What was your first wheel?

Discussion in 'Hardware' started by GregoryLeo, Sep 1, 2016.

  1. GregoryLeo

    GregoryLeo Well-Known Member

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    I like to here/read people's stories. So what was your first wheel/rig, and what led you to get it? Mine was a gaming laptop. And the wheel was a Thrustmaster Ferrari Experience for $50 on Amazon.
    image.jpeg
    Bungie cord centering system. FFB that only vibrated. Paddle shifters, gas and brake peddles. The wheel was a kids toy ,but it worked in the moment.
    At the time I was very much into a mobile racing game called realracing 2. It had a very strong online community and was lots of fun. And I could use my iPhone as console and play on my TV with an HDMI adapter.
    When Realracing 3 came out, my iPhone 4s wasn't up to the task. And it was decision time. I could buy an iPad for $800 or the laptop and wheel along with a copy of GTR2 for under $700. That and the earbuds from my iPhone were what got me started in this past time three years ago. And I have no regrets.
    I wore that little wheel out in about in about 7 months and my wife bought me the then latest greatest G27 as an Easter surprise. You gotta love a woman who does that. I retired the Ferrari experience, but I am still using the laptop for racing.
    So as I said before, what's your story?
     
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  2. Don Rudi

    Don Rudi Well-Known Member

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    My first wheel was the Thrustmaster RGT. Before that I always had these handheld miniwheels, which reminded me of my RC controls. In 2007 I dug a little deeper into the EA F1 Challenge modding community and to race beauties like the Sauber C9 the mini wheel just felt inappropriate, that's how I ended up with the Thrustmaster RGT wheel.
    What followed was a time void PC, but with various consoles instead. After years of racing with gamepads I finally got myself a Thrustmaster T150 and a Wheelstand for Project Cars on the PS4, that's when the Racing virus replaced my Flightsimming virus :) Somewhen I saw a video of Raceroom and I simply had to try it out - time to use my PC for something different than Photoshop and Prepar3D. My T150 was firmly attached to the wheelstand so I was lucky to find my long forgotten old Thrustmaster RGT in a box in the attic. Luckily nobody ever wanted to buy my RGT back then.
    After a few races in Raceroom, I did not touch my pCars on the console anymore and it was time to attach the Wheelstand to my PC. Thus my RGT was again retired and superceeded by the T150.
    As some might know, the T150 was replaced by the T300RS meanwhile and I have a hunch Santa might bring a Fanatec CSL wheelbase ;)
    While I will certainly sell my used T150, I will never part from my trusty beloved ancient RGT.
    So that was my story :)
     

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  3. Gopher04

    Gopher04 Well-Known Member

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    Can't remember the name of my first wheel for the PC, but I do know it had no motor..seriously I'm not kidding.
    My second wheel is easy, and I had fond memories of it, the rare Momo Red.
     

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  4. Ernie

    Ernie Well-Known Member

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    My first racing wheel was a Thrustmaster Formula T2.
    [​IMG]
    Bungee cord mechanism. No FFB. Build-in sequential shifter. 2 Pedal set. :)
    I don't remember exactly, but i think that Grand Prix 2 (by Geoff Crammond) was the first sim i played with that steering wheel.

    After that? ........... Momo Force (a.k.a. Red Momo) -> Logitech G25 -> Fanatec GT3RS -> Fanatec CSW v2.
    Quite amazing how simracing equipment has evolved over the past 20 years.;)
     
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  5. le_poilu

    le_poilu Well-Known Member

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    My very first one was the Sega Saturn wheel:
    [​IMG]
    No FFB, no feeling ... a big plastic toy to play Sega Rally... but joypad was much better at this time.

    After that I had very first FFB wheel on the consumer market (AFAIK), the good old MS Sidewinder FFB Wheel:

    [​IMG]

    By the time there where nothing better you can get.. but I never liked it really.
    It never gave me the feeling I was driving, the FFB was more or less big vibration, pedals were nothing close to what I call car pedals.
    At this time, game support wasn't great too.
    Support was dropped when windows XP came out, it was the gameport version, not USB.

    After that I gave up on gaming wheel for a long time ...

    I came back in the wheel with a Fanatec CSR wheel + CSP V1 pedals (Xbox360 for Forza4). Much better but still not at the level I expected. Upgraded after a year for a CSR-Elite (still Xbox360, but slowly coming back to PC). Slightly better, but again, not good enough in my mind (couldn't get rid of the cogging of the brushed motors).
    Then I jumped on the CSW V2 when it came out (thanks to me owning à CSR-E I get a invite code for the first batch), and went full PC gaming.
    Now I'm truly satisfied with it. After replacing my CSP V1 pedals with a protosimtech PT-1 I finally have something that really give the sensation of driving a car, not having a toy in the hand (and under my feet) to control a game.

    Maybe one day, will I go to the Direct drive route, but I don't feel the need at this time.
     
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  6. le_poilu

    le_poilu Well-Known Member

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    Indeed !
    As many say: it's the golden age of racing sims. We never had such great hardware and such great racing games :)
     
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  7. digitizer

    digitizer Well-Known Member

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    My first wheel is G25. Then its is broken and my friends give me Driving Force Pro. After repairing (power supply) now i with G25 again and DFGT is my second wheel. I hope my next wheel, will be with direct drive
     
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  8. theravenousbeast

    theravenousbeast Well-Known Member

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    Formula Force EX. Bought it for the ToCA games, got hooked on GTR2 instead :D The pedals were shot by the time I replaced it but the actual wheel and FFB was fine.
     
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  9. DerHek

    DerHek Active Member

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    This was my first one , after that I had one like Ernie posted and after that 2x dfgt ,g25,t500,cswv1,now cswv2. En for the future I think it's going to be the osw.
     

