Ive tried many a tuning method in my Forza time.
Ive used tuning calculators.
Ive used "Standard" setups for drivetrains.
Ive tuned based on "feel".
Ive tuned based on mechanical balance.
Ive tuned using other's tunes.
I have found that tuning for vehicle/weight balance, or Weight Bias Tuning, works best and then you adjust settings from there to make your car handle the way you want to handle. If you car isnt balanced properly, it wont perform as well as it could.
A car that oversteers a little bit during a sweeper (because thats how you like it) will feel different than a
car that oversteers a little during a sweeper.
will usually net you with a good tune that YOU like.
A car needs to be in balance with itself for optimal performance. Weight Bias Tuning puts your car into balance with itself in respect to its weight distribution. From there, you can proceed to fine tune the car's settings to suit your style.
Example: Say a car has a 55% weight distrubition favoring the front. You can use the suspension parts to distribute the weight to whatever ratio you feel comfortable with. A car that has a lower ratio (weight distribution favoring the rear) will feel like a RWD car, while a car with a higher ratio (weight distribution favoring the front) will feel like a FWD car.
This is not saying that taking a Viper and changing its weight bias to 65% (65% of its weight to the front) will make it drive like a Focus, but it will most definately not be the same Viper.
Ive used weight bias tuning to make the rear end of an oversteer monster heavier, sticking the tires to the ground a little better. Ive used WBT to lessen the load on the rear wheels on a FWD car to make it whip around the corners faster.
Once you get a balanced tune, you can then change the tuning setup as a whole to fit your driving style. If the car feels too soft (i.e. slow turn in, not enough body roll, etc), you can increase the values of the necessary components to loosen the car while keeping it balance. Conversely, you can soften it up by lowering the same values.
Here is an excerpt from Tonka Crash's explanation about it.
Remember, all credit for this goes to him, Blooze, Fit4aking and everyone else who developed this. Im just passing along information:
First we have to gather some information about the car. As a minimum you need to upgrade to race anti-roll bars and race suspension. You need to record the current weight and in the tuning screens record the suspension settings before tuning. The ARB, Spring Rates and Damping are unique to each car.
Total ARB = Front Arb + Rear Arb
Total Damping = Front Rebound Damping + Rear Rebound Damping
Total Spring Rate = Front Spring Rate + Rear Spring Rate
Total SWR = (Front Spring Rate + Rear Spring Rate) * 2 /Weight
SWR is what we call the spring weight ratio. It's just an artificial definition we use to non-dimensionalize the spring settings. One thing you will find if you look at the suspensions settings as you upgrade a car is that the Total ARB, Total Damping and Total SWR are fixed for a car regardless of the amount of upgrades. If you know the values for a car at any given weight you can use them to calculate settings for any other weight.
Once you have your totals you redistribute them based on the new balance % you want.
Front ARB = Total ARB * (1-Balance %) - Rear ARB
Rear ARB = Total ARB * (Balance %)
Front Spring Rate = Total SWR * (Balance %) * Weight/2
Rear Spring Rate = Total SWR * (1-Balance %) * Weight/2 Total Spring Rate - Front Spring Rate
Front Rebound Damping = Total Damping * (Balance %)
Rear Rebound Damping = Total Damping * (1-Balance %) - Front Damping
At least initially Bump Damping is just 50% of Rebound Damping. This is in keeping with Turn 10 default values and the idea that the game is 90% there to start.
Front Bump Damping = Front Rebound Damping * (50%)
Rear Bump Damping = Rear Rebound Damping * (50%)
Ive made lines through some mistakes and made the corrections in red. In the original post, Tonka Crash wrote the values that have been stricken and they didnt work. The car was extremely out of balance because the calculations were wrong. Example: for front and rear ARB. For true balance, the ratio has to add up to 100%, but if you wanted a 56% front bias, your ARB settings would read:
Front ARB = Total ARB * 55% (1-56%)
Rear ARB = Total ARB * 56%
So instead of having an even 100% ratio, you now had 111%. I confirmed these with Fit4aking. He said I was right with the adjustments I made and that hes not sure where Tonka got those formulae from (considering he helped develop them lol). The cars made with the corrections I made worked great.
