Mod F1 1982 for rFactor

Well, obviously GPC79 brakes fit best with GPC79 brake calipers.

Anyway, I've managed to get the 1979 Final Chapter mod and I like the Alfa 179's dash very much. I tried to get it to work with my 179D but a few things have come to my sight that I'd need help with.

1. The Oil temp and water temp gauges are reversed, meaning Oil Temp shows water temp and vice versa. That's an easy fix, just changing the background images for the needles.
   
2. All three gauges, oil temp, water temp and rev count have their angles and values very off. I managed to get values for the rev-counter so that it actually shows from 0 RPM to 13,000 and with correct angles. But I can't get the angles for the oil temp and water temp gauges to work properly. The gauges say 60min and 130max temperatures, but the cockpitinfo of the 179 from the Final Chapter mod has values of 70min and 280max temperature with weird angles, too.
   
3. After having moved the dash to the correct position and saved it properly, too, through 3DSimED3, in the cockpit, the complete dashboard moves up (as in positive Z values) but only when the needles and all the stuff is enabled in the cockpitinfo! If the needle textures are not found by the game, or are not defined, then the dashboard is in the correct position.
   

So I'd really love to get some help there, especially about the position of the dashboard because that makes no sense to me, since it's placed correctly in the spinner, in the GEN file loaded into 3DSimED and in the car when no gauges are defined. Until then, I keep working on the BT49D.

Tiny dev update

It turns out, making this BT49 into a BT49D is more than just slapping a white-blue Parmalat skin onto it.

In total, the following things have been done so far (except the obvious parting of parts to follow the structure of the 1982 mod):

- Hollowed out the cockpit area in order to be able to fit a new interior, dashboard, details and steering system; re-mapped the roll-bars in order to be able to add the "Santál" stickers; re-mapped the front wing in order to be able to add different paint schemes to the right-side front wing; re-mapped the mirrors for better visibility (hopefully that doesn't need to be changed, I haven't tested the mirrors in-game yet)



- Re-designed/changed the front suspension layout to provide better visual appearance of suspension, adjusted to 1982 D-spec (I hope the weird upwards pointing doesn't hurt, so I really, really hope that the behavior is normal in-game. Again, never tested. I only worked on the 3d model so far.)



- Re-designed rear suspension layout to comply with the suspension design used on the BT49 from the B-spec onwards. ("[For the BT49B], an alternative rear suspension layout was designed to go with [a new Weismann gearbox, which proved to be unreliable and wasn't used beyond the Dutch GP 1980]. It replaced the standard pullrods with rocker arms that activated vertical coil springs mounted behind the gearbox.")






- Re-designed the rear wing to fit the 1982 paint better, plus to comply with image footage I've seen of BT49Ds. Re-mapped the rear wing and gave it its own material, "wcrearwing". Re-designed and re-mapped the exhaust system to look like the exhaust system of the GPC79 Brabham, but with full-length exhausts. (I haven't seen BT49D exhausts yet, so I'm currently assuming that the exhausts go that way. If that turns out false, I'll re-design the exhausts again)





So far, I'm sure I'm doing pretty well, given that this car seems to have many changes done to it between 1979 and 1982. At least compared to the Alfa 179D, this car seems to have been much more developed going through B- and C-specs. Or the Autodelta history keeping was really just that bad as I've once seen/read.

Anyway, I hope I haven't made any sort of fuck-up with the components. Everything looks like it fits like a charm, and given that I've simply imported all those objects into a "new 3DSimEd project", I can edit each one on their own using "Isolate". That way, I'll also be able to edit and set the proper pivot points for the brakes and tyres, so I hope that'll go down well.

Also, I just remembered one thing I have to do, livery-wise. I have to create a specular map texture for the new rear wing material, since it literally uses a texture map from the GP4 car. But I have absolutely no clue how to do that, maybe one has to do it from scratch? Or is there a way to "easily" "convert" the texture into a spec map?

Cheers! 