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  10. The Iron Wolf

    The Iron Wolf Well-Known Member

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    Wow, nice thread, sure brings the memories :)

    Does Kempston Joystick on Z80 count? Hours and hours in some Moto GP game there, and some green rally – I was always into cars/motosport etc.

    First wheel – ~20 years ago Logitech Momo. I still have nice memories of it, but remember the clamp wasn’t as successful as on newer Loigtech wheels. And of course, sliding pedals :) Eventually, table clamp just broke. I extended life of the wheel by running some metal screws through the clamp, but it didn’t help for long. At that time I raced Rally Masters in LAN, Need For Speed (the one with Porsche, and if I am not mistaken, one of the first games with cockpit view), Codemasters Rally/F1. Then I took a break between 2004 and 2010.

    In 2010 I got DFGT and Wheel Stand Pro – amazing wheel, still think best wheel for the money. And raced periodically, mostly F1. But then in 2014, incidentally, I saw a video on Youtube, on how to route cables on Wheel Stand Pro. I don’t know why, but it didn’t occur to me that I do not have to re-mount wheel every time I want to play with slipping pedals – I can mount it nicely once, and then just unfold wheel stand. That was a tipping for me. Once racing got easy, I got into this hobby way more seriously, and my first simulator with calculated physics was GTR2. Recently I’ve spent most money in my life on myself for Fanatec and VR, and do not regret it. Amazing hobby, a lot of likely minded people in community and safe and cheap alternative to real life racing.
     

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  11. Not Lifting Off

    Not Lifting Off Well-Known Member

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    Many joysticks on a c64 then on an amiga, first pc racing games i used the 2 button version of this, push to accelerate pull to brake.
    [​IMG]
    Then a rubber band to centre thrustmaster i think followed by a Guillimot Ferrari FF Wheel, a long break from any regular racing, a few years on and off, then last year got a G25 to start to try and race regular again, now have that plus a couple of fanatec CSR`s and Elite pedals.
    In the next couple of months im going to get either a DD wheel or Fanatec Elite then either build or buy a little cockpit to fit it all in with the long term plan being a motion rig!
     
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  12. sbtm

    sbtm Well-Known Member

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    My first one was the Microsoft Xbox 360 wheel. Bought it for Forza 2 and 3 and was shocked how strong the FFB was. Took a while to get used to it :-D

    [​IMG]
     
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  13. Sascha Reynders

    Sascha Reynders Well-Known Member

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    My first wheel was a Logitech Momo (the black one), then came a DFP (one of the first wheels with 900° rotation, if I'm not mistaken) and after that a G25. Then, between 2007-2008 and late 2015, I kinda quit simracing 'cos I just didn't have the time for it anymore (I was playing actively in two bands during that time). Then the bug bit me again, continued for a while with the G25 but replaced it with a G29 early this year. Used the G29 for about two months, until I came across a showroom T500RS at a very reasonable price, that's the wheel I'm currently using.

    I still have all the other wheels and they're all still working :)
     
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  14. Fanapryde

    Fanapryde Well-Known Member

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  15. rbn

    rbn Well-Known Member

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    This was my first wheel also. Also played it with GP2. Uber simple wheel :)
    Every now and then the bungie cord snapped or one of the springs in the pedals broke.
    I had a few springs and cords for spare parts :D

    After that I had the first Thrustmaster FF wheel, think it was called Nascar Pro (or the EU version) but it was real crap. Broke two in 2 days....
    Then I got a Logitech Formula Force, the one with the red rubber wheel, best wheel ever build quality wise, had it for years and years, cable driven mechanic really good and smooth. Logitech went gears after that, no idea why, maybe costs.
    After that I went Xbox 360 and got the MS FF wheel, not a great wheel, but racing on the Xbox was fun. Stil works so not that bad quality wise.
    Went back to PC and got a T300 because I missed simracing.
    Its a year old now and has a hardware issue :(

    Looking back it seems that TM isn't that great at making quality wheels but the T2 was a classic!
     
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  16. Balrog

    Balrog Well-Known Member

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    My first wheel was a Logitech WingMan Formula Force GP
    [​IMG]

    My father bought it for me when I was a little kid, because I showed great interest in racing games. But at first I found it really hard to drive with it so I stuck with the keyboard for a while.:p But later he bought Grand Prix Legends and thanks to that I started to learn how to drive with a wheel properly, that was the first game where I felt that using the steering wheel is a real benefit, but at the time I was miserably slow, it was a great success when finally I was able to beat Ludovico Scarfiotti at the end of the field.:D

    And later when I got into high school I received F1C '99-'02 as a gift from my family and that's where my "sim racing career" really started.:cool:
     
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  17. RacerMark

    RacerMark Member

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    If memory serves right this was 2 motors for 'rumble' and a bungee chord for centring.
    [​IMG]
    Toca had me hooked but the wheel didn't.
     
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  18. JakkeFin

    JakkeFin Well-Known Member

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    I started my simracing with keyboard and indy 500 (Papyrus/electronic arts) in 1989.
    First wheel experience was with geoff grammonds GP 2.
     
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    Last edited: Sep 2, 2016
  19. MeMotS

    MeMotS Well-Known Member

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    Coleco vision wheel.
    Remember playing a lot of that. Problem was with the batteries :(

    Screenshot_20160904-012910.jpg

    Look at that gas pedal

    Screenshot_20160904-013206.jpg
     
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  20. Mich Angel

    Mich Angel Well-Known Member

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    My first was the logitech momo racing wheel, still kind of working but it's colecting alot of dust in the closet now a days :p
     
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