So, you save your current tune in case you like it. Then reset your settings to default.
Then, you wanna write down:
Weight
Fr Springs
Rr Springs
Fr ARB
Rr ARB
Fr Rebound Damp
Rr Rebound Damp
You then choose your new Weight Bias ratio. I start with 54% but you can start with whatever you want. Youll change often until you find whats comfortable for you.
Once you have your %, you fill in the numbers in the above formulae and write down the new values. So, for your question, you would write down the default numbers of your 60/40 (60% front weight bias) car, then use 54% as your new Weight Bias. Your car will now be in balance with itself and "feel" as if the weight balance has been adjusted to 54/46.
There are two important things to remember.
1. Unless you are increasing your decreasing your values to adjust the feel of the car, your total values (total ARB, total spring rate, total damp) before applying a new % should never ever be different than after applying a new %. If you ever get a different total after, you did something wrong. Meaning, if your total ARB is 26 at 60% bias, make sure its at 26 at 56% bias.
2. You cannot adjust any of the three main settings (ARB, springs, damp) alone. If you make adjustments, make them as a whole. Meaning, if you want to do a new %, pick a new % and re-do your calculations. If your car feels too "soft", increase the three main settings BY THE SAME %. If you increase them all by the same %, your cars feel will change but it will remain in balance. 100:200 is the same ratio as 150:300 and 50:100.
WBT is more about keeping the car in balance with itself, no matter what driving style you like.
Say you have a powerful RWD car with a 61% front weight bias and its extremely "happy" in the rear, you can lower the ratio down to like 58% or 57%, giving it more weight in the back to try and calm it down. On the other hand, say you have a FWD car thats running a 52% weight bias that doesnt grip enough in the front. Itll understeer like a madman. You can raise its ratio to a 54% or 55% front bias to give it some more weight in the front, giving it more grip on the front tires and less weight in the back.
Trust me, its very easy to use. When tuners get into the more technical aspects of tuning, I get easily confused. I wind up reading and just thinking "ok, but despite all that, how can I make my car not oversteer so much?". lol
Let me break it down to you this way:
Say you have a RWD car that weighs 1000 pounds.
40% front bias 50% front bias 60% front bias
400lbs 600lbs 500lbs 500lbs 600lbs 400lbs
With a rear wheel drive car, which would be ideal? In this example, somewhere between 40% and 50% (in actual tuning, the percentagess would only differ by a few points, or even half points). The more weight in the back, the more traction you'll have on the drive tires. However, if you shift it too far back, your handling will suffer. No weight on the front means no traction on the front, right? So you've got to find a front weight bias ratio that feels comfortable for you.
According to the "article" by Fit4aking, some people like 54.5% as a starting point. I usually use 54% or 53.5%. You have to find what feels comfortable for you. Once you find this comfortable balance, you can adjust the values as a whole to change the feel of the car.
Example: You get your car into a balance that you like and your numbers read:
Fr ARB: 9.98 (10.48)
Rr ARB: 11.72 (12.31)
Fr Spring Rate: 425.82 (447.11)
Rr Spring Rate: 499.88 (524.87)
Fr Rebound Damp: 7.9 (8.3)
Rr Rebound Damp: 6.7 (7.0)
Fr Bound Damp: 3.9 (4.1 or 4.2)
Rr Bound Damp: 3.4 (3.5)
Say the car feels a little soft to you. You would increase all of those values by 5% at a time until you found a setting you liked. The numbers in parenthesis are increased by 5%. Or, if it felt too loose and you wanted to tighten it up, you could drop them by 5% at a time. You could fine tune by increasing/decreasing the values by 1% or 0.5%, but thats for the uber meticulous lol.
As long as you increase/decrease by the same % across the board, you car will stay in balance.
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