Pascal Mikula wrote:

Well, obviously GPC79 brakes fit best with GPC79 brake calipers.

Anyway, I've managed to get the 1979 Final Chapter mod and I like the Alfa 179's dash very much. I tried to get it to work with my 179D but a few things have come to my sight that I'd need help with.

1. The Oil temp and water temp gauges are reversed, meaning Oil Temp shows water temp and vice versa. That's an easy fix, just changing the background images for the needles.
   
2. All three gauges, oil temp, water temp and rev count have their angles and values very off. I managed to get values for the rev-counter so that it actually shows from 0 RPM to 13,000 and with correct angles. But I can't get the angles for the oil temp and water temp gauges to work properly. The gauges say 60min and 130max temperatures, but the cockpitinfo of the 179 from the Final Chapter mod has values of 70min and 280max temperature with weird angles, too.
   
3. After having moved the dash to the correct position and saved it properly, too, through 3DSimED3, in the cockpit, the complete dashboard moves up (as in positive Z values) but only when the needles and all the stuff is enabled in the cockpitinfo! If the needle textures are not found by the game, or are not defined, then the dashboard is in the correct position.
   

So I'd really love to get some help there, especially about the position of the dashboard because that makes no sense to me, since it's placed correctly in the spinner, in the GEN file loaded into 3DSimED and in the car when no gauges are defined. Until then, I keep working on the BT49D.

I can't offer much advice without having the files. If you want want to upload the car and the files then I'll try and take a look.

David Sabre wrote:

Pascal Mikula wrote:

Well, obviously GPC79 brakes fit best with GPC79 brake calipers.

Anyway, I've managed to get the 1979 Final Chapter mod and I like the Alfa 179's dash very much. I tried to get it to work with my 179D but a few things have come to my sight that I'd need help with.

1. The Oil temp and water temp gauges are reversed, meaning Oil Temp shows water temp and vice versa. That's an easy fix, just changing the background images for the needles.
   
2. All three gauges, oil temp, water temp and rev count have their angles and values very off. I managed to get values for the rev-counter so that it actually shows from 0 RPM to 13,000 and with correct angles. But I can't get the angles for the oil temp and water temp gauges to work properly. The gauges say 60min and 130max temperatures, but the cockpitinfo of the 179 from the Final Chapter mod has values of 70min and 280max temperature with weird angles, too.
   
3. After having moved the dash to the correct position and saved it properly, too, through 3DSimED3, in the cockpit, the complete dashboard moves up (as in positive Z values) but only when the needles and all the stuff is enabled in the cockpitinfo! If the needle textures are not found by the game, or are not defined, then the dashboard is in the correct position.
   

So I'd really love to get some help there, especially about the position of the dashboard because that makes no sense to me, since it's placed correctly in the spinner, in the GEN file loaded into 3DSimED and in the car when no gauges are defined. Until then, I keep working on the BT49D.

I can't offer much advice without having the files. If you want want to upload the car and the files then I'll try and take a look.

I can do that, yeah. I sort of deleted the altered MAS files so I'll have to replicate the whole thing first, but I'll send you a PM when it's uploaded. Then again, I'm also still not sure whether to really use that dash or the GPC79 dash, since the Final Chapter dash looks better and has a better position for the rev light and stuff like that, but it has those "bugs", plus the GPC dash fits in better as far as the shape of the cockpit goes.

Pascal Mikula wrote:

- Re-designed the rear wing to fit the 1982 paint better, plus to comply with image footage I've seen of BT49Ds. Re-mapped the rear wing and gave it its own material, "wcrearwing". Re-designed and re-mapped the exhaust system to look like the exhaust system of the GPC79 Brabham, but with full-length exhausts. (I haven't seen BT49D exhausts yet, so I'm currently assuming that the exhausts go that way. If that turns out false, I'll re-design the exhausts again)

They use a different exhaust routing since the BT49C. I found a picture about the exhaust, but I am not sure to upload it because I fear I would burned by the image owner.

