Game mechanic explanation and tech (technical terms used!)

Regarding suspension I did some of my own testing and found that it goes back to curbs and bumps yet again. It was because Broughy had said something about lowering the center of mass in his intro video that I started to wonder if it made a difference again. Essentially what I found was the lower the suspension the less air time you got from each bump and curb.

This also plays a factor in why pulling back or pushing forward makes a difference. Initially I ignorantly assumed it must be related to the games bike mechanics but this is just isnt the case. On a perfectly flat road it doesnt seem to make any difference whatsoever. Whats actually happening that causes this method to make a difference is the car catches the slightest air from a LOT of tiny bumps in the road. Each time the wheels leave the ground the car stops accelerating even if its for a fraction of a second. By pulling back or pushing forward you are getting one set of the 4 wheels back down quicker and now the car is accelerating faster. Using the LSGP drag strip as my testing grounds was a perfect place to display this I just had no clue what exactly I had found.

Now I will say this I initially said pushing forward was the way to do it not even considering pulling back might help. Until of course Crazyman came along and showed me it did(Thanks Crazyman for actually believing me and doing your own testing its helped immensely). However now I will say it is based on drive train which is better between pushing forward and pushing back.

Many people commented that it did nothing or seemed to do nothing except maybe in a Zentorno. Why is that? Well I think its most noticed in that car because of its awesome acceleration to begin with and the fact that its AWD. Most people were racing RWD cars with the exception of the Elegy and Zentorno. Getting the front wheels down on a Dominator does absolutely nothing for instance. However getting the rear wheels down most certainly does do something.

My conclusion is that lower suspension and pulling back on straights is the best way to get ultimate straight line speed. Obviously dont pull back to the point your car flips or anything silly on big jumps just a nice 45 degree angle will do. On the "flatter roads" you can pull back as hard as you want.

All this information was passed onto Broughy1322 a few days ago and he will likely do his own testing but his intial reaction was "that makes a lot of sense" So take it or leave it. Its up to you

It seems its pointless in trying to say anything.. im obviously not seriously testing this, its just what iv tried and come across when i tried it. All i wanted was a discussion sharing ideas. Im not saying im right or wrong on anything, and yes maybe the turismo was a bad example but i found that suspension still affects it in the same way as i described so i think i had a valid point. But w/e i dont want to argue with people, everyone seems so hostile towards me when im trying to have a discussion. comments like * you obviously didn't read what i wrote earlier* is not very nice. 

I was behind one that had that problem today ...Threw sparks the whole race and made the car extremely slow. That's the first time I saw it up close.

I would say maybe even something like the merryweather mesa, because the suspension has a huge effect on that car I have found. But thats probably bc with stock supension it can just roll over in a corner and with the completely lowered suspension it does that much less. Probably relating to the center of gravity.

Alright it's that time again. Here's an update on my findings about the mechanics of the game.

So it's been known for quite some time that different wheel types make a difference to the way said car behave over bumps, but there has never been any clear descriptions of what each wheel type does. My findings are not complete as they dont cover the Lowrider or Muscle type, so if anyone knows what the general characteristics for those are feel free to let me know.

Alright, lets get started.

High-End
This type makes the cornering snappy but limited, a bit like using high tyre pressure. This means that the car will be responsive but the optimal turning angle is on the low side compared to most other types. Also the thin tyrewall offers little to no bump soaking.

Tuner
This is the opposite of High-End. The cornering is a little on the looser side but still feels fairly firm overall, a bit like using low tyre pressure. This means that the optimal turning angle is quite high, but that also means that the traction build-up is slower. The relatively thick tyrewall makes this quite comfortable over most bumps.

Sports
This is pretty much the mid-point of High-End and Tuner. It's not snappy nor loose. The optimal turning angle is decent. The tyrewall is a little thicker than High-End but not by much, so it wont offer much bump soaking.

