My First Tune ('69 Charger)... feedback?

First-time poster. I’ve been getting back into FH2 and would love some feedback on my first tune. I’ve read a ton of the awesome documentation on this forum and spent most of today tuning this car. There’s a few “must-have’s” for me: the supercharger and the street hood. I just think those are really cool and want them on my car. But everything else is up for discussion. I’ve shared the tune in case you want to try it out:
Keyword 1: Circuit
Keyword 2: Average
Description: Aptos
My GT (creator): Aptos

Without further ado: here’s the car, build, & tune. I’m going for a circuit racer, not so much off road.

Car: 1969 Dodge Charger R/T

Performance Index (#): 800
Class: A
Speed: 6.4
Handling: 7.6
Acceleration: 8.3
Launch: 8.4
Braking: 9.4

Drive: RWD
Power: 529 HP
Torque: 534 LB-FT
Displacement: 6.1 L
Weight of Car: 3416 LBS
Weight Distribution (Front): 52%

Build:

Conversion
Engine Swap: 6.2L V8
Drivetrain Swap: Stock
Aspiration Conversion: Positive Displacement Supercharger

Engine (all stock)
Air Filter: Stock
Fuel System: Stock
Ignition: Stock
Exhaust: Stock
Camshaft: Stock
Valves: Stock
Displacement: Stock
Pistons and Compression: Stock
Aspiration: Stock
Intercooler: Stock
Flywheel: Stock

Platform & Handling
Brakes: Race
Springs & Dampers: Race
Front Anti-roll Bars: Race
Rear Anti-roll Bars: Race
Chassis Reinforcement and Roll Cage: Race
Weight Reduction: Sport

Drivetrain
Clutch: Stock
Transmission: Street
Driveline: Stock
Differential: Race

Tires and Rims
Tire Compound: Race
Rim Style: Sport - Profil 5 by Fikse
Front Tires: 245/40R18
Rear Tires: 295/35R18

Aero and Appearance
Front Bumper: Forza (Adjustable)
Rear Wing: Forza (Adjustable)
Hood / Bonnet: Forza (Street Hood)

Tune:

Tire Pressure
Front (PSI): 29.0
Rear (PSI): 29.0

Alignment
Camber Front: -2.5 °
Camber Rear: -2.0 °
Toe Front: 0.2 °
Toe Rear: 0.0 °
Front Caster (Angle): 5.7 ∟

Anti-Roll Bars
Anti-Roll Bars Front: 14.20
Anti-Roll Bars Rear: 16.20

Springs (lb/in)
Springs Front: 888.4
Springs Rear: 819.6
Front Ride Height (in): 7.6
Rear Ride Height (in): 7.6

Damping
Rebound (Front): 7.9
Rebound (Rear): 9.4
Bump (Front): 3.9
Bump (Rear): 4.7

Aero
Front Aero Downforce (LB): 100
Rear Aero Downforce (LB): 200

Brakes
Brakes (Balance): 48%
Brakes (Force): 200%

Differential
Acceleration (Rear): 25%
Deceleration (Rear): 10%

1 Like

Here is an opinion strictly looking at your post - I have not been on the game today, I have not downloaded or used your car, but I can offer some insights or question to ponder just looking at the Original Post.

Brakes: Race <— Do you really need them. I do notice you have adjusted the pressure but really that only translates to you having to pull the trigger half as far to get the same effect. They add adjustable pressure, 1% efficiency increase (not a whole lot) and they don’t typically drop a lot of weight. Can you get by without them and use the PI points elsewhere?

Chassis Reinforcement and Roll Cage: Race <— Again, do you need it. Does it really hold the car together that much better than some fine tuning and careful driving inputs cannot fix? Does it lower the PI enough for you to take advantage of some good upgrades? How much does it increase the weight? What is the front weight bias without it - I’m guessing 54%?

