Also another question I have is how do you figure out where to set the sliders on under powered cars early on or race cars?

For the early days I can never tell if my 7hp/15ft lb tq car will even reach its claimed top speed of 41 miles an hour. Most of the time these cars are too slow to show acceleration stats so I dont really know how to set these sliders early. I tend to go nearly full left towards torque for low gears then in the middle for high gears for everything unless its a truck then its low/low.

For race cars and winning races I still have no idea what im doing. With high hp/tq I tend to go middle to low for low gearing and near the top for top speed. I assume the car has more than enough HP to reach top end but on a track does top speed even matter?

Originally posted by REDACTED:

I design the engine first, then the trans and then the chassis. I havent tried this yet but I wonder if doing the engine and chassis first, then designing the gearbox last would let me fine tune the performance stats a little better.

Have you tried the "prototype" system in the designer? While this won't give an exact estimation, it will be close. The reason why it can't give you an exact estimation is because of the aerodynamic drag of the final vehicle body.

https://wiki.gearcity.info/doku.php?id=gamemanual:gui_rnd#design_components (Scroll down to the bottom of "Designer" and the next sub section, "Prototype Design")

With that in mind, if you make the chassis and engine first, then do the gearbox while looking at the ratings via the prototyping system, you could probably get close to matching the real values.

Also another question I have is how do you figure out where to set the sliders on under powered cars early on or race cars?

The rule of thumb is if it has very low amounts of torque, you should gear your gearbox toward torque to maximize the engine's ability to move the vehicle. It might not help the top speed, but it will reduce fuel consumption, increase dependability, etc. If you think about it, you'll want more torque for most types of races anyway.

When your engines are within 100lbs / 1 ft lbs range, then start looking toward adjusting the gear ratios in any other way than making the dang thing move.

For race cars and winning races I still have no idea what im doing. With high hp/tq I tend to go middle to low for low gearing and near the top for top speed. I assume the car has more than enough HP to reach top end but on a track does top speed even matter?

For under 60mph, hp to weight ratio is the most important vehicle metric. When you start getting above 60mph, acceleration becomes increasingly more important.

Thanks Eric for the fast reply as always. I guess I did answer my own question. I do use the prototype, ive just been stuck thinking I had to do the chassis last but doing the trans last makes more sense now to better fine tune a car.

From what I understand for very low HP stuff, keeping both sliders towards torque until 100 ft/lb, then I can start sliding to the right for efficiency and stop speed? That makes sense.

As for race cars, I always tend to prioritize HP over torque unless its super early. I assume you'd want more HP during a race since you're always at high rpm...

Is there a cheat sheet somewhere to see what matters the most for winning races? Does top speed matter as much as power/weight?

Does a much better car vs the competition mean I can slack on team funding? I assume the car just needs to be better than its competition or close which I can find out that info but how important are the team sliders...

I could ask a bunch of questions and none REALLY need an answer if I knew how simple the racing mechanic was in the game. If it takes top speed, power to weight, team funding, gearing ect into account.

Currently I just provide a better car than everyone and max funding out and can dominate but that seems like overkill.

Game Mechanics manual would probably cover the most of the questions related to racing: https://wiki.gearcity.info/doku.php?id=gamemanual:gm_racing

Sadly, it's not as complex as I would like, but it might improve in one of the FBS in the future.