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I do enjoy creating realistic simulations for Scalextric digital racing. For my club, I've used RCS64 - and many of those formats transfer nicely to the Scalextric ARC app. However, a long-format GT or endurance race doesn't really work with the app - pit stops are way too frequent, ruining that endurance vibe that is a different challenge and great fun. During lockdown last year, I spent a few weeks properly exploring the Magic ARC app and creating a very satisfying GT format for ARC Pro.

The Magic ARC app was produced by Italian developer Cristiano Ruisi of Magic Studio as a more detailed alternative to the official app. Scalextric released the Bluetooth communication protocols for the ARC powerbases back in 2018 so that third-party developers could create their own apps. So far, Cristiano’s is the only one commercially available. You can find it in the Microsoft Store, GooglePlay, Apple App Store (if it’s not there, check back in a few days) and Amazon appstore. The webpage is here: magicstudio.eu/index.php/games/arcapp

The Magic app works in a similar way to the Scalextric app. It doesn’t have the visuals or the panache, but Cristiano has included many layers of user-definable settings that are lacking in the Scalextric version. It is aimed at the digital slot car enthusiast - borrowing a lot of features from RCS64 - and is surprisingly easy to use. A pdf User Manual is available from the website and is also bundled with the app. Of course there are glitches, but they don’t take much to work around – and Cristiano has worked hard to fix those bugs via a feedback forum here.

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My starting point with any simulation is the real-life racing series itself. For this example I looked at the British GT Championship, but any GT series or stand-alone race would work. I watch the British GT races and looked back at some highlights and full race re-runs on YouTube to refresh my memory and to drill down into the minutiae of the format - this page on their website helped too: https://www.britishgt.com/about/british-gt

This is what I identified as the characteristic features I wanted to include in my Magic app format:

  • Race length. As you can see from the 2022 calendar (above, right), there is a mix of distances. Two-hour races feature at three weekends, plus there’s a three-hour races at Donington and Silverstone. The other two weekends are double-headers, with a pair of one-hour races on the Sunday. A Scalextric GT championship should also feature this sort of variety – as the different race lengths require different skills and strategy. The longer endurance events score 50% more points for the championship standings than the one-hour sprint races.
  • Classes of cars. The British GT Championship races include both GT3 and GT4 cars. This mix of classes is one of the things I like about the British GT Championship – great for spectators and for the drivers. In a Scalextric championship, we can tweak the build regulations – or use power settings in the app – to give the GT3 cars better performance. Or we can leave them the same. At the moment, there aren’t too many Scalextric GT4 cars to choose from.
  • Driver grading. All racing drivers are categorised by the FIA, based on their experience and success. The top drivers in the world – such as those in Formula One – are Platinum; Gold and Silver make up most professional drivers; and Bronze are amateur drivers. The British GT Championship currently has Pro-Am, Silver-Am and Amateur teams in GT3. In GT4, all-Silver driver pairings are still permitted. In a Scalextric championship, pairing the best drivers with less experienced ones is the ideal way to create competitive racing – and replicate the Pro-Am crews that are the backbone of the British GT Championship.
  • Drive time regulations. In most GT championships, the time each driver is in the car should be fairly equal to their team mate. In British GT one-hour races, there is a driver-change window between 22 minutes and 32 minutes for GT3 and 28-38 minutes for GT4. The difference is to avoid an overcrowded pit lane. For the longer races, it is specified that the starting driver must drive for at least 62 minutes – or 58 minutes in GT4. Although maintaining similar driving times, we can be flexible with our Scalextric championship – not everyone can race for half an hour – or an hour – especially when using the ARC controllers.
  • Pitstops. All cars in the British GT Championship are restricted to a minimum pitstop time to change driver, refuel and change tyres. The times differ for each circuit, GT4 cars stop for longer and there’s extra for the all-Silver driver pairings. Each car must make at least one pitstop – and in the three-hour races, teams must complete at least three stops. One of the benefits of using the Magic app is that we can set nice long stints and set the pit stop duration to 10 seconds - which feels quite a long time.
  • Success penalties. In the British GT Championship, time is added to the pitstops of the top three finishers from the previous round. In one-hour races, that’s 10, 7 and 5 seconds. For the longer races, it’s 20, 15 and 10. This isn’t the easiest thing to add to a Scalextric race, but there are ways to do it. One option is to start those three cars from the pitlane and delay them leaving – or to give them a Stop-Go penalty during the race. Success penalties add to the fun and the strategy of the championship.
  • Balance of Performance. BoP attempts to keep all the different makes of car on a similar performance level – delivering exciting racing and encouraging manufacturers to enter their cars, knowing they are in an equal fight. GT series organisers spend a lot of time analysing data and adjusting BoP. The main techniques they use are weight, engine horsepower and aerodynamics. In a Scalextric GT series using the Magic ARC App, we could use the Max Power setting, although very small adjustments don’t make a whole lot of difference. It could also be a very time-consuming process to get right – and like in real GT racing, car owners and drivers will never be entirely happy!
  • Control Tyre. Another way to standardise performance is to use a tyre from a single manufacturer. Pirelli currently supply tyres to the British GT Championship and have developed a range of tyres that give similar grip and performance for the various GT3 cars. In GT4 there is a standard wheel and tyre combination. This could be simulated in a Scalextric GT series if all cars use the same tyre – or compound. Mechanical grip from the tyres is super-important when running slot cars without magnets. The newer in-line GT cars can all be fitted with NSR or Slot.it tyres. One or other of the Slot.it P6 or NSR RTR tyres would be ideal. Unfortunately, the older ‘sidewinder’ cars have different-sized wheels, so that may be a case of changing the wheels to 17.3mm Slot.it plastic wheels, glued to the axle and fitted with suitable wheel inserts.
That's the research done - but before I get into the software set-up, I'll quickly go through the hardware needed and choose some cars...
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Hardware: As pit stops are such an important part of any endurance race, you definitely need a pit lane – and the pit lane needs to be long enough to hold all the cars racing. We’ll also be racing for a while, so it’s sensible to check (or change) the batteries in the controllers – if the charge runs low during the race, the driver will experience all sorts of odd throttle and brake behaviour! Likewise, the tablet or phone with the Magic app should be charged up - or plugged into a charger.

