FlyPT 6DOF/Stewart/Hexapod Interface for linear and rotating actuators

The only thing I can say about this, is that I really get the feeling of loosing control of the car (all the time).

Quick question about tuning centre as I read your post on Pierres build thread.

Normally we drive round to get a base tuning centre results and tweak from there. But in the post you said that 10 in tuning centre would equal 100mm of travel. So my question is should all the tuning numbers for my rig be 15 and -15 as I have 150mm of range in either direction.

Or have I completely misunderstood again lol

Sorry for late reply.

No it's not related, but with correct scale and ranges it could be although I think, it's not necessary.

OK, I might be wrong somewhere, but it works like this:

Simtools doesn't know the scale used in the values the games sent (at least in most games).
So, you don't know what the 10 means. If this is a force, does 1 correspond's to 1G? We don't know.
Since everything works around bits, if they use a 8 bit value in the game to store the G force, it means the G force could take a value of -128 to 127.
But the game creators also define that for example 1G corresponds to a value of 32. So in this case you could go from -128/32 to 127/32 (-4G's to 4G's).
This is just an example with some crazy values.
What I want to say, is that Simtools doesn't know those decisions from the game creators.

When you use the tuning center, what it does, is search for minimum and maximum values. It depends on the way you drive and the type of car.
Now, if you drive to hard, go off road, crash or use the fastest and with more grip car, you can get high values.
If you drive a slow car, always on a flat track without going off road, you get low values.
Here the trick is to use something in the middle and try to drive it normally inside the track, passing over some curbs.
That way, you get some good values.
The problem here is that if you crash, or for some other reason, get big values, all the small details will disappear. For example:

Crazy driving with fast car, you get maximum value of heave = 40 and minimum = -40
Driving with slow car not going over curbs, maximum value of heave = 5 and minimum = -5

Simtools picks those values and spreads them over a 10 bit (0 to 1024) value (can be other setting on the bit output - For FlyPT Interface it's 16 bits).

So for fast car:
In game = -40 => Simtools output = 0
In game = 40 => Simtools output = 1023
In game = 0 => Simtools output = 511

Slow car:
In game = -5=> Simtools output = 0
In game = 5=> Simtools output = 1023
In game = 0 => Simtools output = 511

Can you see the resolution?
Fast car = 1024/80 = 12,8
Slow car = 1024/10 = 102,4

Here all the small details of the fast car disappear, because of the resolution.
So we look for smaller values.
Anything outside those values, is cropped to the maximum we defined in the tuning center.
That way we don't loose small details and in reality, the big values happen only in crashes or going out of track, things we don't want to happen.
Opposite also happens, we want to feel the car going over a curb. If we use values to small, anything bigger is cropped and you don't feel the curb.

Now, what happens with those 1024 values?
In the FlyPT interface, they are assigned to a range that you specify on the poses.

If you have a range of 85 mm on heave:
In game = -40 => Simtools output = 0 => FlyPT Interface heave = -85 mm
In game = 40 => Simtools output = 1023 => FlyPT Interface heave = 85 mm
In game = 0 => Simtools output = 511=> FlyPT Interface heave = 0mm

If you don't use the FlyPT interface, they are assigned to the actuator range (I think that's the case of the SMC3).

Now scale enters here, just to relate the position readings from the hardware to a real measure (linear) in the actuators:
Pot reading = 0 => 0 mm
Pot reading = 100 => 45 mm
Pot reading = 200 => 90 mm

In the end, scale might not be so important, it's just to make values correspond to something we can measure easily.

So all we need to do is save a different config in FlyPT for each car using gain . Get a base setup and then change it to suit each car. Which I suppose we can already do with the game manager profile editor.

Unless @yobuddy could make more than one tuning centre config for each game and then we could label them for each car each car has totally different characteristics and having a proper tuning centre values for each car would be way easier to setup for motion rather than playing with sliders all the time

Or maybe that's just way too hard and not needed lol

For some time now its been apparent that a second tuning center is a necessity too for a number of purposes and Simtools is somewhat neutered without one. Since yobuddy has been responsive to the needs of users thus far and considering the amount of revenue Simtools is now generating creating resources imho the time has come for this to come to fruition.

ps Another option instead of a second tuning center might be to create a proxy server for telemetry or something like that that would make it possible to run more than one instance of Simtools at the same time?

Tuning centre setting for each car in the game would be better you could have a lot of different cars to get tuning values from. Surely it wouldn't be that hard to implement now I think about it, just pick the selected config from the drop down where it currently is in tuning centre.