SUV
Now this is an interesting type. The best way to describe this type would be to say that it brings out said car's "qualities", meaning that if a car tends to understeer/oversteer it will do so even more. This type basicly makes the handling looser overall, so a loss of traction should be less of a surprise. The thin tyrewall offers little to no bump soaking.

Offroad
"On rails" is the phrase of the day with this type. The optimal turning angle for this type is the most limited out of them all, meaning that you'll build up maximum traction at a very low turning angle. So there's next to no freedom in terms of sliding as the traction reaches its peak so quickly, thus slowing you down really fast. The thick tyrewall will offer a tiny bit better bump soaking than Tuner (marginal difference depending on the car).

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Spoilers! The saviour of the day when it comes to traction!

Yea okay we all know that by now as even the game claims that traction is improved. But because of recent debate I decided to check out if picking a different spoiler altered the characteristic.

So what did I find out?
Well... it doesnt change the handling the way custom wheels do. But! It doesnt mean they dont change anything. Bear with me for a moment.

Centre of Mass/Gravity (CoM or CoG, whatever you prefer)
This will get into some potentially technical stuff, just wanna let that be known.

Every physical body has something known as the Centre of Mass or Gravity. This is a point usually inside of the volume that makes up the hitbox of the vehicles aswell as the destructible props. From here the pull of gravity is applied, hence why it's referred to as CoG. The way this point is traditionally decided is by looking at the bounding size of each hitbox that makes up the body and then taking the average position vs size of it all. Keep in mind that the CoG is only based on what's permanently attached, so things like the doors or hood wont change the main car's CoG as those parts are seperate physical bodies. So say you lose a door that wont make the car lighter on that side nor heavier on the opposite.

Alright, so why is this important?
Because the size and placement of the spoiler is usually permanently attached to the car, meaning that it will never break off from damage. This means that the spoiler's hitbox will be influencing the CoG of the car itself. Let me give you a few examples where the differences, or lack of, are pretty clear.

The Feltzer
Most of you surely know about the huge park bench of a spoiler the Feltzer has aswell as the tiny one. The large GT Wing is famous for getting stuck in things like pulling down poles or getting caught in other stuff near the car. There's our evidence that it has an effect on the hitbox of the car. But because of how dang big that thing is it also shifts the CoG towards the back by a lot, making the car very rear-heavy compared to the small alternative. That CoG shift along with its overall soft suspension will make this change very easy to detect.

On the flip side...

The Comet
Alright so for anyone that has driven this car over bumpy roads, you'll know that this is a very tail happy car. But it's tail happy for more than just traction reasons. It's suspension is practically rigid, so if there's a bump in the road you'll feel it. Because of this the different spoiler attachments make little to no difference to the overall handling as the suspension wont respond much differently to bumps. That's as far as my testing goes anyway. I honestly couldnt tell if the different spoilers made any change in the first place. At this point I had to test it on more cars to confirm that it's only a CoG change and nothing more.

I'll be brief with the rest.
Feltzer - The park bench gives the rear wheels a ton of pressure so it sticks really well but also nasty oversteer in some situations.
Comet - I honestly cant tell if it does anything or is just placebo.
Massacro - The largest spoiler makes it understeer a bit more, but also allowed a little more aggressive throttle control.
Ruiner - The largest spoiler gave the rear wheels a welcome grip increase, but it was still just as slidy overall.
At that point I felt confident enough that I had figured this out. Unfortunately nothing fancy, just basic physics going on that will naturally tweak the resulting handling.

TL;DR
Wheel type behaviour:
High-End limited but responsive.
Tuner loose, nice over bumps.
Sports 50/50 High-End/Tuner.
SUV brings out said car's "qualities".
Offroad "On rails", nice over bumps. very limited but very responsive.

Different spoilers matter?
To some degree. Use different spoilers to tweak the grip balance. A large spoiler = more rear grip, slight understeer and vice versa for small spoilers. You want a spoiler either way it goes, so dont take it off!

So are tuners and a big spoiler better for more "pure" tracks. I assume that offroads and and a smaller spoiler are still bigger for bumpy tracks and tracks with lampposts.