I also reckon it's useful to have two smart devices – one for the Magic app and the other to run a timer to indicate the start of the driver-change window. A pad of paper and a pen always comes in handy - whether it's to keep a backup of the race progress, jot down driver times, penalties or anything else you want to remember. It’s also good to have a basic toolkit available – cars can break down. During the race, teams might want to pit to clean the rear tyres and improve grip – especially if the track is laid out on the floor.

Cars: To run these one, two or three-hour races, we’ll need Scalextric cars with the traction magnets removed. Otherwise, we’d be limited to 10 or 15 minutes before the motor overheats and risks permanent damage. Scalextric cars aren't designed to run non-mag, so some careful set-up with a little weight and replacement tyres is never a bad idea. DiSCA's Gary Skipp gives an excellent walk-through on his YouTube Channel here:



Scalextric have produced plenty of tasty liveries from the British GT Championship over the years – including two more set cars in the 2022 catalogue. But you don't have to stick to those liveries - any GT car will do... although I would stick to one brand to give similar performance. I think Scalextric (or Carrera) cars are ideally suited for digital racing - not too fast and sufficiently robust. Most Scalextric GT cars are also very easy to convert to Scalextric digital using the C8515 digital plug.

I’ve chosen to race just four cars on my small living-room floor layout.  Any more and a small track does get rather congested. The full six cars need a bigger lap length. However, four cars does mean eight drivers – and a lot of fun. Three of the four cars are GT4 Mustangs (I do like them) and the other is the TF Sport Aston Martin Vantage V8. The RAM Racing AMG GT3 will be straight on the grid when it's released!

Okay, next is the Magic app set-up...
As I said in the opening post, I spent quite a lot of time experimenting with the Magic ARC App to find the settings that work on my track. I hope this will serve as a good basis for your own experimentation to fit the GT format to your own track and requirements. What I'll explain here is a one-hour race - but that is easily scaled up to the two- or three-hour race lengths also used by the British GT Championship.

