Tire/tyre Catalog

[PMP1337]

Why do we have tyre options tab. Is there a real world brand that manufactures their own tyres?
You always talk of balance between realism and easy of use. Why not change the tyre tab for a tyre catalog. Like real manufacturers do, instead of choosing the parameters you chose out of a tyre list.
Choosing the compound(purely for sorting) based on the type of car you are building and then looking through the available tyres.

I came across this idea when building 50's and 60 cars and the tyre sizes were not right for the period. I had to up the slider alot to get the tyres even thought they were period correct.
I searched and found out most 50 to 70's sports cars were infact using the same tire. The Pirelli Cinturato (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirelli_Cinturato).
Even cars that were supposed to be affordable sportscars like the Triumphs or the MGs. Because automakers weren't researching tires. They never have that cost.

And you always talk about simplifying were you can. Right now I think the current settings are too confusing to newcomers. Actually, Matt Farah inquired about this precise subject in one of his playthroughs. He was trying to put big tires and size wasn't changing. It's hard for newbies to understand things like increasing diameter and lowering wheel size to get wider tires.
Having a catalog would be simpler and more realistic. And could even add more options without increasing the UI(since you would have a dropdown menu), options like economy tires(like the ones the put on priuses).

PS: I know there was another thread about a similar suggestion but it was 2 years old and derailing.

[Der Bayer]

I came across this idea when building 50's and 60 cars and the tyre sizes were not right for the period. I had to up the slider alot to get the tyres even thought they were period correct.

Why not share your information/sources with us? Which tyre sizes should be available in which years? We didn't find too much information and based the tyre size progression on one graph showing the profile heigt over the years, so any additional input could help.

[UltimateBMWfan]

I don't agree. A dropdown menu to select tires that are available on the market will be such a pain to gather information for, and doesn't result in much gameplay benefit.

It'd not only constrict the creativity of the player even more, I don't see how it makes it simpler. Right now, you have sliders for tire width, rim size, etc. What you're suggesting is that to simplify the system, we should pick a rim size, and then select a pre-existing tire that you can't tell the difference of until you click and waste more time looking at.

I don't understand how clicking on 225/45 R17 and clicking on 245/45 R17 is easier and simpler than having a slider and seeing how it affects the car's performance in real time.

[strop]

I get where this enquiry is coming from. When making period replicas I do often wonder if my tyre choices are period correct. But as der bayer said, the information can be difficult to come by, and as bmwfan said, selecting a drop down category is probably more finnicky. I like the freedom I get with this, so the real problem lies with the lack of information elsewhere.

[TrackpadUser]

The biggest problem I would see with a tire catalog, in addition to finding all those sizes, is that the standards for defining the dimensions have changed quite a lot with the years.

Still, this doesn't mean that the limits don't need tweaking. Do you have examples of sizes that should be available at a certain period but aren't w/o using a lot of quality?

+1 or +2 for sportier cars does make sense, even if the car is an inexpensive sports car.

[PMP1337]

Why not share your information/sources with us? Which tyre sizes should be available in which years? We didn't find too much information and based the tyre size progression on one graph showing the profile heigt over the years, so any additional input could help.

The biggest problem I would see with a tire catalog, in addition to finding all those sizes, is that the standards for defining the dimensions have changed quite a lot with the years.

Still, this doesn't mean that the limits don't need tweaking. Do you have examples of sizes that should be available at a certain period but aren't w/o using a lot of quality?

+1 or +2 for sportier cars does make sense, even if the car is an inexpensive sports car.

All the cars on the wiki page I linked are good examples.

I don't agree. A dropdown menu to select tires that are available on the market will be such a pain to gather information for, and doesn't result in much gameplay benefit.

It'd not only constrict the creativity of the player even more, I don't see how it makes it simpler. Right now, you have sliders for tire width, rim size, etc. What you're suggesting is that to simplify the system, we should pick a rim size, and then select a pre-existing tire that you can't tell the difference of until you click and waste more time looking at.

I don't understand how clicking on 225/45 R17 and clicking on 245/45 R17 is easier and simpler than having a slider and seeing how it affects the car's performance in real time.

