Solved

Fuel and free pratice

This is not the first time that it happended ... but this time it happened to "a lot of teams": 
How we can run a race without re-fuel if fuel indicated in free pratice is wrong?

The circuit is China.
I can think that pit lane is longer  than stay on circuit but fuel is already wrong in the first laps and I Was in pole position!
In free pratice  fuel was 2.56 for lap....but it was 2,7 during race. Ok. I was on max push... but 0.14 litres of difference is too much: there were necessary 2 litres more.
In some other circuit with max push , (Hungary for example) if I add 0.14litres , i will arrive with 2 litres more... crazy

I confirm everything Simone says, by now on some tracks there are obvious problems regarding refueling and I would also add that very often in live races we find ourselves with blocked strategies forcing the managers to leave and re-enter to be able to unblock it, thus skipping a possible pit to try to make an undercut or overcut

Hi Simone
               I don't think the issue is with free practice but I'll try provide some information where I can to help. And maybe from there we can drill down to whether or not people can be helped to understand the situation better or examine what could be changed in free practice to help.

First off I will consider your comment on China vs Hungary. China is 5.442km per lap, while Hungary is only 3.498km per lap. So it makes sense that running full push would consume a different amount of fuel per lap on each circuit. This is why 0.14 per lap on china does not follow through to hungary. (I did some quick maths and I believe hungary woudl be about 0.07 extra per lap), but my maths also tells me it would be 0.10 for China if base fuel was 2.56 so it's a little off. But the formula I have is an estimate and also not my own originally.

Next up, having a look at free practice. I don't think that free practice is neccesarily is wrong. However its not clear to a player what it is telling you, and also there are things that can affect the output.

For example running your practice laps while your engine is not fully repaired, will produce a slightly different result in fuel consumption compared to when you have a repaired engine if my memory serves me correctly. (It's been well over a year since I last thought about this so apologies if it turns out not to be true.)

And also if you change your Fuel Economy after you have run your practice laps, again the answer's won't be much use to your planning.

But, putting those bits to one side, lets look at a key issue. Practice laps do not know what your strategy will be, so they can never give you fully accurate information for your planned strategy. Your push level will change depending on your tyre choices, and also your chosen race mode (Refuelling / Non Refuelling), with heavy cars in Non-refuelling requiring more push at the start. All of this can result in deviations from the simulation that free practice provides for you.

I believe free practice usually runs at Push level 3, no matter what tyre is selected (never confirmed this, I just take it for granted.)

So first off, it would be nice if it could be clarified somewhere what conditions an average free practice lap runs at. This would be beneficial for players and hopefully at least help highlight that if you expect to be running at higher push levels than what free practice runs at, you can try for an adjustment.

As for actual improvements, i've thought of 3 options:

#1: Free practice returns an additional set of information on what the average push level for the lap was. And maybe also how many litres of fuel was in the car.
#2: The player is given the ability to set a push level for a free practice lap, and maybe also the amount of fuel in the car
#3: Each tyre compound runs at a push level appropriate for that compound.

1&2 could possibily also be combined as a single item.

Apologies on the long winded answer, hopefully there's some useful stuff in there.


Natal Race:

Could you explain the blocked strategies a little more? I've heard something like this mentioned as a problem between entering the race and lights out but hadn't heard of consistent issues within race itself. I have had an issue a few times where I can't change my fuel load, but usually this has been due to a connection drop out for me earlier in the race.

From what you are saying it sounds like you can't intereact with the pit in button at all?

Hi Michael, during the race if I go to the pit button there is a padlock, the writing is red and the writing strategy blocked appears, to unlock it you have to exit and re-enter, surely if a manager notices it before the start he will solve the problem immediately, but if for various reasons he doesn't check before the start, this problem is found in the race

Free practice has been confirmed on the forum at pl3 many times

Thanks DD :-), what I meant was I had never bothered to confirm this myself.

In that case I will suggest that perhaps there could be a formal note added to the free practice page or within section 1.4 of the help page to fully cement this.

Agree.   Jack posted confirmation in a thread a few years ago and there have been a couple where mods also confirmed pl3, but you are right there is no easy way for a newcomer to find this information.

Pl3??? Then the problem is much worse because today in China I calculated at pl2 and I finished the race with 0.2 of fuel… Calculating it at 3 I would have run out of fuel….

That’s strange since pl3 calculations work perfectly for me

I don't understand...

Ah maybe I should reference. To me 5 is the highest push level and 1 is the lowest.