What I can do in the interface is:

Make range in tuning center a big value (if you get 80 in a crash, let's use 80).
That value is converted to something like 32 bit (huge value, so big resolution).
The interface receives that value and I add some fields for us to crop that value.
That's the only way I can do it in the interface, without loosing definition.

When I was part of WMD in PCars2, one of the implemented features was auto calibration for FFB (yes, I know that most of you don't like PCars).
We could make something similar.
Imagine we store min and max values received for the last minute, and use only something like 50% of their maximum (remove extremes).
We could make an auto calibration with those values. You only have to set time and percent of range and allow auto calibration.
Maybe this could be a Simtools feature, or I can implement it in the interface if I use the above solution.
The advantage of this system is that you only have to make 1 or two laps for the rig to adapt to the new car.
The bad is that if you change game/car, you have to give time for the rig to adapt.
Also it would be good to have a button to stop/start the auto calibration.

What should fit everyone's needs is a tuning center with individual settings for all 12 axis 1a thru 6b and the ability to save as many variations per game title as one wishes .

Yes, totally agree, would be excellent for controlling a motion sim + G-Systems, which often would benefit from having different sensitivity setting.

Upon thought 2 individual tuning centers, one for 1a thru 6a and one for 1b thru 6b, is needed instead of one with all of them. This is mostly for commercial purposes. This way two different commercial entities can supply preset tuning values for their equipment without imposing on the other. Therefore a commercial motion rig and a g-seat for example could be bought and used with Simtools without jumping thru hoops attempting to make them play good together (turnkey solution). I suppose there would need to be a way to assign which tuning center is for what.

I would be happy with either. Its often difficult to pick a Tuning Center setting that has suitable detail without clipping on larger data values - always ends up as a compromise. Eg Heave. Would enable the Motion sim to translate large movements using a higher Tuning Centre setting therefore stopping any clipping, while the G-System can be set for small detail/movement with a small Tuning Center setting. Best of both worlds and would give the simulation a much more realistic dynamic range then is currently possible.

Since Simtools has become a commercial product now (whether its developer wanted it to or not) my thought process is that is what should be driving innovation. However there's not any real competition which may be a problem with the cash coming in. Its great software but really in need for Simtools 3 to move forward.

Wow lot of great ideas, we don't need simtools 3 for this it's just an add on and surely it would not be that hard @yobuddy ? It's just pointing to different config files for the data ?

@noorbeast could you possibly move all these suggestions to their own thread we kinda clogging up the hexpod thread

This would be awesome if you could pull it off, the less work tuning the better

I started mixing different DOf's with each other but cant seem to get it right , tring to get prolonged surge is the hardest I'll keep on trying

What you're requesting and what SeatTime and I are requesting are two different things they just both involve the tuning center. For your wishes an update would probably suffice but ours is more involved and a major change. Besides Simtools 2 is two years old now and in software terms is due for a major update again. Also consider adding b axis as it is now was a simple fix to add more dof's when it was asked for during beta 2 testing by some members and has never been a comprehensive solution. I have other suggestions to offer also that could help make a Simtools 3 significantly better but I'll hold those in reserve for now until I hear its in the pipeline.

Sorry, I have some work to be done on the last days.
I think this week I will have a more stable version.
I will contact by PM as soon as it's done.

Hello @pmvcda , I had little time, so I made my list of all the thing I had to test. Of 11 things, I got 2 done, because I am stuck at my yaw problem.

I'm almost sure it has nothing to do with your interface, and everything to do with the washout of simtools not working, whatever it's suppose to do. I know I should no post it here then, but I like to show you what I have just in case you have a idea of what I could do, and I did not look for the simtools complain department yet.

The 2 next image show data from Aseto Corsa when the car is stopped. One has a yaw value far into the negative and the other far into the positive. The washout should bring the rig back to the center, but it doesn't. It stays there and there is a violent correction between the two value. I've tested many values for the washout, without any change in the result.





But what I found really curious, is that on pause, the rig goes bask to the center, slowly, for the yaw. Even though it does not for the virtual axis. So strange.



I've tested on NoLimit2 since now I know how to add the telemetry, but it does the same. So, it not related to the game.

I guess I have only a few options left:

- Filter yaw to the death.
- Uninstall and reinstall Simtools.
- Contact Simtools.
- Remove yaw altogether.

I'm not at home, so I can't make test's right now.
But can you show a screenshot of the washout filter.
I think it's more of a settings problem.
I would remove the low pass filter in the interface, because it might interfere in what you expect of the washout.