You can just put the link to the image in a post under "Insert Image", that doesn't violate any copyright laws as far as I know. If you don't take it and re-upload it anywhere, that should be fine. Otherwise, you can also send it to me via PM.

But that means I can also assume that the engine cover be fully enclosed at the back, too?

Pascal Mikula wrote:

You can just put the link to the image in a post under "Insert Image", that doesn't violate any copyright laws as far as I know. If you don't take it and re-upload it anywhere, that should be fine. Otherwise, you can also send it to me via PM.

But that means I can also assume that the engine cover be fully enclosed at the back, too?

https://www.ultimatecarpage.com/img/Brabham-BT49C-Cosworth-5641.html
Yup, and yup

Ashar Firdaus wrote:

Pascal Mikula wrote:

You can just put the link to the image in a post under "Insert Image", that doesn't violate any copyright laws as far as I know. If you don't take it and re-upload it anywhere, that should be fine. Otherwise, you can also send it to me via PM.

But that means I can also assume that the engine cover be fully enclosed at the back, too?

https://www.ultimatecarpage.com/img/Brabham-BT49C-Cosworth-5641.html
Yup, and yup

Hmm...I've seen that that database also has a image gallery of a 49D, but the only photo of the D I've seen so far of the back was mostly rear wing, so I couldn't see the rear bodywork and the exhaust. So I'll check the C photo out and edit the exhaust system accordingly.

What do you want an image of. The back end or the C or the D?

Richard Coxon wrote:

What do you want an image of. The back end or the C or the D?

Well I'm working on a BT49D, so I'd love to see the back end, or rather just the exhaust system and engine cover, of a BT49D. So far as I see it, the photo Ashar linked, which shows the engine and exhaust of the BT49C shows that the exhaust routing wasn't changed at all. It's very similar, if not the same, as the Williams FW07 and FW08, which I based my Brabham's exhaust routing on. It's not 100% the same as the original, but as good as I can make it.





And since there are more photos of the engine compartment of the BT49C on ultimatecarpage, there's another photo showing the C's exhaust, which is still the same as the BT49 and Williams FW07.



So far my BT49D has that exact exhaust routing (almost same, but close. See above) and so far, the only thing I'd change on the exhausts would be..the textures and giving it some other shaders but nothing as far as the routing goes. 
But I'd love to see the back end of a BT49D just to make sure I'm not wrong.

The exhaust exited at the back end of the engine cover, there was no hole or space like in the Williams. Sometimes as you can see from the piquet shot, that they cut a section away.

Best i could find for you.

Oh good lord, that'll be a handful to do. So a fully enclosed engine cover, the stripes go around the back too, a grid above the engine's intakes, no filters on top, and that shape of the back of the engine cover where the exhaust exits.. So if I see that correctly, the Piquet shot, the first photo on your post, is from Long Beach? Guess I'll have to cut away the little part for an extra engine cover for Long Beach then..but it looks like that too from the Patrese shot from Monte Carlo. I'm not sure. I'll most likely try to make the engine cover altering with as little amount of triangles as possible, so i'll probably not do the cut-out at the back initially. But I suppose the most challenging part will be designing the exhaust, since it looks like it'll clip through some parts of the gearbox I have at the time. And cutting away/making the gearbox thing smaller doesn't really come as a big option since it would expose too large parts of the rear suspension with the new vertical springs and all that.



Also, that last photo looks very much like either a model car or a "toy" car, or a rendering of a BT49D. Was the fourth "Santál" sticker that's right below the roll bar put on at any round for Piquet? I just saw that Patrese had this extra sticker for Monaco, Detroit and Montreal according to the GP4 liveries, but anywhere else?
God I have so many notes and stuff where which car was entered..I'm almost starting to lose track from so much information! 

