Automation Engine Designer Demo Feedback Thread

[Daffyflyer]

Tech Year - The reason for having it individual per part is for example you might want to put a modern EFI system on an old V8 but not moderize the whole thing (as you can't afford it) - I do think however a way of setting all tech years at once may be a good idea also.


Sound- Really? This is the one area I'm almost totally happy with myself. I don't know how many other racing/car games you've played, but I reckon we sound as good or better than about 90% of them, and the ones that DO sound better are things like Forza that have a million dollar plus sound budget and loads of supercars on hand to record.
We did try recording real cars, but A: we couldn't get good enough quality, even with a pro sound recordist B: we would never be able to find the range of cars we need (where could we find 2 x indentical v12s, one with an open exhaust). Currently we've got something fairly real sounding that changes dynamically with cylinder config, intake, exhaust and cam profile, and I can't think of any ways it really could be made better than it is.


Infobar text - I'm not 100% happy with that font either, we'll have a think about that one.

Sort Function in Engine Manager - Absolutely agreed!

Engine Designer Window - Agreed, but unfixable.

First of all you have made an amazing engine simulator!!!
I have tried for the last days to recreate the Renault engine range for the Europe market in the 80`s/90`s and I am getting there...

And what about an automatic advance in ignition timming complementary to the fixed one?
It could be done like VVL valve timming with a minimum and a maximum value...

Regards
Bragametro.

[Daffyflyer]

That's pretty much what the ignition timing slider is, it represents how agressively you want your engineers to try and tune the ignition timing in general

Just a couple thoughts:

I've noticed that engine weights and dimensions are independent from displacement. I understand the idea behind having the three different block sizes, but if seems odd to have a 1.2 liter that's the same size and weight as a 2.3 liter (using the medium block). I'm not sure how easy it would be make these figures fully dynamic, but it's something you may want to consider for the sake of realism. Otherwise, in the full version I think people will lean excessively towards larger engines since there's no packaging or weight disadvantage for doing so within the same block family.

I've also noticed that the costs for some engine components seem a little off. For example, on one of my engines a tubular header only costs $5 more than a cast manifold. On the same engine forged H-beam con rods are only $12 more than el cheapo cast rods, which also seems ridiculously low. As a result all my newer econobox engines have headers and forged internals just because there's no convincing reason to use the more realistic "cheap" stuff.

Regarding the intakes, going from a standard to a performance unit increases annual service costs on one engine from $1069 to $1307. I'm having a hard time figuring out why this should be, considering it's just a high flow filter in a nicer box.

On exhaust manifolds, it would be really cool to see length/diameter/resonance/4-2-1 vs 4-1/etc. taken into account. In my testing current options just seem to raise or lower the whole torque curve rather than move the powerband up or down the RPM range. Also, most new cars have close-coupled precats for emissions purposes, so this should also be an option.

And finally, one very minor complaint about mufflers: The baffled muffler looks (at least to me) like a straight-through muffler and vice versa.

Ok, I'm done. Really guys, awesome work, I'm having tons of fun here.

[Daffyflyer]

As we don't really liniarly scale engine size (its horribly hard to do) we haven't done weight that way either.


The costs are a bit out of whack and will be subject to tweaking at some point.


The exhaust manifolds both give some extra power across the whole rev range (better flow) and give peaks of resonance at various RPM as calculated from the length of the primaries.

The mufflers are based off pictures I could find of each type

WEIGHTS AND BLOCK SIZES? I have noticed while tuning for race engines, I can gain 5% in both power and torque just by changing block sizes. I use the same displacement and settings. I find while using a different block size, with altered bore x stroke to keep displacement the same, is in my opinion using some supersonic resonance for personal gain. I find this to be pretty much like real world technology. Something interesting I cannot fail to mention. I have experienced horsepower gains using a cast iron head on an aluminum block. Why? I would tend to think that under extreme revs the lightweight material would flex to some degree, throwing the center line of the cams and/or valves off, reducing power. I am not an experienced engine tester. I like to tinker with cars under a shade tree. I tend to pick up fast it seems. Last but not least. I love this game!! Well worth my donation. These are just my opinions, and would very much welcome any input as to why the above things happen.

[Daffyflyer]

Huh, those are some interesting points, I'm not convinced thats working quite as it should if you're getting those effects, I'll have a bit of a look into it.

Although one thing is that the carbs/headers and such scale with block size and as such flow more air, so that could be it.

Regarding the intakes, going from a standard to a performance unit increases annual service costs on one engine from $1069 to $1307. I'm having a hard time figuring out why this should be, considering it's just a high flow filter in a nicer box.

I don't really know, but I guess the higher airflow in performance- und racefilters is partially achieved by just using worse/less fine filters.
So there's probably more dirt going into the engine which should effect lifetime, and servicecosts (cause you'll have to change the oil more often).

I've also noticed the cast-iron = more-power-than-aluminium effect, btw.

[Daffyflyer]

^regarding dirty oil and airfilters, this was our reasoning

I am pretty impressed so far.

I would love a way to review and even save test runs including the graph, results, and selected components.

My 1st issue is having the slider arrows & check boxes not line up with cursor, I have to aim down and right.

The sliders feel very choppy In both the settings and components explanation area.

Check boxes are hard to see and the section selection text doesn't match the UI, plus the text is tiny.

I had mentioned my experience in User Accessibility testing elsewhere and have some feedback.
First, the video explanation need an option somewhere for captions or transcription.
Currently my adaptive equipment only allows left mouse clicks, so I can't right click to rotate the engine view. Maybe add an onscreen arrow rotation tool or a 'use left click to pan' option in options.

That is all my current feedback for now.