a decent ffb feeling. Tire force, relative adjust gains, scoop knees, deadzones, relative adjust bleeds, damper saturation, soft clipping, purple monkey dishwasher etc . Never ending parameters.

Just recently I have found THE setting. I have done many a lap without issues and really feel that I won't find a setting much better. This setting may seem quite light at first. But please don't just disregard it straight away. Give it chance. It has wonderful detail, and you'll wonder how you ever drove with such a heavy and sluggish wheel. You can feel every rise and fall of the road. Curbs become lively. You can feel the springs and the tires working with the car. You can feel what the car is doing. It feels natural and it gives you great information what the car is actually doing.

Again I understand that it's a very subjective topic. Everyone has different opinions on how their wheel should feel driving a car and feel free to change my following suggestions to your hearts content. But one thing I hope you do not change or disregard is your Force Feedback master scale and tire force settings. These play a critical role in how hard your wheel works and having too much force could lower your wheels lifespan and even completely destroy the motor in a short time.

Thus ends this little ffb journey of mine. What follows will be my current setup for ffb. I felt that it was/is extremely important to get these settings out there for everyone to try, and hopefully use as I would hate to see anymore wheels hit the bottom of a trash can and tears hit a cold hard floor.






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GLOBAL FFB SETTINGS


Special Thanks to PureMalt77 at ProjectCARSgame forum who's settings I have used with one slight adjustment to "Deadzone Removal Range".


Controls - Configuration
Steering Deadzone = 0
Steering Sensitivity = 50
Throttle Deadzone = 0
Throttle Sensitivity = 50
Brake Deadzone = 0
Brake Sensitivity = 35
Clutch Deadzone = 5
Clutch Sensitivity = 35
Speed Sensitivity = 0
Controller Filter Sensitivity = 0
Damper Saturation = 0
Force Feedback = 100
RPM/ Gear Display = Yes
Controller Input Mode = 3
Advanced = Off


FFB Calibration
Tire Force = 65
Per Wheel Movement = 0.00
Per Wheel Movement = 0.00
Wheel Position Smoothing = 0.04
Deadzone Removal Range = 0.02
Deadzone Removal Falloff = 0.01
Linkage Scale = 0.00
Linkage Stiffness = 1.00
Linkage Damping = 1.00
Relative Adjust Gain = 1.20
Relative Adjust Bleed = 0.10
Relative Adjust Clamp = 1.10
Scoop Knee = 0.72
Scoop Reduction = 0.35
Soft Clipping (Half Input) = 0.80
Soft Clipping (Full Input) = 1.29
Menu Spring Strength = 0.10
Low Speed Spring Coefficient = 0.50
Low Speed Spring Saturation = 0.75
Steering Gain = 0.75

Note that Force Feedback is back up at 100 but tire force is reduced down to 65. This still gives plenty of detail and dynamic feel without the risk of damaging your wheel.
The soft clipping paramaters allow us to have the ffb at 100 by compressing the data signals to the wheel while still maintaing detailed ffb.


Why is this ffb so good?
It uses mathematical equations to produce a ffb response that is nice and linear. This creates a very smooth and precise feeling wheel.
To try it for yourself with your own wheel, "here is the link that explains everything" with crazy graphs, excel sheets and wheel tests to truly get the most out of your wheel. Told you it was an INFOSPLOSION!


Credit to Diluvian, skoader, VictoriSV, Schnizz58, PTG Ty1er Ward, tpw, STEELJOCKEY, dw123, Jack Spade and anyone else that helped build it.!



Why I changed Deadzone Removal Range?
Every motor in a ffb wheel has a deadzone. A zone where it is unable to generate smaller forces. Some wheels have lots of it. Others don't. To compensate for this we use deadzone removal range. And we just happen to know what each wheel generally has plus or minus a couple clicks. Use the removal range that corresponds with your wheel.
Dead Zone Removal settings for various wheels collected by Lars Rosenquist with the help of WMD members.

Logitech G25: 0.01 - 0.06 (partly depending on new/worn condition)
Logitech G27: 0.16 - profiler strength 100%
Logitech G29: 0.16
Logitech Driving Force GT: 0.03 - 0.05 (values corrected due to forum advice)
Logitech Driving Force Pro: 0.00-0.01

Fanatec CSR: 0.00
Fanatec CSW v2: 0.00
Fanatec 911 GT3 RS v1: 0.06
Fanatec GT2: 0.11
Fanatec Turbo S: 0.09 - 0.1

Thrustmaster T300RS: 0.02

What do all these ffb terms mean and do?
"ffb terms"



"Lengthy discussion on what other t300 settings comunity members are using"










Almost there. You are getting close to driving safely and happily







FFB PER CAR SETTINGS

Now that we have the global settings down. It's time to hit the track and test out the new hotness! I HIGHLY recommend using Jack Spades per car ffb settings.