You're right, ZModeler is indeed the easier way to manipulate and edit the current engine cover and to also help re-texture it, since some mapping will be offset afterwards. But I've only been looking at my possibilities in 3DSimEd and because I've had a really busy day with my last graduation ceremony in school today, I've not really had any time to work on the engine cover and the exhaust; as I said, it'll be a slow progress.
I mean, at the moment, I've replaced the DFV's intake tubes with shorter ones from the Theodore TY02's engine, so that they won't poke through the engine cover anymore. Plus, I've moved the whole engine block a little bit more towards the center of the car, also lengthening the "block" of the gearbox, so that the "drop-off" on the engine cover can occur directly behind the grill above the intake tubes, as I've seen it be the case on the photos. But that's all I've been able to do today.

Quote :

A lot of curiosity is in knowing how this project will go on for the '82 season which for some of my nation was certainly not a good season ...

Well I'll definitely keep working on it, that's no question. It's just going to slow down a whole lot by now since I'll have to look for ways to create cars from scratch once I'm finished with the Brabham. I've listed the missing cars a few times now, and that hasn't changed. There's still models missing, probably even sounds missing, definitely skins missing. So yeah, and the GP4 mod can only bring so much. I'm pretty sure the GP4 mod doesn't have any of the missing cars now; I've already "taken" and based my 179D on the GP4 179 and currently my BT49D is using texture maps from the GP4 mod with adjusted texture mapping so that that works.
By the way, that BT49D model you showed looks awesome! That's just about what I'm going to try to make! Did you make that model? Would you mind taking a look at the existing engine cover and exhaust to see if you could do something to it?

Honestly, after looking into the way the engine cover is built, I'm sure that I'd have to build the whole thing from scratch, at least the upper parts for the whole shape to be built somewhat well. I have no clue how to do that, neither in 3DSimED nor in ZModeler. So far, all the things I've done in 3d editing was rather simple stuff, but I've feared the time for so long when I'd have to start building stuff from scratch; but I didn't think that time would come so soon, with that engine cover. I've now looked at the photos and drawings for quite a long time and looked at the triangle structure of the existing engine cover, and I can't even take the engine cover from the GP4 mod's car, since..well it's a 1979 BT49 with new suspension and a blue-and-white Parmalat paint job! The GP4 model has the same engine cover as the 1979 BT49 and its exhaust system is this generalized exhaust system with one pipe per side that goes through the rear suspension arms, so I'm sort of out of ideas and out of skill now.
Doesn't mean I'm going to throw in now and give up, but I've got no idea how I'm supposed to do this or where to start. I can't even do the exhaust routing yet because I don't know how I'm going to make the exhaust go on the gearbox without clipping into the gearbox.. 
Guess I'll just work on getting the car to show up in the game for now, fixing the wheels' and spindles' pivot points, so that the general model shows up in-game, even without a cockpit or anything.
Or I could start to work on the filter grid that would be placed on the new engine cover, on top of the engine intakes. Or I could try to work on the cockpit. All that's stuff I could do, but I feel like now that the engine cover has been mentioned, the perfectionist in me can't really ignore it until it's done as well as possible. 

Your doing great, lots of patience required to do what your doing for sure, I tried my hand at it couple years ago, quickly found out I didn't have the patience at all.

Pascal Mikula wrote:

I'm sure that I'd have to build the whole thing from scratch, at least the upper parts for the whole shape to be built somewhat well. I have no clue how to do that, neither in 3DSimED nor in ZModeler. So far, all the things I've done in 3d editing was rather simple stuff, but I've feared the time for so long when I'd have to start building stuff from scratch; but I didn't think that time would come so soon, with that engine cover.

An engine cover is a very good thing to start with. Not daunting, a single object with a not so complicated shape. This could be your first step into 3D modelling, and it's way easier than you think

There are two basic ways you can model it, one is creating a flat surface from top view and then pick vertices one by one to move them to where you want, or the other is face by face over the background image you use as template, then move the vertices. In complex proffesional modelling programs you define areas with editable lines and they become filled with polygons, in zmodeler 1 you do that one by one but it is not as hard as you think. I did the whole Indy track from scratch (except the racing surface itself) with it, buildings, trees, vehicles, everything and I have done simple cars and loads of single parts.