Weight Reduction: Sport ← You went race in so many other places, why not go Race here as well? You’re in a fairly heavy car, does it benefit to leave it heavier because it has so much power and you kept it in RWD? I prefer AWD for online but that does not mean it is the only way to go. I do enjoy the RWD car as well but the weight is something to consider, as is the weight to power ratio.

Engine Upgrades: All Stock <— What is the starting class for this car or is there no room for upgrades due to the Engine Swap and Supercharger? The power seems fine and it’s not a bad motor so leaving things stock isn’t an issue. If you do decide to upgrade or make changes I would always look at these engine upgrades first:
Exhaust - Air filter - Piston and Compression - Valves - Intake Manifold - Displacement
These upgrades provide a power increase and a weight decrease. It doesn’t hurt to look at the aspiration conversion as well depending on what class you are going for or what you need for the car but keep in mind that the Race Aspiration Conversion adds weight.

Tire Compound: Race <— You seem to be making a Grip tune in RWD with this car. Your car has plenty of power already an it ought to do fine. If you need to (or want to) add more power, you can always leave these at Sport and make some minor tuning changes or driving changes to assist with the rear end.

Tire Pressure: 29.0 PSI <— Have you tried 28.0 PSI - I really like it and find it does very well in the game. If nothing else, I would make the Driven tyres have a 28.0 PSI pressure and the non-driven tyres can remain at 29.0 PSI. You shouldn’t need understeer correction with tyre pressure in this car.

Toe (Rear): <— May not be needed and you would need to test how it affect the car elsewhere but have you tried changing this any? Positive Toe values assist with turn in response and stability during cornering whereas negative Toe values create more straight line stability. I found on my Challenger SRT8 that Toe (Front) 0.3 and Toe (Rear) -0.5 worked really well. With the rest of the build it created a stable car that still responded well and does well in turns. This isn’t something you need to change or mess with and you did say this was more for circuits than off-road but it if has any stability issues that cannot be fixed elsewhere, try changing your Toe a bit.

Differential Acceleration: 25% <— Have you tried going higher with a value in the 50 - 60 percent range? This really depends on driving style, the power of the car, and how it puts that power down from the build. Lower values mean that you can be a littler more flexible with your throttle inputs and often time give it more gas more quickly when the front wheels are straight and you don’t have to be concerned of spinning out. A higher value can also assist you with cornering and corner exit if used properly. There is a fine setting that helps with cornering and not spinning out - you must test and test and test and find it.

Hope this helps. To be completely honest with you: If I remember or look at this thread next time I get on the game, I will give your car a try. This may be some time though so I apologize I haven’t been able to actually try it before giving you more feedback. My tune for the same vehicle in the few classes I have it in all use AWD so opening up my tune for your viewing would not necessarily help you out too much.

Good luck.

I agree that this car handles really well when set up as a all wheel drive.

But given the above build, all of the settings are a lot more stiff than they need to be. Also, you might want to try either lowering the front ride height or raising the back. also:

Front
Springs: 574.3
Rebound: 6.6
Bump: 4.4
Tire Press: 23

Rear
Springs: 527.5
Rebound: 6.6
Bump: 4.4
Tire Press: 23

Tire Pressure of 23 PSI? It isn’t much for off-road but for circuit racing and that seems it’d be a tad on the low side.

Try it :slight_smile:

Next time i get on, I will try it out.

I know there was a thread earlier with SpotTheKitty regarding tyre pressure. After much deliberation and experimenting I think they narrowed it done rather well. The lower pressures do tend to work depending on side wall height and what the set up is for. Kitty said that even as low as 22 is good to help prevent understeer and drive well on Storm Island and I assume that translates to off-road in general. I have personally also on occasion reduced pressure to help with understeer but often find there are better ways to do so that don’t require a tyre pressure drop AND result in better handling all around.

I guess if you’re doing lots of circuit racing, even on road, you have plenty of laps you can run to allow the tyres to heat up to a good operating temperature. I don’t know about you, but if lap times and winning (point-to-point more so than circuit) are king, then 28.0 is the sweet spot according to SatNiteEduardo.