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The first thing is to create and name a new race in the main menu. I’ve used the old British GT Championship logo – a bit of a glitchy process to upload, but worth it. Once it’s set up, the GT race remains in the main menu. Some of the settings we’re interested in are the Race menu – important things like the race length, Yellow Flag options, Start Mode, Race End, plus the simulations for Fuel, Tyres, KERS and Weather. Compared to the Scalextric ARC app, all these have more complexity and can be customised quite extensively. The Magic ARC App can only run races up to 5 hours long. If you want a longer race, you’d need to run several ‘segments’ – for example a 24-hour race would be six 4-hour races.

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You’ll notice in the two images above, that I’ve chosen not to use the Fuel Load Simulation. This simulates a ‘sluggish’ car with a heavy fuel load. With a short race, this works well, but in this one-hour race, the effect continues too long – and there’s no way to customise the simulation. I prefer not to use it. I have chosen weather – which is great fun. If the weather changes, cars will experience a power drop and inconsistent handling – a driver can choose to stay out or can pit for new tyres to return power and handling to normal. The amount of rain in the race can be set – but exactly when the rain falls is random. Ideally, toss a coin to decide if the Weather simulation is used or not and – if it is – use dice or a random number generator to set the percentage.

You’ll notice I haven’t used the Qualifier Mode in the race menu. I usually set up and run practice and qualifying sessions separately. The grid order doesn’t matter very much and qualifying isn’t entirely necessary – but it can be rather exciting!

Not all the settings are in the Race menu, there’s also plenty in the General Configuration menu...

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These are shared options for all races and cannot be saved specifically to our British GT race. The first thing to do is choose a voice (that’s a lot of fun) for the text to speech effects – and made sure the Driver Colors match the colours on the powerbase and the controllers. Then there are general settings about the track, lap times and how the drivers (or teams) are displayed on the race screen...

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However, there are some settings we want to tweak for our GT simulation – the longest possible pit stop time (10 seconds) and the ‘Extremely Low’ option for both Fuel Consumption and Tyre Wear. Because of the extremely low settings, I’ve set the Tyre and Fuel Level Warnings to low percentages – to get a timely reminder to pit. Tyres do ‘go off’ and effect handling, so pitting at 15 or 20% is wise – you can leave Fuel Level to a couple of percent before pitting. If either go to zero, the car will not count laps.

The final settings are for the cars and the drivers – or teams in the GT format...

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Adding the images is a little glitchy, but helpful for the race screen. From these menus, you can set the Max Power, Tyre Wear, Fuel Load and Fuel Burn settings, which work alongside the settings in the General Configuration menu. I’ve tweaked these settings to give a pit stop about every 15 minutes – about enough time for a decent driving stint and just before my hand starts to cramp from using the ARC controller. I can race for 60, 90 or even 120 minutes with Slot.it controller – so that might be a nice upgrade if you’re considering some serious endurance racing with ARC Pro. In the Driver menu, you can choose controller features – rumble is always useful to prompt a pit stop, although not available with the Slot.it controller. I’ve set the Throttle Curve to the soft ‘Profile A’ which is good for non-mag driving.

The final ‘Prepare for Race’ screen allows you to calibrate the low speed for each car – and to connect each car to the powerbase using the Set ID button. This bypasses and streamlines the standard car connection process of pushing buttons on the ARC powerbase...

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In terms of running the race, there's plenty you can do in advance to train less experienced drivers, enforce ‘No Contact’ racing and marshalling crashed cars. First and foremost, Scalextric racing should be fun – but that fun and enjoyment is helped by some basic rules and organisation. At our digital club we call this our 'Digital Driving School' and everyone gets a re-cap at the start of each event.

With four cars and eight drivers, one of the non-driving team mates acts as the ‘Race Controller’ and the other three non-drivers ‘marshal’ a part of the circuit – that means replacing cars when they crash and calling for a Yellow Flag if there is a problem with the track, barriers or bridge supports. The cars stop under a yellow flag, but the time continues to count down – a bit like a Full Course Yellow. The first job for the Race Controller is to start the race and hold any cars serving a success penalty in the pits. The Race Controller also announces the driver change windows and notes down how long each driver has raced. When it’s their turn to drive, they hand over Race Control duties to their team mate. Likewise with the marshals.

