I’m new to FH3, and while I love the game, the handling seems very different from what I’m used to. Whenever I apply the normal brakes (not emergency brakes) the wheels lock, and I can’t turn them at all. Am I missing something?
Also, it seems like all of the cars understeer a lot for me. I haven’t played with the tuning at all yet, so I’m guessing I can fix some of that in there. Can anyone give me a few tips on how to fix the understeer without making the cars oversteer?
Softer suspension overall will help but there are many factors such as RWD/AWD, what assists you are using and your driving style. You should look in the tuning section, there’s sone sound advice in there.
If you are locking the brakes a lot you need to look at how you brake. If you can try only partially applying the brakes (only 50%-70% trigger pull) otherwise you may need to run with ABS turned on until you get used to it. Also, check in the game settings and make sure that the braking and acceleration dead zones are set to 0% and 100%, this will give you a wider range of motion on your triggers so you can perfect your driving. The defaults can be much closer together making it harder when you don’t use assists.
A good portion of your understeer is likely due to the brakes locking as this will lock the front wheels and stop you from being able to turn in. However, you will still get under steer if you are driving some front or all wheel drive cars, downloading tunes or reading some of the tuning threads will help you with this.
If you are tuning a car yourself, apply race brakes in the upgrades for every car. This allows you to transfer brake bias between front and rear as well as adjust brake pressure, this will make a massive difference when not using ABS.
That’s because the game physics has improved over the last time you played and is more in sync with real world physics. All you need to do is take the turns with less speed and you’ll correct whatever over or under-steer issue you’re having.
If you want to drive without ABS to get a more realistic driving experience for all the older cars which didn’t have ABS originally , you may look into practicing cadence braking - it’s a bit tricky to get used to (much easier with a controller, but takes quite a bit of learning with a wheel and pedals), but it can shave a second or two off your lap time once you’ve mastered it.
The basic idea of cadence braking is to not push the brake and hold it, but to do short bursts of braking and releasing the brake, giving you alternating split seconds of slowing down and being able to steer - this is essentially what an ABS does automatically (and much faster than you can do manually), and it’s an essential skill for driving older cars that were built before the invention of ABS. Once you master it, you can brake ever so slightly later before going into a turn, while still being able to steer your car through the turn.
I should probably add that while the above sounds like I’m the total ninja master at cadence braking, I’m actually pretty far from mastering it and blow it spectacularly quite often. I’m a rather mediocre driver in general, with rather modest rankings in the rivals leaderboards - but still, I guess my rivals times would be even worse without using cadence braking.
Turn on ABS, tune your car to lower the brake pressure, or just like everyone who plays the game on the reg, don’t slam the LT all the way down (50-70% is just right, or if you’re really having issues and refuse to use ABS then get an Xbox Elite controller and use the trigger modifier which allows you to slam on the breaks but only use 60-70% of the trigger).
Simple formula on turning: There is 100% available for directional control, wheel rotation, acceleration and braking. It is a balance of braking while you’re going in a straight direction, letting up on the braking to keep the tires rotating while introducing a change of direction. Use the brakes to gain control of the car for entrance speed into the turn, and acceleration moderation to balance the speed through the turn while turning.
The motto is always “slow in, fast out” on turns, so the sooner you’re on the gas the faster your straight-line speed will be after you exit the turn.
This^^^ I personally don’t go this high because it makes the car very unstable during braking at least for me but definitely tune the brake balance past 50% and you’ll notice a huge difference.
I have my brake pressure turned up to 115% and I am very light on the brake pedal. It’s a combination of my driving style and the fact that I use a G920 wheel, which has a very stiff brake pedal.
Also, SatNiteEduardo’s recommendation of the ARB settings is very helpful. Most cars default to around 30-40 on the front ARB, which is way too stiff in comparison with the rear ARB. Soften up the front ARB to get more turn-in.
There are actually a couple of small spots on Blizzard Mountain where if you get stuck in those spots, you can’t turn at all. I believe those areas are glitched as it happens no matter what car you are using, braking or not. If you move left or right a little on the track, you can miss those spots. I found maybe 2 spots where this was the case. I thought it was my controller going bad, but it works fine everywhere else in the game.
In any case. Yes, if your brakes are locked up, you can’t turn. It’s the same in real life. Bleeding speed off in the turn is a bad idea anyway. You should be dumping speed before you hit the turn, coast into the turn in for maximum turn radius, and drop the hammer on the way out of the turn.