Ive been thinkig a lot about this and, 0.8 update is absolutely amazing, but here are some ideas which would greatly improve the realism in beamng. Have more engine customization, by that i mean, different camshafts/crankshafts lenght connecting rods pistons. In terms of damage, piston damage, you can run an engine with a messed up piston or two, this is something is love to see in beamng. Im currently making a vehicle which i would love to have those features. its kinda a pain since i cant. Have the different camshafts and etc as a different slot in the engine, and have those only slightly change some of the specs. by example, you would have the "main" torque curve with all the main specs of the engine, and then different crankshafts/camshafts, piston/rods etc would only slightly change those specs instead of having its own torque curve. lets say a certain piston improve the rpm by 100, well it would be something like this Code: "rpmmodifier":[ ["rpm"] [0, 0], [+100], [+100], [+100], [+100], [+100], [+100], [+100], [+100], [+100], [+100], ], This is just a quick way to explain it, it could be more precise like this too Code: "rpmmodifier":[ ["rpm"] [+0], [+10], [+15], [+22], [+27], [+34], [+39], [+43], [+47], [+53], [+55], ], As for piston damage, i wanted to detail my engine extremely well with a jbeam for every part in the engine, so lets say in this case its a v8, every piston would have a beam connected to the crankshaft node(or beam) and if its rpm goes too high or just its beamstrenght is passed it beaks, and when it breaks that piston decrease the engine's performance accordingly to its power. some other ideas that ive had is if you bust the oil pan a small effect of oil is dropped from under the engine and suddenly since there wont be any oil left the engine will heat up quickly. kinda like when the radiator is broken. it drains out and then it stops affecting the engine since it cant cool it down. having a small water stream effect would be cool to have as well for the radiator and the fuel tank. Transmission fluid and brake fluid could also be a thing. I really hope that beamng ends up adding those in since it would add sooooo much potential and detail and realism to everything.
Its good to hear some new ideas especially concerning the RPM modifier. That would add huge customisation options to this game like different intakes and exhaust, aggressive cams, forged pistons, lightweight valve train. It could even advance into gearbox customisation. However i don't think your engine idea would work very well as it is would very hard to simulate the piston, rod and crank. There would need to be hundreds of coltri's, lots of beams to reinforce the crank as well as some very light node weights which may become unstable if you had to make something like a forged racing piston for something like the bolide. I would hate to be the one making it because of how confined the structure would have to be. @Goosah @Diamondback @stenyak Would it be possible to implement something like the RPM modifier that @crashmaster has suggested.
the way i was thinking about making a broken piston was with a single beam attached to a node which acts as the crankshaft node. if one of the piston beam broke it would make that piston fail and then less power etc.
I will be testing stuff tomorrow as i am currently planning a very detailed engine jbeam. its a pretty big project.
Engine stuff... ahh, thats like my favorite topic... I try to learn every and anything about engines. Might have seen this before, but I made this in an excel sheet. May be useful in what you are embarking on... https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B24uvBKGyYwGVkNIUk9pVWdaM1U I am working on the mathematics of this all the time and am constantly adding things to it. Is it 100% right now? No... not even close... but it does do a pretty darn good job at getting pretty close.
