How To Use Brake Bias - Sim Racing's Secret Switch

if you're a Sim racer but the words break bias don't mean anything to you don't click off this video today you will learn something that will actually help you for this is one of the most important useful and eye-opening things I can ever possibly teach you in Sim racing especially if you're new and struggling to make progress if you know how to use brake bias you can give your car extra stability extra turning power and extra stopping power at the flick of a switch anytime even as you drive it's not difficult to learn either trust me understanding break bias is as simple as putting the right amount of milk in your tea and making the small effort to use it will give you an advantage over those who don't and it will help you build confidence and race results in basically any racing simulator including eye racing ACC Gran Turismo and so on let me show you how before we crack on a quick plug use the discount code Danny Lee to get five percent off everything at race anywhere a UK based Sim racing hardware shop but also ships globally with a specially selected and up-to-date range of equipment in their store buying advice and guidance a build and collect service and you can even visit their site in the Midlands to try a high-end demo setup for yourself before you buy check the video description for more information and thanks for taking the time to look whenever you press the break in your virtual race car whether just a little bit or a lot that breaking force is portioned out or split between the front and rear wheels this is not usually a straight 50 50 divide like you'd think it would be in fact the share at a breaking force sent to each end is usually set slightly in favor of the front wheels with some exceptions however you don't really need to know this as a driver all you need to be aware of is that the name for the split of braking force between front and rear is called brake bias and that it actually plays a big part in how your car behaves when you break you don't need to know the details on how it works just but it does what makes break buyer such a powerful thing to know about is that almost all race cars and simulators give you the ability to adjust your brake bias whenever you want as you're driving from the cockpit but not only is it something that you can change on the go it's also often the only thing you can still change when you're in a fixed setup series on iRacing where every setting on the car is locked except brake bias because of this knowing how to control brake bias gives you a big advantage over those who don't if this will be your first time exploring brake bias you'll need to choose your controls for doing so in your game menu in most simulators and games that feature it you will need to choose two buttons to operate bait bias want to increase it and want to decrease it I personally use the two thumb buttons either side of my steering wheel as I like to count my button presses clearly and have them split on opposite sides of the wheel just like the shifter paddles are but you can choose a dial to do this whatever seems coming through for you just make sure you can get to it easily it's also handy to be able to see the current brake bias percentage your car is set to which you can usually bring up in game in iRacing you can see the brake bias by pressing f8 to bring up the in-car adjustments box but some cars will show you the brake bias on the dashboard and if you happen to have an external dash display then you might be able to see it there as well so what does break bias do exactly well generally speaking increase in brake bias makes a car safer and more stable while braking but makes it less eager to turn and increases your stopping distances in other words safer but slower decrease in brake bias makes the car more unstable and nervous while braking but makes it more eager to turn and can also improve your stopping distances in other words looser and sketchier but has the potential to be faster if you can control it brake bias is usually displayed as a percentage and this is represented to you as a percentage of front bias meaning if you see 52 brake bias that means 52 is going to the front leaving the remaining 48 going to the back therefore if you increase the percentage that means you're sending more brake Force towards the front and decreasing the percentage means moving it towards the rear however the percentage number itself is not what you should focus on don't be fooled into thinking that any percentage above 50 is safe just because more forces go into the front than the back that's an easy mistake to make and it doesn't work that way not to mention other factors in the setup that make this a bit of a mirage what really matters is the movement of a percentage one way or another if you're driving open setup series a car with high downforce and high grip may be able to tolerate a much lower more aggressive brake bias setting that same car at a different track with a low downfall setting may need much more brake bias meaning a safer balance because it doesn't have as much grip this is why I say don't worry about what the percentage itself is because it can vary wildly from car to car setup to setup all you need to worry about is whether you move that percentage up or down to change the balance when you break like I said earlier brake bias is like choosing the amount of milk in your tea use more milk when you need a safer weaker cup of tea but won't offend anyone but is really boring or use less milk for a stronger daring copper for when you want to taste it you know really live on the edge another important thing to keep in mind about brake bias is that it only affects how things feel when you're using the brakes so it has no effect on anything at all if you're not pressing the brake pedal brake bias only influences how you enter Corners the how you enter Corners influences how the rest of it goes so that's no small thing okay so let's look at practical examples of how brake bias can help you racing and to start with let's talk about using it to add safety and stability welcome to a segment I'm calling vicious Corners that are made completely harmless when you add a bit of brake bias a great example that comes to mind is sunset Bend at Sebring Raceway the last corner on the track you enter at top speed it's really bumpy and you have to slow down a lot for it whilst throwing the car into the turn this corner is many races nightmare because it's very easy to lose the back end of the car on Entry so if you find Sunset Bend really tricky to get around safely increasing your brake bias to put more bias towards the front of a car will add stability and safety it may come a small cost to how well your car turns it may feel a little less agile as a result but the extra confidence you'll have with the car should pay for itself in terms of race pace and avoiding a crash another dicey corner is poo on at spa it's a very fast faces downhill and in most cars requires a short but sharp Slice on the brakes when swooping into it those factors can combine to make puon quite tricky as the back end can suddenly get loose on Entry if you accidentally add too much of any one ingredient puon isn't too bad a corner in itself it's merely the fact that it requires an accurate swipe of brakes and steering to nail it and if you get that wrong you're in for a ride just like our first example if you find this corner particularly tricky increase your brake bias and you will find the cart is much less nervous when you dip into that brake pedal you'll find better be a bigger margin of safety and this corner will scare you no more there's a chance you may have to take it slightly slower to avoid running wide and picking up an off track or a track cut but it will pay you back with added bravery and confidence for our final example of Corners designed to make your bum squeak we're looking at turn one of Daytona road course here we have another very fast off-camber slightly bumpy and ever tightening Corner that requires you to break hard whilst the car is turning which is a recipe for a nervous car if you find this corner feels a bit like Russian Roulette once again just increase your brake bias a percent or so and you will see the difference you will have much more confidence entering the corner at a slight cost