Barry Rowland is one of the top reviewers in our little simRacing world. He makes good and long reviews checking all the internals of the hardware devices, which is useful to deduce qualities and durability. This time, he is testing throttle and brake T300 paddles to help simRacers with disabilities. Here it is.
First I would like to thank Glenn Sidman for donating this paddle kit that we are giving away to our contest winner Nate Kolita. As mentioned in the intro segment of this video, I will be shipping this T300 wheel base and paddle kit out to Nate as soon as this review is published. So he should have it in hand within a week.
It’s great to see fellow sim racers creating their own hardware solutions for other sim racers. Glenn Sidman has really done a great job here with this Paddle kit. The design, materials, parts and production quality of this unit are top flight. Using Hall sensors instead of potentiometers should give a very long life cycle to the end user. There is a large amount of adjustability build into these paddles. Even making it relatively easy to swap the brake and throttle positions from left to right. I was able to get everything dialed in to my liking. And it didn’t leave me wanting for more adjustments.
Driving the T300 with this kit attached was easier than I thought it would be when I first saw pictures of it. The throttle and brake paddles had just the right amount of resistance to give me a good feel for what the paddle was doing without it tiring me out on long stints. I was able to modulate the throttle just as well as I could with my foot. And after some practice, was able to do the same with the brake paddle. The replacement carbon shifter paddles seem to be just the right size and positioned to make it very easy to use them.
Now it did take me some time to adjust to using this kit. Being a motorcycle rider adjusting to the throttle was rather instinctive for me, and the brake paddle itself did not take long to get used to once I had my preferred tension dialed in using the in game settings. What gave me the most problem was adjusting to braking and downshifting at the same time with my left hand. But even though it felt quite foreign at first, I was able to manage it after 10 or so laps. And improving as I spent more time with it. I was able to get to within a couple of seconds of my best lap time when using pedals. And if this was the only way I raced, I’m pretty sure I would be able to improve even further. Which leads me to believe that you can be competitive with this setup once you have spent some quality time with it.
I think that most would agree that Glenn is building something special here with these hand control kits. And hats off to him for donating this GT paddle kit. It’s always a great feeling to help out our fellow sim racers whenever the opportunity presents itself.
Original source clicking here.
