Wheel / motor intertia
Posted: Wed Feb 23, 2011 11:04 pm
The car works really good, but there's a feature I miss from Jitter, wheel intertia. Using high values, it resists the wheel changing speed rapidly, and you can use it as a cheat to regulate a vehicle's acceleration to low values, even when using a high torque. Imagine the wheel is a concrete block, and forces applied to it only change the speed slowly. When reaching a hill, the car coasts up it, as the wheel's momentum is consumed. When going down a hill, the car hesitates to accelerate, as the wheels gradually speed up again.
In Bepu, when I apply a large drive force, the car picks up speed almost instantly. If I reduce the drive force, the car accelerates more realistically, but then it can't climb a shallow hill. I vary the drive force based on gear or speed, but even then, the car picks up too much speed going -down- the hill (exhibiting behavior like a toy car). As if the car's wheels and drive train have no inertia resisting changes in velocity.
I'm probably not explaining it right, but I suggest a mechanism in the wheel or motor that resists accelerations and stores momentum, such that a vehicle accelerates more slowly, and coasts up and down slopes.
In Bepu, when I apply a large drive force, the car picks up speed almost instantly. If I reduce the drive force, the car accelerates more realistically, but then it can't climb a shallow hill. I vary the drive force based on gear or speed, but even then, the car picks up too much speed going -down- the hill (exhibiting behavior like a toy car). As if the car's wheels and drive train have no inertia resisting changes in velocity.
I'm probably not explaining it right, but I suggest a mechanism in the wheel or motor that resists accelerations and stores momentum, such that a vehicle accelerates more slowly, and coasts up and down slopes.