of turning power in all three examples you just saw the focus was on how adding brake bias can be useful to make the car more stable and build your confidence so that you can feel like you're making solid progress nothing comes for free though and although you notice your car is more predictable under break-in when you add brake bias the ultimate absolute potential lap time you're capable of may suffer because it won't turn as well because the balance has become too safe however your lap times were only going to start coming down when you believe in your connection to the car and that's always undermined if you're constantly worried about spinning so don't feel bad about up in brake bias to make it safer if it works for you I still need to do this from time to time when I just feel like things are getting a bit sketchy due to tire wear track heat or just lack of concentration and by adding a dash of brake bias I help protect against my own mistakes when I'm just not feeling on the ball break bias is not just useful for adding stability to tame a nervous car under braking it can also be turned the other way to reduce stability why would you ever want to reduce stability well in reality the words reduce stability just means make the car looser and easier to turn this is a thing to understand about brake bias it's about balancing speed against safety and if you feel as though you have too much safety in the car you can sacrifice some of it to unlock some pace if you're going around the track and the car feels almost like it's too tight and you're missing the corner apexes due to understeer when braking that's the sort of situation where you might decide to knock your brake bias down a bit to make the car relax and let the rear of the car float a little bit in other words introducing a dash of oversteer when you reduce your brake bias a bit you'll now notice your car will turn slightly harder when trial breaking and it may feel like it's cornering better but at the same time you may feel that it's now slightly looser and less safe the clip on screen is of me losing control of the car because I was running a lower more aggressive brake bias setting to improve pace which I was coping with for a time however the concentration lapse for a moment and with no safety net of stability but a higher brake bias setting would have given me I lost it if I was running more bias this spin probably wouldn't have happened but this is the trade-off you make by using brake bias to add agility if you like to race fixed setup Series in iRacing you might discover that those setups are often built a little bit on the safe side in order to make sure everyone can actually drive them what that means though is that sometimes you can crack a little extra Corner in power and lap time out of them if you go more aggressive with your brake bias provided you can control it one specific situation where brake bias can be lowered to directly gain that time is in deep break-in zones but tight where you're braking hard in a straight line from sixth gear all the way down to second or first for this think Monza turn one The Hairpin at Hockenheim The Hairpin at Sebring basically any section of track where a high speed section ends with a hard braking Zone into a tight chicane or even a hairpin for these sections of track if you reduce brake bias by a percent or two before you're due to hit your brake marker you should find that your stopping distance improves slightly which basically means you can break that little bit later for it this might only be by a car length or two but if you want to find an extra Temple to in your lap times this is one of the areas where it can be chipped loose with the help of brake bias as well as improving your stopping distance the more aggressive brake balance should also help your car rotate around the slow Apex corner you now find yourself at giving you a nice double dip of help you'll just need to be a bit more careful not to end up in a slow speed spin when you do actually turn in smooth and delicate steering will still be needed whenever your brake bias is set aggressively then once you escape in from that part of a track you can click the bias up again and return it to a more neutral balance for the rest of the lap sometimes brake bias can be useful for counteracting cold tires at the start of a stint on the open and lapse of a race some cars under steer some cars oversteer but in either case you can take the sting out of whichever cold Tire Quirk yukara Choice has by adjusting your bias accordingly for the first lap or so this is also worth doing sometimes because it adds a margin of safety and control if you have to brake hard to avoid contact with someone else that extra dash of front brake bias could save you from losing control here's an example of me spinning out on lap one in a recent race which was completely unforced and all down to me just pushing a little too hard at one of the trickiest breaking zones on the track and getting completely caught out I don't always add extra brake bias for the start of a race but here's an example where I wish I had because that might have prevented this spin I could have run one percent more brake bias for laps one and two and then put it back down to normal once things have settled in keep it in mind because although a safer break buyer setting might induce some understeer and slow you down a little bit spinning will slow you down a lot in cars that don't have ABS including LMP cars formula and certain varieties of GT brake bias takes on an even deeper meaning cars without ABS require more accuracy and restraint yeah in particular front tire lockups are a real threat but you can tilt the odds back in your favor by using brake bias to give yourself more room for error against whichever end of a car your problems lie if you're always worried about locking the front tires up you need to reduce brake bias if you're always worried about losing the rear of the car under braking you need to increase the brake bias if you have different problems at different Corners you can always adjust brake bias partway through the lap the tricky bit is just remembering to do that so increasing or decreasing bias is the way to go to solve certain problems but you'll also need a general idea of how much Buy for me the usual range of brake bias adjustment I need is up to maybe two percent either side of what comes in the setup by default so for example in our demo Mercedes GT3 there happens to be a standard buy a setting of 54 percent I don't usually have to stray outside of the 52 to 56 range to get the effect I want any more than that is unusual for me if it was to use a different setup for the Mercedes and it came with 56 biases standard I would stick between 54 and 58 percent it's just a rule of thumb to remember as most cars give you the ability to adjust brake bias far outside of the ideal range Way Beyond most reasonable settings it's important to know that you only need to nudge your brake bias rather than smashing it out of a ballpark all right I'll set at the start of this video that break bias was simple to understand and it is I'm just getting carried away with how many situations there are but brake bias can be of use to you in reality you can involve yourself into brake bias as little or as much as you can be bothered to do just knowing that you can use it is often enough for you to think of situations where it could have helped you if only you knew about it it's easy to understand in essence increase bias to add safety and understeer when you need confidence decrease bias to add agility and oversteer when you're in a Zone adjust it anytime on track to find a happy balance that suits your style as often as you like all that matters is that you now know you can adjust the behavior of a car under braking and how to do it it's so simple that you cannot pass it by you're always wishing you're a better Sim racer well here's one of the easiest things you can do to take another step up thanks for watching I hope this made sense but if you have any questions whatsoever feel free to ask in the comments below and please do chip in with any additional pointers I might have missed don't forget to give race anywhere a Mosey and remember the five percent discount code Danny Lee drop a like And subscribe for more stuff like this in the future cheers