What creativity? There is no creativity on tires. You either trying to get the best sticky tire, or the biggest offroad tire, or a fuel saving tire. And you have not just 1 slider. You have 3 or 4 sliders.

Having time to gather information? You just need to contact a tire brand and ask for old catalogues.

What you're suggesting is that to simplify the system, we should pick a rim size, and then select a pre-existing tire that you can't tell the difference of until you click and waste more time looking at.

As I said in my first post you would pick the purpose of the tire and then the size.

The real question I asked on my post and no one answered. What do real car manufacturers do?

[UltimateBMWfan]

What creativity? There is no creativity on tires. You either trying to get the best sticky tire, or the biggest offroad tire, or a fuel saving tire. And you have not just 1 slider. You have 3 or 4 sliders.

Having time to gather information? You just need to contact a tire brand and ask for old catalogues.

I don't understand why you think having a drop down menu of existing tires would be simpler than having a range of values from sliders though. If I were a newbie, I'd rather be able to adjust a slider and see the effects real time than go through a dropdown menu and see a bunch of tires that fit the rim size already. You'd need a slider for rim size and rim width anyways, the only thing that could be converted would be the tires. That'd only trim the slider number down by one or two, and would (in my opinion) not only complicate the whole matter, but create a whole lot more work as we'd have to decide on preset tire sizes.

Also, contacting a tire brand for catalogs IS gathering information, and the time it'd take to gather all the different tire data, implement the data into the game, and polish out any bugs would take too long. The only purpose would be to reduce the amount of sliders, and with rim width and size having to be sliders, you'd reduce a max of 1-2 sliders. Not worth the effort in my opinion.

[Leonardo9613]

The real question I asked on my post and no one answered. What do real car manufacturers do?

Real car manufacturers develop a car and then look at what compounds the tyre makers have. Then, they work together so that the car can have precisely the specifications it needs to have (side-wall stiffness, size, softness of the contact patch). So yes, tyres can be somewhat custom made, especially on top spec cars. Or do you think that Pirelli had the huge Countach tyres on its shelf?
For the cheap stuff there is no escaping the savings when making stuff in large scale, so they go with the off-the-shelf stuff. However, that could be balanced out on the game with lower development time and costs.

[TrackpadUser]

Alright, using dimensions found on the internet, I verified if it was possible to make those tires in 1952, the year production started.

For 3 of them, you need +5 quality. For the other two, only +1 quality is required.

Taking into consideration that those why high performance tires, amongst the first radial tires and commonly used for racing in their era, I think we can agree that this makes sense.

Although if you don't understand what quality actually is, you might think the +5 quality makes no sense.

[NormanVauxhall]

The real question I asked on my post and no one answered. What do real car manufacturers do?

Sometimes also happens that the car manufacturer contact a tire company to design a new tire model.
As it happens for the Mini in the 50's. (dunlop 10" tire for the mini).

[Sayonara]

Sometimes also happens that the car manufacturer contact a tire company to design a new tire model.
As it happens for the Mini in the 50's. (dunlop 10" tire for the mini).

It's not uncommon for cars to be equipped from the factory with OEM tires which are similar from those available on the aftermarket in some way. The Nissan GT-R's Bridgestone Potenza RE070R RFT is exclusive to that car, but uses the tread pattern of the widely available RE070R. This happens on more affordable models as well, but nobody is particularly interested in documenting how their family hatchback's factory tires differ from the mass-market model.

While we're discussing tires, would it be too much to ask for [url]Low Rolling Resistance[/url] tires, perhaps available from the 00's onwards?

[07CobaltGirl]

I think that's what the hard compound is for....LRR tires.

[Killrob]

Yes, the hard-long life tires have the least rolling resistance and can be considered the eco choice!

[Trifler]

I don't know that it's necessary to limit the tires to specific sizes that were available in real life. What I could see though is having the absolute maximum allowed tire width (regardless of sidewall height) be determined by the year.

[TrackpadUser]

And here is an example where this could create problems:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_Power_Wagon

Limiting to width regardless of sidewall height would cause problems when trying to replicate this and other large trucks.

It would also let you make ridiculously low profile tires on 1945 cars, which doesn't really make any sense.