Picture the scene: You’re nearing the end of the iRacing Daytona 24. After a gruelling day-long race, you and your friends are about to cross the line, completing the renowned sim racing event for the first time.
Suddenly, your wheel base goes awry, and you’re in the wall. It’s race over. All that hard work, testing, planning and driver-swapping has gone to waste, the front of your LMP2 car ripped away.
What you’ve just experienced isn’t necessarily a technical fault with the wheel, but instead could be electromagnetic interference, or EMI.
In sim racing, even just a momentary glitch can cost tenths of a second, and that can be enough to ruin your race.
What is EMI in sim racing?
In simple terms, EMI is when several electronic devices in close proximity can affect each other, thanks to an emanating invisible electromagnetic field that disrupts performance.
If it sounds like some kind of superhero power from a movie, you’d be right – only it’s the films that are aping, and exaggerating, a real-world phenomenon.
In this instance, it isn’t threatening humankind, but instead, preventing sim racers from winning events.
More down-to-earth examples include that annoying static or beeping sound when a phone is hunting for data during a radio broadcast or video microphones cutting in and out at a busy event due to the sheer volume of nearby electronics.
In sim racing, EMI can see devices disconnect, reconnect or even cause phantom gearshifts.
The chances of this happening increase the more devices you have in the vicinity – think triple monitors or VR headsets, pedals, shifters, wheel bases, wheels, dashboard displays or button boxes.
On a more catastrophic level, electrostatic discharge (ESD) could even lead to the complete failure of devices.
Think of this as the small static shock you may have received by touching the metal part of an office chair, but on a scale that permanently damages electronics.
Grounding devices
One method of avoiding such potential issues is by working out a way to ground your devices.
This could be along the lines of placing nylon washers between bolts and the cockpit surface, or even purchasing a battery cable and affixing it on one end to your PC and the other to your wheel base.
However, these methods are very much do-it-yourself. There is no easy-to-install kit, no safety warnings and no guarantee that it will work. If you start taking apart your devices, it could invalidate warranties or worse, damage expensive items.
Then, if you end up with multiple devices grounded at more than one point, this can create multiple routes for the current to pass down, which causes a ground loop, and then you end up with the same issues you started with.
These pesky ground loops can also be caused by improper grounding implementation and devices connected to different electrical circuits, leading to a voltage difference. Either way, EMI is a possible end result. Again.
USB frailities
The ubiquitous Universal Serial Bus (USB) connection is susceptible to EMI, as it was originally designed for less taxing devices such as a mouse or keyboard.
Sim racing equipment is intrinsically more complex, however, with LED lights, swathes of rotary switches and force feedback systems all at play. These came to the market long after the humble USB was invented, and consequently, can expose inherent weaknesses in its design.
Connecting, disconnecting, reconnecting, or simply showing connected and not functioning. These are all symptoms of EMI affecting USBs.
As USB is a grounded connection, when multiple high-powered USB devices (typically seen in sim racing) are connected straight into a PC, you are opening yourself up to causing power and connection issues.
Should these challenges occur, they may be limited to one single device, causing some to assume it’s a problem that that particular item of equipment – when in fact, it could be as a conseuqewnce of to many USB inputs or a fragile USB hub messing with that device’s motherboard, processor, or drivers.
It could even trigger the Windows operating system to re-enumerate all devices on the USB bus, which, if so, can cause the simulator software to lose connection with the devices.
With reliability, dependability and consistency key founding principles of Simucube’s design and engineering, these ‘phantom’ disconnections can be avoided when using a wheel that connects wirelessly.
Bypassing a USB connection, Simucube Wireless means you omit the use of yet another cable. This de-clutters your setup and also reduces the chance of a cable being damaged.
Perhaps more importantly, it omits the chance of a disconnection, or unpredictable behaviour, through EMI, ESD or grounding-related issues. The system has been specifically designed to aovid these potential issues, and Simucube 2 wheel bases also have an element of built-in isolation to protect from said connection difficulties.
Simucube Wireless is not only offered on its own wheels – such as the Tahko, Valo or Round ranges – but natively across six third-party wheel brands, with a full list online.
Simucube Link
Even when using a Simucube Wireless-compatible wheel, a complete sim racing setup is undoubtedly still going to require a profusion of cables.
Where this diminutive square box, with pulsating orange light, comes into play is to help streamline that process.
A traditional method of setting up your sim racing equipment could be to plug your wheel via USB to your wheel base, which in turn is connected to your PC, and then potentially a shifter, button box or pedals via a USB hub.
Instead, using Simucube Wireless to pair the wheel, the wheel base via USB to the Simucube Link Hub, then connecting all of your remaining devices via Ethernet to the Link, USB connections have been reduced, and to your PC, there is only one – between the Link Hub and the PC.
Crucially, the Simucube Link reduces direct USB connection between the sim racing equipment and your PC to the absolute minimum, with the Link acting as an intermediary and thus increasing reliability. It is an isolated design, with the avoidance of EMI/ESD at the heart of its creation.
The Link is viewed as such an essential item by Simucube and is required for use with its genre-defining ActivePedal range. It can also be purchased separately for €176.40.
Not only could this help avoid an embroglio of USB cables, but it protects your sim racing devices from EMI, and even the dreaded ESD. No intermittent wheel bases or shifters, no unresponsive devices and no taking apart your rig to blindly ground devices yourself.
Chat with the Community
Sign Up To CommentIt's completely Free