Speed dropping off suddenly

If I'm on a long straight by the end of it sometimes my speed will drop off by 10-20 kmph.

For example, on the long flat out part of Indianapolis, around the start finish line my car will suddenly go from 305ish kmph to 287 kmph. From thereon after 291 is about the highest speed I'll reach, allowing other cars to pass me easily. What's going on?

In case it's needed, I'm running:

GP3 1.13 decrypted w/ GPxPatch
2002 Season Upgrade
2007 carset added to that

maybe its the plank wear. if the ride heights low enough to wear it past the 1mm mark the car will start to lose speed when it bottoms out as a penalty. its something in the game to penalise you instead of disqualifying you. so when you hit the speed at which your plank starts to drag off the ground after its worn, your car starts to drag a lot and loses top speed gradually. check and see if your plank icon in the car starts to go red instead of yellow when it happens.

Yeah that's it, I was wondering what that red light was for. How do I fix it? I'm no good with set ups so I just pick the default one.

raise your ride height

Ride height is the main factor but you can look also at suspension hardness and packers. Raising spring strength will cause less bottoming while keeping a bit of aero effect for cornering. Downside is that harder suspension reduces grip and increases tyre wear. The trick is to find the right compromise.

Nico bites yer tyres!

Will I need a different ride height for different tracks?

Every track is different. It depends totally on how bumpy it is. If it's like Interlagos, where height changes are common, the ride height will be most likely higher than a track where it is relatively flat (ie. Silverstone), the ride height won't be lower. (Never put it at 15mm and 20mm respectively, unless you increase the top part (packers) to full: Otherwise you will scrape along the floor more often than not).



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/11/2007 05:22PM by Diax F1.

also on high speed tracks, where you'll want the car as low as you can to make up for the downforce lost by running with less wing. the higher speeds mean the cars pressed to the ground quite a bit more so its easier to bottom out on the plank on those tracks.

handy tip though: set your ride height lower for qualifying so that just after youve completed a hotlap the plank will start turning red. this all means you can get a small downforce advantage for your hotlap. then return to the pits and the plank will be ok again for your next run to do the trick again. you wont get any penalty or laps taken off you for plank wear in the game which of course wouldnt be the case in real life! therefore if you want a longer run rise it slightly so that it turns red after whichever lap you want as your inlap. best way to maintain the plank for that run is travel very slowly on your outlap so that you dont wear the plank at all and then nail the hotlap. obviously rise the ride height again for the race.

incidently, has anyone ever tried a hack to disable that drag penalty you get from plank wear? would be more realistic for pre-1994 mods