The Magic race screen is nicely laid out – you and your team mate can keep an eye on progress, fastest lap time, how much fuel is left and how far the tyres have worn. I think it works best if the drivers concentrate on driving and the non-driving team mate makes strategy calls – that’s what happens in real GT racing. With pit stops scheduled for approximately 15 minutes, the team can change drivers after 15, 30 and 45 minutes – as long as each driver races for around 30 minutes in total. That gives options – maybe the ‘Am’ does the first and last 15 minutes and the ‘Pro’ driver has a straight 30 minute stint in the middle.

The more you play with the Magic ARC App, the more you can mould its settings to the GT format that suits your track, your cars and the abilities of your racing buddies. Remember – it’s great to simulate a real-life racing series, but there are always some compromises necessary to maximise the fun.

I hope you enjoyed this introduction to the Magic app and it has inspired you to re-create your own favourite races and series. A version of this article originally appeared on the Jadlam blog last year, but I have reworked and updated it for SlotRacer Online.
(16th-Feb-22, 02:04 PM)woodcote Wrote: [ -> ]I do enjoy creating realistic simulations for Scalextric digital racing. For my club, I've used RCS64 - and many of those formats transfer nicely to the Scalextric ARC app. However, a long-format GT or endurance race doesn't really work with the app - pit stops are way too frequent, ruining that endurance vibe that is a different challenge and great fun. During lockdown last year, I spent a few weeks properly exploring the Magic ARC app and creating a very satisfying GT format for ARC Pro.

The Magic ARC app was produced by Italian developer Cristiano Ruisi of Magic Studio as a more detailed alternative to the official app. Scalextric released the Bluetooth communication protocols for the ARC powerbases back in 2018 so that third-party developers could create their own apps. So far, Cristiano’s is the only one commercially available. You can find it in the Microsoft Store, GooglePlay, Apple App Store (if it’s not there, check back in a few days) and Amazon appstore. The webpage is here: magicstudio.eu/index.php/games/arcapp

The Magic app works in a similar way to the Scalextric app. It doesn’t have the visuals or the panache, but Cristiano has included many layers of user-definable settings that are lacking in the Scalextric version. It is aimed at the digital slot car enthusiast - borrowing a lot of features from RCS64 - and is surprisingly easy to use. A pdf User Manual is available from the website and is also bundled with the app. Of course there are glitches, but they don’t take much to work around – and Cristiano has worked hard to fix those bugs via a feedback forum here.



My starting point with any simulation is the real-life racing series itself. For this example I looked at the British GT Championship, but any GT series or stand-alone race would work. I watch the British GT races and looked back at some highlights and full race re-runs on YouTube to refresh my memory and to drill down into the minutiae of the format - this page on their website helped too: https://www.britishgt.com/about/british-gt

This is what I identified as the characteristic features I wanted to include in my Magic app format:

