Balthazar Setup Helper is a free RC car setup and vehicle dynamics tool for racers who want to better understand how setup changes affect their car. Analyse suspension geometry, load transfer, roll stiffness, damping, cornering behaviour and RaceBox telemetry.
Questions about the Setup Helper, want to discuss RC setup and vehicle dynamics, found an issue, or have an idea for a new feature? Join the Balthazar RC Community to discuss Balthazar with other users and help shape its future.
Join the Community →Balthazar Setup Helper currently includes community-measured models for:
Please note: The car models included in Balthazar Setup Helper are not official manufacturer models and are not licensed, endorsed, or provided by their respective manufacturers. They are created from manual measurements made by community members and may differ from the manufacturers' official specifications.
Unlike most RC setup tools that mainly record your setup settings, Balthazar Setup Helper calculates what those settings actually physically do to the car. It translates suspension geometry, springs, anti-roll bars, weight distribution and other setup inputs into physical characteristics such as wheel rate, roll stiffness, load transfer and damping. This lets you compare not only different setups on the same car, but also cars from different manufacturers. Their designs and geometry may be different, but the physics that determines how they behave on the track is the same.
Please note - The car models included in Balthazar Setup Helper are not licensed, endorsed, or provided by their respective manufacturers. Model geometry is based on manual measurements contributed by community members and may therefore differ from official manufacturer specifications.
Bump steer analysis - The Steering tab now calculates how toe changes throughout the suspension travel. An interactive drawing and graph show the bump-steer curve from compression through ride height to droop, making it possible to see exactly what the steering geometry is doing rather than just comparing steering-arm settings.
Bump steer optimizer - Want less bump steer, more toe-in under compression, or a particular balance between compression and droop? The new optimizer can calculate steering geometry changes to help achieve the desired bump-steer behaviour.
Ackermann + bump steer during chassis roll - Ackermann and bump steer no longer have to be considered separately. The steering simulation can now apply chassis roll, compressing the outside suspension and extending the inside suspension. The resulting bump steer is combined with Ackermann to show the actual steering angle of each front wheel throughout the corner. The Ackermann graph follows the same simulation, making it easy to compare the steering behaviour with and without chassis roll.
The ARC A10 2025 and the Capricorn Quantum models support the new bump steer functionality. Other models will be updated if and when physical access to such cars to measure happens :-)
Nothing here here to see, move on :-)
Progressive springs are not supported yet
Suspension system - only traditional designs with a standing shock and spring mounted to lower control arm is supported, no systems with rockers or torsion springs are supported (yet)
ARB (Anti Roll Bar) stiffness - the current method is on the simple side, while based on a few real life experiments on ARBs handy to the developer many more samples and models of ARBs should be measured with a view to tune the math, especially how the angle and length of the lever arms of the bar, and the ratio between the torsion bar portion and the lever bar portion, influence the overall stiffness. As you understand from that, only simple / traditional steel bars with two bends models are currently supported.
Damping Ratio - the damping ratio is currently calculated based on an average corner mass on the axle at play, since in real life each corner tends to carry different mass (think weight) this should be considered when calculating the damping ratio and a left/right number should be presented.
Damping Ratio #2 - the damping coefficient (N·s/m) use an empirical constant (k_empirical * oil_viscosity_cst / total_hole_area_mm2), this constant needs a lot more real life experiments to reflect the true damping coefficent across cambinations of oil viscosity and piston hole areas.
Pitch stiffness - introduce a pitch stiffness metric, or Nm per deg of nose-up/nose-down rotation
Aero - some classes of RC cars are heavily influenced by their aero profile and the downforce generated, influencing suspension dynamiccs massively. A future version should therefore make an effort to incorporate aero dynamic effects.
Negative droop (wheel axle below chassis) does not work
Spring is rendered too wide subject to shock body width, it should adjust with the shock body width
Track width should be calculated from suspension geometry and wheel's measurements