Tuning Lessons Intro

Before you can even start to consider thinking about Tuning you first need to do the foundation work so that you actually end up tuning the right car for the track you are planning on racing. Before we get to that though, let's talk about what it means to pick the right car for the track...

Cars and Tracks and Tunes, Oh My!

If you are confused we can simplify the issue for you - all car types are not created equal. All tracks are not suited to all car types. Just because you CAN race any car type and class on a given track does not mean you SHOULD.

So with that in mind, consider this: Today you have decided that you want to get some competitive MP racing in on FM6 so your first task is simple - find the right environment and choose the right tool.

For this exercise we have determined that we want to go head-to-head and wheel-to-wheel with the online world at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway's Brickyard. That is an easy choice to make because, with just a few exceptions it is a very generic and thus good track for almost every car type and it rewards consistent good driving habits with victories!

Seriously think about that for a moment - it is an oval course, and all of the cars on it will likely be within 6 points of each other in terms of class and PI, so the real progress is going to come not from the ride but from the driver - and the driver that wins this will be the one who makes the fewest mistakes.

Mistakes in this case include:

-- Accidentally Pitting

-- Hitting or Rubbing the Wall

-- Hitting or Rubbing other Cars

-- Downshifting or coming off the go-button by accident

The driver who does none of that - and who smoothly passes the pack, and who takes each of the corners smooth and with precision? Yeah, that is the driver who is going to WIN. And while we said that the cars will be pretty close in PI there is still a possibility of making small Tuning tweaks to your ride to help make it better. Or faster?

Banking G is necessary for MP Creds Online...

That said, now that we have the venue, let's pick the car type we will use... The only car type not suited for (or intended for) racing here is the Sport Utility class. Those big and heavy monsters were made for shorter tracks with lots of turns, elevations changes, and surface variety. The reason for that is that most of the power in them is in the lower-end.

Sure you could retool the gearing to make them more competitive here but why bother? Instead let's select a car that is very much suited for this environment. Remember we said that SUVs are the only one not intended for this sort of circuit - but the thing is of the remaining cars, some will be MORE suited than others.

What we have to choose from are:

- Formula E

- GP

- GT

- Hypercar

- IndyCar

- JDM

- Muscle

- Supercar (including V8)

- Track Toys

So there you go - you have a list of 9 Top Level Types, which when you do the math actually equals a surprising 21 sub-types (only 20 if you are grouping JDM and SpoCom as a single sub-type).

If you have ever been to shows like SpoCom Hawaii, NorCal TUNE, or the Tokyo Sunday Garage events then you understand (1) why that could make one sub-set, and (2) between the JDM expo events and SpoCom events they get the hottest girls in the least clothes pretty much ever.

But we are not interested in girls right now, we are interested in going fast. In a circle. Making nothing but left turns... Whoa! Evil NASCAR flashback! (Face Palms Hard).

In the goes fast and belongs here category we believe that the following make really great choices for this example - which is a 10 Lap MP Race:

Picking Your Car

Right then, we now know what track we want to focus on so next we decide on the ride. The whip. The iron. Yeah baby!

S-Class Cars

• 1966 McLaren M2B (S748)

• 1967 Eagle-Weslake T1G (S766)

• 1967 Brabham BT24 (S774)

• 1967 Honda RA300 (S767)

• 1967 Lotus Type 49 (S775)

• 1975 BMW #25 BMW Motorsport 3.0 CSL (S766)

• 1975 BMW #93 Herve Poulain 3.0 CSL (S766)

• 1979 BMW #6 BMW Motorsport M1 Procar (S777)

• 1981 Ford #2 Zakspeed Racing Capri Turbo (S800)

• 1981 Ford #55 Luqui Moly equipe Capri Turbo (S800)

• 1982 Ferrari #71 Ferrari France 512 BB/LM (S795)

• 1982 Ferrari #72 N.A.R.T. 512 BB/LM (S795)

• 1987 Ferrari F40 (S713)

• 1992 Bugatti EB110 Super Sport (S757)

• 1993 Jaguar XJ220 (S706)

• 1993 McLaren F1 (S738)

• 1995 Ferrari F50 (S703)

• 1995 Toyota Supra Fast & Furious Edition (S710)

• 1997 McLaren F1 GT (S769)

• 1998 Mercedes-Benz AMG CLK GTR (S759)

• 1998 Nissan R390 (S800)

• 2002 Ferrari Enzo Ferrari (S769)

• 2004 Maserati MC12 (S741)

• 2004 Saleen S7 (S744)

• 2007 Ferrari 430 Scudaria (S710)

• 2008 Aston Martin Team Forza DBS(S800)

• 2008 Didge Viper SRT10 ACR (S731)

• 2008 Lamborghini Reventon (S717)

• 2009 Chevrolet Corvette ZR1 (S704)

