Since there aren't any torque/hp curves published for R3E cars that I've ever seen (hint, hint devs - easy/crowd pleasing enhancement idea ), I'm wondering if there is any significance to the HUD rpm bar turning green. It goes: white -> green -> red It seems to go red right before hitting the rev limiter and green right before that...any chance it turns green at max HP? Or perhaps the thresholds are just determined on pure mathematics (i.e. turns green at 85% of rev limit, red at 95% of rev limit, something like that). I was watching the tire compounds live stream replay and I noticed Georg seemed to be shifting the X17 right around the time when the HUD rpm bar turned green (hard to be 100% sure because that car revs up so fast, but he was definitely consistently shifting well before the wheel LED's were completely lit).
As far as I know, the HUD was designed to show the optimal shift rpm of every car highlight in green, whereas when it turns red, you are no longer at the optimal shift point and are (perhaps theoretically) losing efficiency by shifting later. In my experience though, some cars like to be run right up to the rev limiter if you want to be quick, while others are fastest when you do indeed shift when the bar turns green. I dont have any knowledge as to how the green portion of the rpm bar was determined, whether it is based off simple arithmetic like you postulated, or if it is based on HP/Torque, or something else entirely. The FRX-17 as you say does rev up so fast, that it can be tough to shift when the bar turns green when you are in the lower gears, but Im not too sure it really matters in that car whether you shift when it is green or wait a tough longer. Personally, I use the shift lights on the motec display and generally shift as soon as the first blue light illuminates. I believe this is in the 'green' zone of the HUD.
I agree that it would be nice to have such info in-game. However, there is some info about max hp and torque in the cars release threads here on the forum. F.e. FR X-17: https://forum.sector3studios.com/index.php?threads/formula-raceroom-x-17.8051/
In the '92 Merc Evo there is roughly 600rpm between the red light on the dash illuminating and the engine bouncing off the limiter. There is a definite but tiny gain in acceleration if you wait until right before engine hits the limiter. In racing terms it's more or less negligible, but it is there.
Yes, it's maybe the same on all cars using H-pattern cause of the time needed to change gear, it's better if you can get some more km/h before to gear up, at least it's my impression.
Thank you for the tip! That will require some digging, but I'm willing to do it to set my mind at ease. I did notice for the M235i, on the store page the HP number includes RPM (like "333 @ 5800 RPM") - having it integrated into the in-game car selection screen would be ideal, but just having it on the store page would satisfy me as well. In the meantime, I'm thinking if maybe I get some time to kill this weekend, I'll start a thread listing all the HP/RPM numbers I can find between the store and digging through the release notes.