"Excel Project CARS per car ffb settings"

"PDF Project CARS per car ffb settings"



Plus a link to "Jack Spade FFB Tweaker Files thread" if you want to learn more.

Download either the excel or pdf file.



Click your desired ffb tab




Pick a car and manually input the numbers into the car ffb settings.





Like who?

I suggest you enter these ffb settings while in your garage as you can save the settings for every track. If you save your ffb setting while in the pits on track it will only save those settings at that track. Just like a normal mechanical car tune.

Jack is such a good bloke he even has different parameter modes to choose from. These parameters change the feeling of the ffb slightly, so you are bound to find something that you like.

Parameters include:
Taken from Jack Spade's description of each -

------------------------------------------------------------------------



I personally use the Fy+SopLateral Mix as I find it has a really good feel for what the rear of the car is doing. This allows me to catch the rear of the car earlier if it starts to slide out. Give them all a go and find one you enjoy most.

What do the fx, fy, fz, mz scales mean and do?
"In depth description and guide"

Put simply they relate to the following forces.
Fx = longitudinal force component (braking)
Fy = lateral force component (sideways force when cornering)
Fz = vertical force component (weight transfer, bumps)
Mz = torque around the vertical (Z) axis due to e.g. caster, King Pin Inclination, scrub radius etc.

The numbers represent percent, so 100 = 100% = 1.0

Don't be afraid to fiddle with the fx, fy,fz,mz scales. Increase or decrease to personal taste as the parameters aren't always perfect but are generally pretty damn good. The Master Scale can be used to increase/decrease the overall strength or weakness ffb of the car. If you do increase or decrease the master scale, always keep the SoPScale at the same level as the Master Scale. So if the master scale is at 34. SoPScale will also be at 34.
Remember don't go overboard with too much Master Scale or you'll start overloading your wheel again.









Happy car is happy!


That's it! You made it. Congratulations you fantastic human being!
I really do hope this has helped people out there. Even if just one person out there finds a use for it I will be happy. As I have wasted so much time fiddling with these settings instead of playing Project CARS.

Please let me know if you have any questions or if you feel I have missed something that I could add.

Also I would be very interested in how wheels other than the t300 fair with my suggested settings so we can better hone in settings for other wheels.

Feel free to add settings to this thread that you feel work really well for you and could benefit others. Please keep in mind that if your working hard on the wheel. The wheel is working harder. This thread aims to keep the lifespan high on wheels and the temperature low.

I'm officially done fiddling ffb settings. I hope this has helped you understand a little more about your wheel and you can reach driving NIRVANA.

See you out on the track!



Noxrai.

Thx Nox, great write-up!

@garyw61 thanks mate

Good write up Nox, interestingly I had gone down the same path and wound up using Malts settings also, hopefully we don't have a situation after the next update where they'll change stuff and we'll have to start over again.

Great minds think alike eh?

Hey mate got t300 today should I be updating firmware and adjusting this on a pc

If you just got a t300 it more than likely has the latest firmware. But it would never hurt to check.

Regarding all adjustments, I would do them through the in game options and settings and not your pc. I have as of yet no expirence with setups that need a PC to adjust parameters.

Awesome mate im setting up now

Have fun with your new toy

My FFB has absolutely crapped itself, so i'll be putting these all in in about 10 and testing Thanks heaps @Noxrai

Let me know how it goes

Well done Nox

Well done @Noxrai !
Wish I saw this last night...
I actually had time from 7.30 onwards to play around but didn't see this thread until this morning

Oh my gosh @Noxrai you incredible human!!! It's perfect!!!!

Awesome to hear mate!

Cheers for writing this up, I didn't realise just how much my FFB could be improved. Feels so realistic.

Thanks mate. Glad it's helped you out and im honoured to have it as a sticky

Thank you mr Nox. I just tried the wheel setup provided and the wheel feels an absolute treat mate. It's smoother and it think will decrease the wear on my wheel. Virtual high five.

Norxi
I used your settings last night .
They were fantastic all I changed was the tyre force to 80 got even more feed back (your a legend )