This tutorial assumes that you are using v0.1.12a or higher.
Follow the instructions for downloading/installing Engine Simulator on the main page.
Navigate to bin/ and run engine-sim-app.exe
After double clicking the .exe Engine Simulator should start and open with a default engine.
If an error pops up saying that you're missing a DLL, then run the .exe files in the installation/ folder
Engine Simulator requires a fairly powerful CPU to run well. However, you can still adjust the performance to work with slower CPUs.
To do this, we first check the RT/DT gauge.
A value around 70 is ideal. Above 80 and you will notice audio distortions or a drop in framerate. If your gauge looks like this, you need to adjust the simulation frequency:
The simulation frequency is the internal simulation "framerate" or tickrate. It is displayed in the Frequency gauge:
To adjust the tickrate, hold the n key and scroll down with your mouse. Once the RT/DT gauge stabilizes at around 70, you've found a good simulation frequency for your PC.
IMPORTANT: different engines have different performance requirements so you may have to adjust this differently for different engines
If you still experience audio distortions even after following the above procedure, check the IN. BUFFER gauge. If the gauge is erratic or moves very far to the right or left, your CPU is struggling to keep up with the real-time audio processing. There is no solution to this right now but a fix is planned for future versions. Different engines have different audio processing requirements and so they may work on your PC. Typically engines with 2 or more exhaust systems tend to be the most expensive.
The system status lights in the bottom left corner show the states of the ignition, starter, dynamometer and dynomometer hold functions. For now, we're only concerned with the ignition and starter lights.
To turn the ignition on and off, press the a key. You should see the ignition indicator light turn on. In a real spark ignition engine, "ignition" indicates that the ignition module is active and the spark plugs will fire. It has the same meaning in Engine Simulator.
The starter is a small electric motor that is fitted to most internal combustion engines. It spins the motor initially so that it can start and then run on its own power. Pressing the s key will engage the starter. Once the engine is running under its own power, you can let go of the s key.
If you still have strange audio artifacts like skipping or looping even after adjusting the simulation frequency, the bottleneck may instead be on the audio side of things. There are no adjustments in Engine Simulator to solve this right now but it's an area we're actively researching. You may have better luck with a different engine but it's likely that your CPU will struggle regardless of which engine you select. Sorry about that! Look out for future updates which will make the audio processing faster and easier to run on slower CPUs.
To rev your engine like a maniac, you can use the following buttons:
q- Light throttlew- Light/part throttlee- Part throttler- Full throttle
To finely adjust the throttle, press the space key and scroll up and down with mouse. You can see the exact throttle amount in the "Throttle" instrument on the right.
A dynamometer (dyno) is a device which measures the output torque of an engine and converts that to a power output. By default, torque is measured in lb-ft and power is measured in horsepower.
The dyno in Engine Simulator has more features than a real-life dyno. Since it is a theoretical dynamometer, it can both act as an engine brake and it can also motor the engine. Motoring an engine means to spin it using an external motor.
If this stalls your engine, it's probably because the engine idles higher than the minimum speed supported by the dyno (by default it is 1000 rpm). In this case, simply apply part throttle to keep the engine from stalling.
Dyno tests in real-life are usually conducted at full-throttle. You could nonetheless do a part-throttle dyno test if you really want to.
The dynometer will continue increasing its speed until either it reaches the engine's redline or it senses that the engine can no longer apply a positive torque to the dynamometer (ie. the engine requries external help to maintain engine speed).
When the dyno can no longer increase its speed, it is automatically disabled and the maximum torque and power are displayed on the "Torque" and "Power" gauges.
To get a read-out of the peak torque and power, press the i key. The read-out will be displayed in the status text in the top left corner.
Engine Simulator offers a variety of ways to look around and inspect your engine. The Engine Visualization display in the center of the screen is a 2D visual representation of the engine you are testing.
- Pan the display by clicking on the Engine Visualization and dragging with the mouse
- Zoom in and out by placing the cursor within the Engine Visualization window and scrolling with the mouse wheel
The engine might be a little hard to see while it's running. To slow down time, use the following keys:
1key - 1/10 speed2key - 1/100 speed3key - 1/200 speed4key - 1/500 speed5key - 1/1000 speed
The current simulation speed can be seen in the 1 / Speed gauge.
Pressing the tab key will change between display layouts.
Engine Simulator comes with a simple vehicle simulation with a manual transmission. Launching is the same as launching a vehicle in real-life but is somewhat complicated by the lack of smooth pedal inputs. Nontheless, it can be done (though controller/steering wheel support is planned).
The shift key presses the clutch in (ie disconnects the transmission from the engine). The pressure applied by the clutch disk on the flywheel is shown in the Clutch gauge. 0 is equivalent to the clutch pedal being completely pressed.
This will depend on the engine. If you want to smoke your clutch completely, you can bounce off the rev-limiter instead of holding part-throttle. For some engines, it might be too difficult to launch without the fine control of a clutch pedal. In that case, simply holding the engine at full throttle will suffice.
Gears are changed using the up and down arrow keys. The current gear is displayed in the Gear display.
Release the clutch pedal by releasing the shift key. To smoothly release the clutch, hold the space key simultaneously.
To change to a higher gear, the same procedure as a real car is followed. Press the clutch with shift then the up or down arrow to change gear. Once you've selected your intended gear, release the clutch by releasing shift. The engine's current RPM and the vehicle's current speed are shown prominently in the Engine Speed and Vehicle Speed gauges.
An engine's braking capabilities can be measured using the dynamometer as well using the hold feature. The dyno hold will motor the engine at a rate of your choosing.
Nothing will happen immediately upon enabling the hold feature because it also requires the dynamometer to be active.
The dynamometer will now spin the engine at the speed shown in the "Dyno. Speed" gauge.
After adjusting the speed, you can read the measured torque and power of the engine which will usually be negative if the throttle is closed.
To change the engine being simulated, press on the "Load Script" button in the upper left corner.
Then, navigate to the location that you unzipped Engine Simulator to. To load one of the engines that appeared in AngeTheGreat's video series, open an engine in assets/engines/atg-video-1/ or assets/engines/atg-video-2/.
Allow a little time for the script to load and for the simulation to stabilize.
Once the script is loaded, you can interact with the engine in the same way as described in the previous steps.
If you'd like to change to metric units, click on the "Load Theme" button in the upper left of the window.
Navigate to the location where you unzipped Engine Simulator then go to assets/themes and choose default_metric.mr. You only need to set this once and Engine Simulator will remember your theme next time you open the application.
It can sometimes happen that an engine "explodes" or disappears off the screen. This means that the simulator has reached an unsolvable state from which it cannot recover. This shouldn't happen under normal conditions but can happen if you lower the simulation frequency too much or try to run a physically impossible engine.
There is no way to bring the engine back after it "explodes" in this way. The best option is to press the "Reload" button in top left corner or pressing the enter key which will reset the engine and the simulation.
This tutorial covered all the basics of operting Engine Simulator. The next tutorial will teach you how to download engines from the community portal and run them in Engine Simulator.