OK, so I know most people with a wheel have the off center
problem, so last night I decided to take the wheel apart and poke around. As
for the force feedback when I opened the wheel up I replaced the motor with one
that was in a Logitech force pro ( the momo one). The centering on the motor
feels a little stronger but the force feedback is still rather weak, so I know
the motor in the wheel has the potential to be like the pc’s force feedback,
the gearing of the wheel is identical so it’s up to the game as to the
sensitivity of this. As I understand it the force feedback is not adjustable in
this game, maybe we need to see if turn 10 can put a patch up so this is
adjustable, but we will leave that to another thread. OK on to the centering fix.
The first thing you need to do is get a game going and take
note of the position the wheel is in when you’re driving straight, mine was significantly
off to the right
Mine was significantly off to the right( this picture is
somewhat of an exaggeration) so now that you determine how far the wheel is off
take the bottom cover of the wheel off. This is what you will see
The next thing you’re going to look at is the sensor for the
wheel position. It’s a brown circuit board directly behind the wheel.
In the center of this you will see a white plastic half
moon, this is the gear that we are going to re-position.
Now here is where it gets tricky, you need to rotate the wheel
to the position that it is when you’re driving straight. So earlier you made a
note of this position, set your wheel as close to this as possible and take
note of the angle the half moon on the gear is. The reason your doing this is
because the sensor believes that at that particular angle the wheel is
straight. So note where it is at, mine was angled to the right just a hair as
you can see in the picture. Next you can unplug the wire going to the sensor,
and then remove the 2 silver screws holding the sensor in and remove it, try to
pull it straight out and keep the sensor from moving.
So this is the sensor removed. The next step is to remove
all of the screws from the metal plate, there marked in red
The next step is to pull the metal plate apart from the
gears, be careful as the wires travel though the plate, so separate it and keep
that in mind. Also pay attention to the motor as to not hit the circuit board
on the right. After its separated take a look at the gearing. Look as to where
the half moon gear is and you will see it. Look at the center of the main gear
and where it comes through the plastic shaft there is another gear that drives
the sensor gear.
Now that you see how everything works you will get an idea
of what needs to be done. You need to reposition the sensor gear. Keep in mind
when doing this your keeping the sensor gear in the same position but moving
the bigger gear(the wheel). So once you pull the plate off push the sensor gear
out of the metal plate so it is sitting on the plastic tray like in the above
picture. Position the wheel so that it is straight relative to the unit. In the
picture below I used the 3 plastic lines and eyed it up to the chrome to try
and center it, but you can do it whatever way works best for you.
Now that the wheel is straight we need to get the gear in
the proper position. The gear should be resting on the plastic “tray” if you
push the gear away you can spin it freely and then slide it back toward the main
gear, this is rather tricky so be patient. Get it where you think is right and
slide the metal plate down and take note of where the sensor gear is, if you
need to you can look at the sensor itself and note the angle at which it was at
when you removed it. This takes some trial and error of repositioning the gear
until it’s just right. Now that the gear is in place put the screws
back in the metal plate and the sensor back on. Before you put the cover back
on carefully test it to make sure the wheel is centered, if its not remove the
plate and try to reposition the sensor again, but if your very careful when you
position the sensor you should be able to get it right the first time. Here is the
wheel straight
Hopefully this helped, one small note, if you can’t find a
screw driver they sell a multi star drive set at harbor freight, this is what I
used. If you have any questions or a
better way to do this please post so others will know.