Most races are too short for high tire temp to be an issue. The long answer to the question lies in the Tire Patch. This is the area that touches the road, and the larger it is, the better the grip. the down side is that as the tire pressure goes down, you get more deformation of the tire, which can be countered by using a lower aspect ratio tire. I also find that the steering can be impacted, but around 29, for the Front ARB I get good response, and start most tunes with this and calculate what the balanced Rear ARB is.

Also, I am a Maverick when it comes to the game. I have my own spreadsheet to do my calculations. When I make a change, I adjust several settings at the same time. For example, if you were only to increase the Front Tire Pressure, the front would tend to slide earlier and grip less than the rear. Good way to deal with early over steer, but might make the car harder to handle and possibly spin out when drifting through a turn. I take the approach of finding a balance that I like, and apply it to all of my cars. That way, I can move up and down classes, switch cars and drive types but still anticipate how the car will behave to the controller.

my only question would be about the downforce.
do you really need max downforce for an a class?

the car may kill it on a very small circuit but something point to point
might get left in the dust…

i agree with ppidrive about the cage, i would only use a cage on s classes and above.
you have enough engine to overcome the extra weight.

Unless you plan on using this specifically on those pesky 30 - 45 second a lap circuits, the downforce is a bit over kill. There are some cars where the higher downforce does help, or works well as a grip tune, but rarely do I think it would be absolutely necessary for A class. When I’m testing a tune I like, I’ll run whatever rivals event it is that I’m testing it on and then continue to run it against my own ghost. If I run rear down force and then race again with min. rear down force I will need to make a slight change in the tune to adjust for it and I may also need to slightly modify my driving inputs but it will have a faster time almost all of the time.

I would suggest max front aero and min rear aero.

The system allows you to save different configurations. Build them both. Run and race using both, and let the situation dictate which to chose for a race.

Remember that when using Aero, refer to how to maintain front rear balance. Too much rear will reduce the effect of the front. Too much in the front may result in the back end tending to break out.

That template looks oddly familiar :slight_smile:
Meow.

Here is where I might start to test. Note I have not run this on the track but it would be something similar to what I would start with for tarmac.

Tire Pressure
Front (PSI): 30.5
Rear (PSI): 29.5

Alignment
Camber Front: -3.5
Camber Rear: -3.0 °
Toe Front: 0.2 °
Toe Rear: 0.0 °
Front Caster (Angle): 2.7 ∟

Anti-Roll Bars
Anti-Roll Bars Front: 14.20
Anti-Roll Bars Rear: 36.20

Springs (lb/in)
Springs Front: 588.4
Springs Rear: 519.6
Front Ride Height (in): 7.7
Rear Ride Height (in): 7.7

Damping
Rebound (Front): 9.4
Rebound (Rear): 9.4
Bump (Front): 1.9
Bump (Rear): 1.7

Aero
Front Aero Downforce (LB): 100
Rear Aero Downforce (LB): 75

Brakes
Brakes (Balance): 52%
Brakes (Force): 110%

Differential
Acceleration (Rear): 13%
Deceleration (Rear): 1%

I don’t understand some of this for a RWD build. Hopefully you can set me straight. :slight_smile: I try to build my cars for stability because there’s no rewinding during online races. So I try to make them handle all sorts of tracks with minimal fuss. That said…

Doesn’t higher front tire pressure induce oversteer? I usually build RWD with front tire pressure 2-3 lbs below rear tire pressure and think it helps keep my car in a straight line.

Positive toe scares the hell out of me. I usually run negative toe in front and rear to avoid the dreaded snap oversteer.

No clue what caster does. Usually max it out at 7. Why’d you choose 2.7?

If there’s enough ground clearance for cross country, and there usually is with a muscle car, I generally set front ride height lower than rear to generate downforce. Is that a valid game strategy?