Channel: Danny Lee

Views: 88,525

Keywords: iracing, simracing, acc, assetto corsa, assetto corsa competizione

Id: vME8LLbXRxs

Length: 17min 35sec (1055 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 07 2022

Reddit Comments

[u/TheEvilToaster]

There one thing to note with BB. Aris has explained that the % number you see means nothing in terms of amount of braking force sent to each axle. Its just an arbitrary number for a given setting. e.g 60% BB doesn't mean 60% force to the front. All you can take a way from the number is a higher number = more front braking.

[u/Tophattingson]

The tip about the +2%/-2% window of adjustment from default at the end seems to be more applicable to iracing default setups (guessing by the footage) than ACC default setups. In ACC, at least for every circumstance I've come across, the defaults lie either at the absolute top-end of the ideal window or outside of it, and every car benefits from reducing brake bias from the default. For the Merc, it's usually pretty close - defaults of ~60.6% vs an ideal window of ~58% to ~60%. But for others, it's comically out. The BMW has defaults running as high as 59%, when you probably want ~51% to ~54%.

I put together a simple table of these figures for quick reference if I change to a new car, based on other people's hotlapping examples. They're not exactly accurate, but they are better than nothing.

[u/Superdoooperguy]

Thank you for this. I’m trying to learn by just playing the single player on series X with a Thrustmaster TX and I didn’t know anything about racing before. Even trying to watch streamers or real GT racing doesn’t help explain anything lol.

[u/GustavSnapper]

Brake bias is simple.

Run it as rearward as possible until the point you start spinning and instability then just a click or two back to it.

[u/avoxinapopuli]

Excellent video. I often have a hard time understanding when to change BB and this video helped a lot!

[u/[deleted]]

True I often find myself nearly gaining a second just by dialing back the brake bias

[u/Dutton90]

Really helpful thanks!

[u/1sttimeusingredd1t]

Excellent video!

[u/velkooo]

Thanks. Subscribed!