• 2009 Ferrari 458 Italia (S713)

• 2009 Ferrari Team Forza 458 Italia (S800)

• 2010 Aston Martin One-77 (S741)

• 2010 Ferrari 599 GTO (S715)

• 2010 Lamborghini Murcielago LP 670-4 DV (S745)

• 2010 Noble M600 (S786)

• 2011 Lamborghini Gallardo LP570-4 Superleggera (S731)

• 2011 McLaren 12C (S737)

• 2012 Ferrari F12berlinetta (S720)

• 2012 Lamborghini Aventador LP700-4 (S750)

• 2012 Nissan GT-R Black Edition (S702)

• 2013 Audi R8 Coupe V10 plus 5.2 FSI quattro (S713)

• 2013 Audi Team Forza R8 Coupe V10 plus 5.2 FSI quattro (S800)

• 2013 Ferrari 458 Speciale (S786)

• 2013 Ford Formula Ford EcoBoost 200 (S772)

• 2013 SRT Team Forza Viper GTS (S750)

• 2013 SRT Viper GTS (S707)

• 2013 Volvo #1 Volvo Polestar Racing S60 STCC (S753)

• 2014 Audi #67 Rotek Racing S3 Saloon (S739)

• 2014 BMW #5 eBay Motors 125i M Sport (S740)

• 2014 Honda #2 Castrol Honda Civic WTCC (S738)

• 2014 Honda #5 Zengo Motorsport Civic WTCC (S738)

• 2014 Lamborghini Huracan LP 610-4 (S759)

• 2014 Lamborghini Team Forza Huracan LP 610-4 (S800)

• 2014 Mercedes-Banz #33 WIX Racing A-Class (S737)

• 2014 Toyota #11 Handy Motorsport Avensis (S733)

• 2014 Toyota #20 United Autosports Avensis (S733)

• 2014 Toyota #80 Speedworks Motorsport Avensis (S733)

• 2014 Volvo #13 Volvo Polestar Racing S60 STCC (S753)

• 2015 Chevrolet Corvette Z06 (S719)

• 2015 Ford #5 Pepsi Max Crew PRA Falcon FG X (S785)

• 2015 Ford #17 Xbox Racing Ford Falcon FG X (S785)

• 2015 Holden #1 Red Bull Racing Australia VF Commodore (S785)

• 2015 Holden #14 Freightliner Racing VF Commodore (S785)

• 2015 Holden #22 Holden Racing Team VF Commodore (S785)

• 2015 Holden #97 Tekno Autosports VF Commodore (S785)

• 2015 McLaren 650S Coupe (S757)

• 2015 Mercedes-Banz #4 Erebus Motorsport E63 AMG V8 Supercar (S785)

• 2015 Mercedes-Banz #9 Erebus Motorsport E63 AMG V8 Supercar (S785)

• 2015 Nissan #23 Nissan Motorsport Altima (S785)

• 2015 Volvo #33 Wilspon Security GRM S60 (S785)

• 2017 Ford GT (S794)

Formula E S-Class Cars

• 2015 Formula E #2 Virgin Racing VIR 01E (S748)

• 2015 Formula E #6 Dragon Racing Spark SRT_01E (S748)

• 2015 Formula E #9 e.dams-Renault Spark SRT_01E (S748)

• 2015 Formula E #10 Trulli Spark SRT_01E (S748)

• 2015 Formula E #11 ABT Spark FE 01 (S748)

• 2015 Formula E #21 Mahindra M2Electro (S748)

• 2015 Formula E #23 Venturi 1 (S748)

• 2015 Formula E #27 Andretti Formula E Spark SRT_01E (S748)

• 2015 Formula E #55 Amlin Aguri Spark SRT_01E (S748)

• 2015 Formula E #99 NEXTEV TCR F01E (S748)

Point of order - no, we have not forgotten that we can simply make an S PI Class by Tuning - that is not the point. The point is to take one of the stock S-Class PIs and then make small Tune changes to it. This basically allows us to walk you through small Tune Changes AND you get to see what the effect actually is, which is that first and crucial baby-step into good and proper Tuning!

Now, for ourselves - and for this example bearing in mind that the Formula E Class are not meant to be tweaked which is why they are in a separate list from the list above despite their being Stock S-Class rides.

Another point that needs to be made - just because a car IS included in the S-Class stock above does NOT mean that the car in question is equal, competitively, to the rest of the cars in the list. For example the Open Wheel rides that date from the 1960s? Totally NOT applicable to this exercise. Just saying...

The Lessons

For the purposes of this process and to teach the basics of Tuning for those of you who are not skilled in the process, we have reached the point where the lessons begin and we will be using the Indy Oval and the Cars listed above for all of them.

The Lessons follow this section in the H&T Menu - we recommend you work your way through them in the order that they are listed. Well, you sort of have to, otherwise you won't make sense of them!