Surely the background image option sounds more than possible, but so far all I've seen are photos from a weird angle. Plus, I'd like to take the existing engine cover as a base, since the bottom plates are already there and made, and basically the top is also at the right height already, just that I want to make a gap over the intake tubes, and then let the cover drop off downwards right behind the engine block, or the tubes themselves. So I'm not sure where exactly to begin. I'm trying to move some existing verts towards the front of the engine cover so I can create a bit of cover between the very front of the model and where the intake tubes are, so I can try and make the gap first, but that's already quite a handful. But I guess it can only bring good things, like more and more patience..

If the existing engine cover can be adapted, the best course of action is to load it in zmodeler and start by deleteing the parts you do not need. Then you go to create-faces-single, and start adding them and moving the vertices following the desired shape.

Alberto Ibañez wrote:

If the existing engine cover can be adapted, the best course of action is to load it in zmodeler and start by deleteing the parts you do not need. Then you go to create-faces-single, and start adding them and moving the vertices following the desired shape.

That's exactly what I'm trying to do, but so far with no real success. I mean, I'm sure that because it's the first time I'm trying something from nearly-scratch (the exhausts don't count, I just took parts of existing exhausts and "bolted" them together) it's going to take quite a while.
Then again, I've found the F1 Challenge 1981 mod, and a 3D model of a BT49C..so maybe those can help me out, too.

Hmm..the 3d model I found, which was also free to download, seems to have a very nice engine cover. Sure, it's only a C-model, but the engine cover and exhaust system look really nice. That'll surely help me create mine! I can't just copy-paste it, since the engine would be too wide for that cover, and the engine of the 3D model has so much stuff, the engine alone would have as many polys as the rest of the BT49D i'm working on.

I'm not even looking at the exhausts yet..I'm looking at the engine cover and how I'm gonna do it and how just the engine block itself is gonna fit. I saw the exhaust system of the 3D model that I downloaded earlier today and believe me, it's more detailed than I could have ever imagined. The whole thing has over 500,000 polygons! So I can only work slowly, and I think that's my weakness. I sort of wanted to have that done today, or maybe at the end of the week, who knows. But as I said, it's all about the engine cover for now. The exhausts can come later.

I found a photo that may be of some help,keep up the great work and don't get discouraged. Take all the time you need ,there's no rush.

Thank you. I'm looking at the 3D model I found earlier, and I'm taking the engine cover from that. It's very well-made and as far as I see it, it's also not too difficult to adjust. However, the poly-count is way higher than usual, and I'll also have to re-map the whole thing since the materials used in it are..weird at best. For example, the blue stripes are not shown through texture map, they're their own polygons with their own material. I'm going to fix that and adjust the mapping to use the WCCARBODY material and my existing BT49D textures. Anyway, I'm going to adjust the engine cover one triangle at a time, in 3DSimed. I think for now I'm going to use ZModeler only for re-mapping of meshes, because I don't feel like I'm really getting familiar enough with it anytime soon; so it might get done sooner than expected.
So far, I'm working on the right side of the engine cover, widening the "bulge" that covers the engine block, and adjusting polygon positions to "cover up" the stripes. If it all looks good enough, I'll copy the changes over to the left side and hopefully it'll all be done then. And after that, it's time for the exhausts. Who knows, maybe I'll take a look at the exhaust system that's part of the model I found? That'd be a whole new level of detail and I'm sure it'd be more than well-received 

Anyway, if anyone wants to take a look at the model I keep talking about, here's the link. It's free to download (which is really amazing, since I've found a model that looks like it's made with waayyyy lower quality and the creator wants $25 for it) and the car is, despite being a BT49C, very detailed and good to use for my BT49D. (Download it as Collada DAE unless you have a way of importing SketchUp 2019 into your 3D editor of choice)



https://3dwarehouse.sketchup.com/model/5ff72cf8-070e-44cc-a4c9-cf68556bb5a5/Brabham-BT49c-1981