High rear rebound damping also scares the hell out of me. I usually set it a full 2-3 points below front rebound to generate understeer and increase stability.

I like lower braking pressure because I run with ABS off so I don’t like my brakes locking up at just the slightest tap of the trigger. That can cause instability when a gentle touch is needed.

I usually have front and rear aero set to minimums. In a RWD build I might put a few ticks on rear aero.

Springs seem a little stiff to me. In a roughly 3000 pound car with I’m guessing 55 percent front weight ratio, I’d expect something more along the lines of 375 front 300 rear.

Anyway, is my tuning logic sound? Or am I way off? Any feedback appreciated. Thanks.

Sounds like you are using sim steering. I am using a controller with normal steering.

Ability to turn which is what I tune for is not the same as instability.

Like I say I have not tested the above but it is certainly where I would start testing.

The lower bump I use plus the accel brings some stability to it.

The real issue is whether it all works as a complete package.

In short my philosophy to being quick is when I get to the turns I need to carry as much speed through the turns as possible. To do that the car must turn. I do not find them unstable though.

I do use sim steering with a controller. Maybe doing that affects turn-in differently than normal steering. I feel like normal steering is a little numb. Also, I don’t think I have great throttle control, especially in a RWD car, so I end up tuning my cars to be more forgiving of my inadequate throttle skills. I’d likely use settings very similar to yours for an AWD build, but for a RWD build I don’t think I’d make it to the first corner before spinning out. Likely not the fault of your settings. A more skilled driver could certainly use them for quick lap times.

Isn’t understeer generally considered a more stable state than oversteer?

Thanks for that feedback. Glad someone else finds them turnable but also stable.

And guess what - if people in this thread saw the settings they would freakout and say it all looks very unstable. Don’t focus on individual settings - its the package that is stable or not.

it’s been mentioned so many times and people still seem hesitant to try some awkward or extreme settings to see how they work. Change tings one at a time and grade the car as a whole. if it does not work somewhere, fix that specific issue only. If it’s the front end that is having an issue, don’t go tweaking the rear… etc

I appreciate the discussion. I’m not sure I appreciate the characterization that I’m freaking out because I’m certainly willing to try less-than-conventional settings. As a matter of fact when I first started playing Horizon 2 I came to these forums and used whatever advice I could find. SatNite and PPI advice more than others because I could see your gamertags at the top of leaderboards. But as I played and started to understand what the settings do and how they affect my cars, I figured out that sometimes whatever you two can do with your cars I can’t necessarily do with mine. You guys are likely better drivers than me. And better than the vast majority of other players. And that’s exactly what’s wrong with some of your advice. I build my cars so they’re easy to drive. You build yours so they’re always on the edge. And you can control them so you don’t go over the edge. I’m not that talented. Neither are most of the people who play. I drove your RWD Camaro SatNite. I know what bump damping does. I know how I like my differential settings. When I drove your RWD Camaro it did exactly what I thought it was going to do. I could tell it was fast. It certainly turns. But it’s squirrelly. I don’t like squirrels in my cars. I hate squirrels. Dirty, rabid creatures. So I built a RWD Camaro of my own. With settings quite dissimilar from yours. It’s noticeably easier to drive (not using that word “stable” anymore because it seems like a hot button). Not as fast as your camaro. Not as nimble. But definitely not as squirrelly. I spent about 30 minutes with it and set the #88 time at Riverbed XX and #45 next door at Grande Sprint. Now I’m not blind, I saw your Corvette at #2 and PPI’s Subaru at #19. I know you guys are good. I’m not trying to insult your skills. I’m just saying if I took your RWD Camaro in an online road trip I would likely spin out quite a few more times than I would spin out in mine. And the most important thing to me is to drive a car online that’s not going to squirrel out and lose the race for me. I couldn’t care less about Rivals.

Shared my RWD Camaro tune. Would appreciate feedback. Or discussion. Arguments. Threats. Just no squirrels. Thanks for being so active on the forums.