Struggling with lock-ups in every Hypercar in LMU? This guide covers five possible causes and how to fix each one.
Battery SOC and Regen
Proper braking technique is most important in avoiding lock-ups. However, even with perfect technique you will end up facing the wrong way if you try to brake at full State of Charge (SOC). That's why we start with this.
Most hypercars run as a hybrid. This means that under braking, the brakes harvest electricity back into the battery. This is called regen. When your battery State of Charge is full, indicated by the blue bar on the right of your gear, the battery has no more capacity to accept regen energy. When this happens, the car's software turns off the brakes on the front or rear axle (depending on the car you're driving) to protect the battery. This creates a handbrake feeling through a rear lock-up, or the feeling that the car simply isn't stopping and resulting in a front lock-up.
How to solve this? Make sure the SOC never hits 100%. This requires managing your battery. Do this by binding ''Electric Motor Map'' to a button on your wheel. With this button you can regulate the battery deployment and manage the SOC. You want to set the deployment to a certain setting so that the battery SOC is approximately the same at the end of the lap compared to the start of the lap.
Keep in mind that your battery deployment does not actually increase the power output of your car. The current hypercar regulations have implemented the hybrid engines in a way that helps the car run for longer, not faster.
Brake technique
Going into a heavy braking zone, you can hit a short peak of 100% braking force in the hypercars. How you treat the brake pedal after this peak will decide if you will lock-up or not.
For every hard braking zone, make sure you start downshifting as soon as you hit the brakes. Don't wait until halfway along the braking zone. Downshifting will increase the RPM and therefore the engine braking. Engine braking will help the rear axle with slowing down the car. Go down the gears in a quick and consistent manner and you will see that it really does help. In this phase of the braking zone it is essential that you have your steering wheel absolutely straight. Any slight steering input can cause a lock-up.
As you are braking and downshifting, while getting ready for the turn in; make sure you are coming off the brakes nice and smoothly. Coming from 7th gear, when you select 2nd gear for instance, you don't want to have more than 50% braking force going on anymore. Before you start turning in for your corner, make sure you don't have more than 20% of braking force. Any percentages higher than that can cause a lock up when you start turning the steering wheel. It is important that you are able to comfortably moderate the lower percentages of the brake pedal to help your trailbraking as explained here: Trail braking explained
If you still struggle with lock-ups after trying this, focus on getting more of the braking done in a straight line, before starting to come off the brakes and turning in.
Tyre heat and pressure
A hypercar tyre at 50°C and a hypercar tyre at 80°C have significantly different peak grip levels. The hypercars in LMU do not have tyre warmers like in Formula 1. This means that for the first two or three laps you have to build up the tyre temperature by driving much slower compared to when the tyres are in their optimum temperature and pressure window. Everyone has to go through this and there is no trick to avoid this tyre warming stage.
Be patient here. Overpushing cold tyres will ''scar'' them for the rest of the stint, meaning you will not receive the peak grip from them, even when fully up to temperature.
Brake bias
How to manage brake bias in Le Mans Ultimate:
- Get the tyres up to temperature
- Figure out how far backwards you can turn the brake bias, up until the rear becomes unstable on corner entries. When this happens, go +1 or +2 clicks further to the front bias again. This is your baseline brake bias.
- Throughout the race you will experience tyre wear. More tyre wear on the front tyres than the rears? Gradually move the brake bias backwards as the stint goes on. More wear on the rear than the front? Move the brake bias forwards as you start nearing the end of your stint.
Most Hypercar setups work in a narrow bias window. Swinging bias more than 3–4% from your baseline usually creates more problems than it solves. Small, progressive changes are the better approach.
The right hardware for every braking zone
If you are not able to comfortably moderate the higher (80-90%) and lower (10-20%) thresholds of the brake pedal, you might need to take a look at upgrading your brake pedal. Lock-ups become rarer when you can feel exactly how much force you are putting in, with the travel and stiffness tuned exactly to your preference.
Pedals:
- Entry point with load cell: MOZA SRP2 gives you a proper load cell brake at a price that doesn't require selling a kidney. The brake pedal measures force rather than travel, which is exactly what building consistent Hypercar braking points requires.
- Mid-range with more adjustability: MOZA CRP2 adds a clutch pedal and more customisation over pedal feel and resistance. Worth it if you're also running manual shifts or want more control over how the brake ramps up.
- Premium load cell option: Simagic P1000-FRS is a professional-grade two-pedal set built around high-resolution force sensing. The brake feel is firm and progressive. It's the kind of pedal that makes trail braking feel like something you're controlling, not hoping for.
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Hydraulic feel: Conspit CPP EVO 3 simulates hydraulic brake pressure rather than mechanical spring resistance. If you've driven a real race car and found load cell pedals still feel too springy, this is the step up that changes that impression.
Sim rig: A flexing rig will create highly inconsistent braking percentages in every braking zone. For a class as technically demanding as Hypercar, cockpit rigidity is a real performance factor.
- Hobby (SIMGASM Hobby simulator): a low-cost entry rig that still delivers a real cockpit feel, removing flex from your setup equation from the start.
- Club (SIMGASM Club simulator): 80×40 profile, compatible with virtually any wheelbase and pedal set on the market.
- Sport (SIMGASM Sport simulator): longer, wider, with a stronger wheel mount and integrated cable passthrough channels for clean builds.
- Pro (SIMGASM Pro simulator): our 160×40 flagship for extreme loads, motion-ready builds, and zero-flex braking feedback.
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