New Product Ideas/Suggestions
Dominic Brennan
Member, Administrator
Suggest/discuss product ideas that you'd like to see in the Fanatec ecosystem.
Dominic Brennan
Member, Administrator
Comments
Time to check your e-mail these few months later..
Some ideas for a new Podium Shifter:
I am BEGGING for a round podium NASCAR rim that allows you to still use the hub’s shifters and button boxes.
Currently with all oval rim you can’t reach the shifters or button boxes comfortably.
I would like to see an accessory upgrade for wheelbase that will add a START/IGNITION buttons mounted in place of static shifters. They could be mapped anywhere on steering wheel, but I do not see a reason for doing it so and wasting precious input within reach of fingers as they are used about ones per game. Important factor is that they still need to be close to steering wheel for people driving in VR. Alternative for that could be a small button box with ignition key and Fanatec key chain fob :D
I wonder how many people would buy a fake mirror and furry cubes with Fanatec branding sold on 1st of April. It could be just a hollow rim that would frame virtual mirror on screen. Or maybe one of those sunshade stickers that could be placed at top of windscreen or in this case top of monitor.
The product that I would buy will be a stalks for steering wheel attached in replacement of static shifters. I understood that so many inputs will require separate USB. The inputs I expect on them are:
Why do I need one of those? For playing City Car Driving, but I do not see why it should't benefit to huge group of people playing truck simulators like American Truck Simulator, Euro Truck Simulator 2, Spintires, etc.
I do not see why Fanatec should not compete with Logitech (saitek) farming simulator controller. Not as an entire bundle (steering wheel + side controller) but as an addition to current CSL steering wheel ecosystem. Fanatec wheels have clusters of buttons at steering wheel. The addon pack could be just a steering wheel spinner knob for existing steering wheel and a side controller looking like this https://toyota-forklifts.co.uk/globalassets/w-inriver/resources/fingertip-control-toyota-tr.jpg?preset=Small , a palm rest with four 2-directional joysticks (if you notice two of them have side buttons for special functions) and three positional gearshift selector (forward-neutral-reverse). This design could be upgraded by 4 or 8 buttons in front of joysticks for in-game functions. Introducing a real life solution is the better what Saitek have to offer.
To all above there is a second layer. It could benefit to disabled people. Spinner knob - that's an aid for physically impaired. Farm simulator controller is a 4 analog axis under reach of four fingers. More than enough to assign brake and acceleration. Stalks on steering wheel base are extra inputs within reach of single hand.
Last thing I would like to mention is a possibility to make another iteration of F1 steering wheel
That is a brilliant idea, but I have no clue how to make a steering wheel stiff enough that will not trigger forward/backwards movement during heavy driving.
So, alongside all the truck related comments, I have a suggestion for a product I'd like to see also. Podium pedals. And what would be the main shtick of the Podium pedals? All 3 pedals would be load cell pedals (possibly with the ease of adjustability of the CSL Elite Load Cell pedal). This would ensure a natural feeling of memorisation of pressure instead of position, thus making the pedal use feel a lot more natural. Obviously there would need to be rumble in there too (possibly even full on force feedback if that's possible). Perhaps the same could be done for a Podium shifter? Force feedback so if you attempt to gear shift without clutching properly first, the shifter will just straight lock up on you.
As for the handbrake, I have no idea how that could be improved for Podium.
Corvette C8.R GTE wheel with backlighting similar to the recent BMW M4 GT3 wheel that was announced. The Corvette brand has always had a following by many peoppe, and there are no dedicated GTE wheels offered yet (the big difference between GTE and GT3 cars is GTE has no ABS). It would certainly offer more variety in the GT wheel mix offered by Fanatec, not to mention the C8.R is brand new and also was just added to iRacing.
It also would be cool to see Fanatec get into button box/mini displays for cockpits. For example the C8.R has a display for both gearing with LEDs that change color depending on what is going on with the car and for the rev limiter as well as one for "rearview mirror" which is just a camera on the rearof the car, and it has a button box with more dials to adjust the car in ways a wheel cannot due to space limitations. It would be even cooler if all of the buttons and dials on the button box were backlit too and the brightness could be controlled by one of the dials for both displays, the button box, and the wheel like the C7.R had (and I'm pretty sure the C8.R has. It would make sim racing that much more immersive.
I would really like to see a fully functional headlights/turn signals and windshield wiper stalks just like on a real car. This would be a really cool accessory for a lot of people that play driving game/sims that allow the use of these functions, especially Euro Truck Simulator. I know there isn't a lot of sims that utilize some of these functions but it would add another sense of realism and emersion in the ones that do. I have seen unofficial accessories such as this for Logitech and Thrustmaster wheels ( https://www.aliexpress.com/i/4000261861165.html ), I haven't seen any for Fanatec wheel bases. I really hope to see Fanatec make a high quality item like this in the near future but sadly seems very unlikely.