  • Race length. As you can see from the 2022 calendar (above, right), there is a mix of distances. Two-hour races feature at three weekends, plus there’s a three-hour races at Donington and Silverstone. The other two weekends are double-headers, with a pair of one-hour races on the Sunday. A Scalextric GT championship should also feature this sort of variety – as the different race lengths require different skills and strategy. The longer endurance events score 50% more points for the championship standings than the one-hour sprint races.
  • Classes of cars. The British GT Championship races include both GT3 and GT4 cars. This mix of classes is one of the things I like about the British GT Championship – great for spectators and for the drivers. In a Scalextric championship, we can tweak the build regulations – or use power settings in the app – to give the GT3 cars better performance. Or we can leave them the same. At the moment, there aren’t too many Scalextric GT4 cars to choose from.
  • Driver grading. All racing drivers are categorised by the FIA, based on their experience and success. The top drivers in the world – such as those in Formula One – are Platinum; Gold and Silver make up most professional drivers; and Bronze are amateur drivers. The British GT Championship currently has Pro-Am, Silver-Am and Amateur teams in GT3. In GT4, all-Silver driver pairings are still permitted. In a Scalextric championship, pairing the best drivers with less experienced ones is the ideal way to create competitive racing – and replicate the Pro-Am crews that are the backbone of the British GT Championship.
  • Drive time regulations. In most GT championships, the time each driver is in the car should be fairly equal to their team mate. In British GT one-hour races, there is a driver-change window between 22 minutes and 32 minutes for GT3 and 28-38 minutes for GT4. The difference is to avoid an overcrowded pit lane. For the longer races, it is specified that the starting driver must drive for at least 62 minutes – or 58 minutes in GT4. Although maintaining similar driving times, we can be flexible with our Scalextric championship – not everyone can race for half an hour – or an hour – especially when using the ARC controllers.
  • Pitstops. All cars in the British GT Championship are restricted to a minimum pitstop time to change driver, refuel and change tyres. The times differ for each circuit, GT4 cars stop for longer and there’s extra for the all-Silver driver pairings. Each car must make at least one pitstop – and in the three-hour races, teams must complete at least three stops. One of the benefits of using the Magic app is that we can set nice long stints and set the pit stop duration to 10 seconds - which feels quite a long time.
  • Success penalties. In the British GT Championship, time is added to the pitstops of the top three finishers from the previous round. In one-hour races, that’s 10, 7 and 5 seconds. For the longer races, it’s 20, 15 and 10. This isn’t the easiest thing to add to a Scalextric race, but there are ways to do it. One option is to start those three cars from the pitlane and delay them leaving – or to give them a Stop-Go penalty during the race. Success penalties add to the fun and the strategy of the championship.
  • Balance of Performance. BoP attempts to keep all the different makes of car on a similar performance level – delivering exciting racing and encouraging manufacturers to enter their cars, knowing they are in an equal fight. GT series organisers spend a lot of time analysing data and adjusting BoP. The main techniques they use are weight, engine horsepower and aerodynamics. In a Scalextric GT series using the Magic ARC App, we could use the Max Power setting, although very small adjustments don’t make a whole lot of difference. It could also be a very time-consuming process to get right – and like in real GT racing, car owners and drivers will never be entirely happy!
  • Control Tyre. Another way to standardise performance is to use a tyre from a single manufacturer. Pirelli currently supply tyres to the British GT Championship and have developed a range of tyres that give similar grip and performance for the various GT3 cars. In GT4 there is a standard wheel and tyre combination. This could be simulated in a Scalextric GT series if all cars use the same tyre – or compound. Mechanical grip from the tyres is super-important when running slot cars without magnets. The newer in-line GT cars can all be fitted with NSR or Slot.it tyres. One or other of the Slot.it P6 or NSR RTR tyres would be ideal. Unfortunately, the older ‘sidewinder’ cars have different-sized wheels, so that may be a case of changing the wheels to 17.3mm Slot.it plastic wheels, glued to the axle and fitted with suitable wheel inserts.
That's the research done - but before I get into the software set-up, I'll quickly go through the hardware needed and choose some cars...
This is really cool Andy,
I've always been put off real car racing because I think GP racing is a bit sterile but since the announcement of  
  • Rossi to drive #46 Audi in Sprint and Endurance for  Team WRT
I'll be taking a interest in it and I actually quite like the look of these cars.
I'm going along to a local club for a look next week and if I think I'll like the racing I'll buy a GT kit and have a go.
Even if I'm no good I'll still enjoy it on my home track I'm sure.
Tibbs - if you want to try out some Scalextric digital racing at a club with these sorts of simulations, I have a hunch we’re not a million miles away from you at WHO/digital in Goring-by-Sea. That’s if I’m right in thinking you’re close to Mr.M’s club?

If only Scalextric made the current Audi R8 GT3… that’s going to be a popular livery.
(16th-Feb-22, 10:02 PM)woodcote Wrote: [ -> ]Tibbs - if you want to try out some Scalextric digital racing at a club with these sorts of simulations, I have a hunch we’re not a million miles away from you at WHO/digital in Goring-by-Sea. That’s if I’m right in thinking you’re close to Mr.M’s club?

If only Scalextric made the current Audi R8 GT3… that’s going to be a popular livery.

Yeh Andy, I'm near Clanfield so thats not a million miles from you.
I need to check it out as I've got a feeling it's going to be a lot harder than I think.

I'm surprised Scalextric haven't jumped on the chance and done a Rossi replica, he has a huge following even though he's come from bikes.