So to my reading, 3 would actually have resulted in you having more fuel in the car than 2. But if you think of 1 as the highest then that would make sense.

let's put some numbers so it will be easier, if in pl I have 2.57 I calculate it by adding 0.03 more for each push so since I calculate at pl2, 2.57+0.03+0.03+0.03= 2.66x50 revs= 133 litres.    If I calculate the pl3 2.57+0.03+0.03= 131.5 litres….. If I calculate the pl2 I put more fuel….  did i do something wrong???  NB I took random values

In my experience the free exercises are pl2, but even if it were pl3 the problem is even worse. The problem exposed by Simone is quite clear and simple. Because in 99% of the tracks the fuel calculation is it accurate and instead in China it is completely wrong? That said, what does runway length have to do with it??

Ahh ok i see yes I follow. So yes we are using different numbering systems. And I think your assumption is also that the number provided by free practice is for the lowest push level (1 by my thinking)

So for me:

Very Low = 1
Low = 2
Neutral = 3
High = 4
Very High = 5

The calculation you are providing, 2.57+0.03+0.03+0.03= 2.66x50 revs= 133 litres I would use for push Level 4 in my way of thinking, If I believed that 2.57 would be push level 1.

But since I believe 2.57 - PL 3.

I would use 2.57+0.03 = 2.60*50 revs. And as you say. I would under fuel using this formula.


But then is that an issue with free practice or with how you are calculating fuel.

This is exactly why I think at the very least the free practice push level should be formally clarified. You can put a lot of work into building a prediction system which will still function fairly well even from the wrong starting point. But it will fail in extreme situations.



Jose M
The longer a lap is, the more fuel will be burned per lap at higher push levels than the given figure in free practice.

How do I illustrate... *thinking intensifies*

So Free practice tells me at a 1.0 km per lap circuit I will use 1L per lap.
When I run a lap at PL5, I burn 1.05L per lap. So I need to adjust by 0.05 per lap in my assumptions.

if the track is 5.0km. I will need 5L per lap, and if I run at PL5, I burn 5.25L per lap. Therefore my difference per lap at this circuit is 0.25 per lap.

Note: All figures are made up.

Sorry if that still doesn't make sense. I'm trying :-)

Why do calculate in pl2 when free practice is pl3 (or to make things more clearer neutral?)

I think you missed understanding:

Circuit: China
League: offline with NO-Fuel
Engine: repaired 
Point: first lap with 5 points till to add. Fuel for lap: 2.56
Second lap after addìng 5 points (not in fuel). Fuel for lap.2:56

According to temperature :push level 5.

Fuel considered for race according to push : 2.65 
Total fuel :109 litres. (41 laps)

Race: fuel remained after lap 40: 1,3 laps 
Fuel for lap during race:2.692 litres.

so there is a big difference:0,14 litres per lap!

In Hungary (and also in other circuits with push 5) : fuel calculations is.correct.

This means that I need to add 2 litres more according to the lenght of one lap:  but this is not easy to decide.don't you think? 
I am sure that with push 1 2 3 and 4 calculation is correct, but with 5 not...

Yes maybe I am not understanding. Out of curiosity could you tell me what your FE was? I will run it through my calculations and see what I get, might help with my understanding.

I will expand as I'm disappearing for the night soon.

I'm assuming that your FE was around 65

I would adjust 2.56 per lap to 2.66, this says I would need 109.2L to complete the race, so I would fuel 110L.

You are saying you experienced 2.69, which is 0.03 more than I would have expected. And you are saying the same formula you have works properly for other circuits.

Therefore you say that something is wrong with china's calculation across a race distance.

And maybe due to the pit lane adding distance to the lap is your suggestion as to why?

Where is the finish line in China compared to the start grid, could that be a factor?

Because many times calculating at pl3 I ran out of fuel….  Last season 4 times!!!!

My FE is 56 not 65.


I wrote in my first post about lenght of pit lane: however 2.7 is fuel for lap also in the first laps and starting from Pole position my first lap should be shorter...
This could be an addition, but it is not enough.

After race I made the same calculation as you. With +0,1 instead of +0,09 because I noticed it in another race. However as you are agree. Also 110 was not enough. 
If 110 were enough, I would not write this post, but they weren’t enough.

However tomorrow I had to run again in China but with 100% instead of 75%... and with 2 drivers . I will try  both additions for understandings. HoweveR FE is not the same... so I don’t know if the experiment will be right

Tomorrow I have 2.44 litres. I had to do 55 laps: what do you suggest as fuel?

Sorry, the starting value for your formula makes no sense to me and there are much simpler ways of determining fuel usage for the race at different pl’s especially in offline races.  I still can’t see how you can calculate at pl2 since the only information you have is practice lap usage at pl3 or possibly historic race data at similar temps and FE.  Let’s leave it at that as our conversation is a distraction to the main thread. ?