Turbo

[Chase-san]

I have for some time run a small mod where I add turbos into the game. Basically, they can be installed on any vehicle exactly the same way as an alternator, but provide extra engine power instead.

My idea for these is for the turbos to give a percentage boost to engine power rather than a flat boost (so a turbo charged 1-cylinder engines doesn't equal a 4-cylinder or something silly like that). Say, 10%, 20%, and 40% boost to engine power for an eco, standard and racing turbo.

In DDA these would basically be items that magically increase engine power. There are down sides and annoyances in real life, but those cannot be easily emulated in DDA.

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[kevingranade]

From what I understand of turbos they should increase both power and fuel consumption, though a slight increase in efficiency is reasonable as well.

[Chase-san]

It's a good bit more complicated then that, but, what isn't? In layman's terms, it depends on how the turbo is tuned (intake vs exhaust turbine size, ar ratio, psi, etc) and the configuration of the engine for what a turbo will do.

Some turbos are setup for economy, and improve overall gas milage with a very mild increase in horsepower, where as racing turbos have a massive increase in power and a big hit in the mileage as well. Then there are the middle of the road turbos that give you more horsepower without really effecting your mileage at all.

Basically, was just going to go middle of the road turbos with different sizes because that is the easiest. With maybe a slight hit to mileage.

[Cat09]

shoulnd't this be in PR or discussion? not really an "issue" is it?

[Chase-san]

That's a good idea. I might make up a pull request for this over the weekend.

[Coolthulhu]

Wikipedia says that turbocharging is "common" and that most diesel vehicles (also heavy machinery, ships etc.) are turbocharged. It also mentions disadvantages, such as "turbocharger lag". I didn't read into it much more than that.

So, what exactly would the turbochargers change? If most diesel engines have it installed, assuming that all of them do simplifies things without any real loss in functionality. If it is just to provide a flat or percentage boost, it may as well be considered fully integrated into any engine for which it would be reasonable to be turbocharged.

Customization? I assume that sports car would come with a different (or at least differently configured) turbocharger than a hippie van - performance vs fuel economy. But then, currently non-electric engines don't allow changing fuel economy at all. It would have to be implemented to make a separate turbocharger part make sense.

[Chase-san]

First, a hippie van wouldn't have one at all (stock anyway). Turbos were restricted to mostly sports cars until more recent days.

Basically, these might be found in garages, sports cars, small modern cars (like the mini), and a number of diesel vehicles (turbo diesels).

[Coolthulhu]

OK, maybe not every car. But still:

DDA takes place somewhere around year 2040. If many "regular" cars are produced with turbochargers today, it can be assumed that at least that many (by percentage) cars will have turbochargers.

A bit more research: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jimhenry/2013/04/30/most-engines-could-be-turbocharged-some-day-taking-diesels-and-gasoline-into-account/ This article states that diesels with no turbochargers are rare outside developing nations and that 75% of new cars in Europe have turbochargers. Didn't say about US

http://www.autoblog.com/2014/10/06/turbochargers-double-us-over-next-five-years/ Here it's 66% for Europe, but not just for new cars, but cars on roads. For US, it's 20% of new cars.

Even if we ignore the company's optimistic projections (40% of new cars in US by 2019) and assume the market stagnated, pretty much all the diesel vehicles and many of the gasoline ones should have the turbochargers, meaning they wouldn't be by any means uncommon and hard to find.

The system for turbochargers should offer more difference in gameplay than just adding another no-brainer part to install on every vehicle the player customized. If it was just a +x bonus to power, it may as well be considered integrated in the engine.

So: what would turbochargers actually add?

[Rivet-the-Zombie]

A turbocharger uses exhaust gas pressure to operate - thus, no loss real in engine efficiency but a lower air intake compression force, whereas a supercharger uses crankshaft power to create a much higher air intake compression. Since the game is taking place 25+ years in the future it would be safe to assume that most engines have a built-in turbocharger already.

Naming this part 'supercharger' would make more sense, as superchargers are not likely to become a standard engine system any time soon, and they pretty much work as stated - causing a small drag on fuel economy while boosting all other aspects of engine performance.

[Chase-san]

That's certainly acceptable, and superchargers are pretty rare. I say probably only only stock on sports cars. But a lot easier to remove and add than an engine.

[Cat09]

if this is the plan, then all the -car and up- (motorcycles???) engines should have their power/fuel stats adjusted to assume turbos

[Chase-san]

No need for that really. Though I feel Cata doesn't need to be very historically accurate, this kind of thing should be rare so I'll mock up a "classic sports car" for the game, and give it a supercharger.

[Rivet-the-Zombie]

engines should have their power/fuel stats adjusted to assume turbos

What would be the point of this? We can say 'they've already got turbochargers' and leave everything as-is.

[kevingranade]

To the best of my knowledge the fuel consumption and power figures are only very roughly based on reality in the first place, if anything the larger engines need to be toned down a lot, just dropping a big engine in a car is not going to get you a 300MPh racecar.

[Rivet-the-Zombie]

just dropping a big engine in a car is not going to get you a 300MPh racecar.

And even if it did, you'd never make 300 mph unless it's in a car that's specifically designed to go fast like that, and on an absolutely ideal surface. We really need a cap on those speed ratings.

[drbig]

We really need a cap on those speed ratings.

Indeed.

[i2amroy]

If we don't want to do a hard cap we could just give an ever-increasing chance of spinning out of control. As pointed out near the bottom of this xkcd what-if, most cars will suffer from "liftoff" between 150-300 miles per hour where they generate enough lift to literally flip themselves off of the pavement. Eventually we should just have it actually flip your car, but until then we could potentially look into just having it make you spin out more and more until your car becomes nigh-impossible to control. (Though we might need to adjust the player's ability to recover from spins slightly in that instance, and maybe make cars slow down a bit less while sliding, kinetic vs static friction and all that jazz).

[drbig]

Honestly? The top-speed figures make no sense given earthly physics. And 300 mph (482.80 km/h) is more of a cursing small/mid air plane speed than anything that can go roads, regardless of their quality :)

[kevingranade]

Keep in mind that the squares/turn to MPH conversion is also fairly arbitrary, if at any point the game balance seems fine but the stated speed is nonsensical, consider just rescaling the speed displayed.

[Cat09]

the cataclysm has caused space/time to destabalize, making the very fabric of reality unreliable! on a side note we might not want too hard coded a limit for the sake of remote controlled flying !funmobiles! ;]

[illi-kun]

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