ACF: Quick and Simple Walkthrough

I've made guides in the past, but they happen to be a bit long. So this guide will be a simple overview of ACF. Quickly going over how to build a car. This guide will be for just simple operation, so I will not show you how to use suspension. Steering will be included however.

1. Installation

Before you can use ACF, you need to download it. It is not on the workshop so download it from the Github [github.com] link right here. Once that is done downloading, open the file using WinRar or 7zip, and drag the folder known as ACF-master into the addons folder of your Garry's Mod Directory.

You'll need a couple of addons in-order to use ACF properly, so download them at this Workshop Collection

After all of those are downloaded, restart Garry's Mod.

2. E2 Chips

Paste these E2s into the editor, and save them.

@name Low OPS E2 Steering
@inputs A D Base:entity
@outputs TURN
@persist SLAVE:entity [TURN_RATE TURN_ANGLE] B C
@model models/sprops/rectangles/size_2_5/rect_18x18x3.mdl
@trigger none

if (dupefinished()) {reset()}

B = round(toUnit("km/h",Base:vel():length()))


if(B >= 20)  {
    TURN_ANGLE = 45
}
else
{
    TURN_ANGLE = 45
}

if (first())    {
    interval(85)
    
    TURN_RATE = 5 

    
    SLAVE = entity()
} elseif (clk())    {
    interval(85)

    if (!SLAVE:isPlayerHolding())    {
        TURN += clamp((A-D)*TURN_ANGLE - TURN, -TURN_RATE, TURN_RATE)
        SLAVE:setAng( Base:toWorld(ang(0, TURN - 90, 0)) )
        SLAVE:propFreeze(1)
    }
}

@name Basic ACF Control
@inputs ThrottleKey ClutchKey BrakeKey
@outputs Throttle Clutch Brake

runOnTick(1)

#Brakes

local Brakestrength = 5

#Power Controls

Throttle = 100*ThrottleKey
Clutch = ClutchKey
Brake = Brakestrength*BrakeKey

3. Building

PART 1

When building ACF, you want to always build north. To find out which way is north, place your spray down on the ground, and the top of your spray is the north direction.

Next, find any baseplate prop for your build. I suggest making something small for your first build. Rotate the prop so that it is facing north. The next thing you want to do is face north and spawn four wheels. Freeze all of these wheels in the air, and use the Make Spherical tool on all four wheels.



Pull out the Precision Tool. Lock onto the centre point of a wheel, and left click. Then, lock onto the next point and right click. Repeat for all four wheels. Wheels should all be level with eachother.



For the back wheels, pull out the Axis Centre tool. Click the side of the wheel, and then click the baseplate. Do this for both back wheels, and don't use this on the front wheels.

For the front wheels, pull out the Ballsocket Centre tool. Click the side of the wheel and then click the baseplate. Do this for both front wheels.

If you want to not have all your components on the baseplate, you can spawn a small plate next to the baseplate, and raise it off the ground. On this plate, spawn a Pod Controller .

Afterwards, spawn yourself a seat, and place it on the plate. Weld it to the plate, and link the seat with the Pod.



Next, spawn the steering chip. Raise it off the ground so it can be easily accessed. Pull out the Wiring tool, and wire the inputs. Wire A and D to the same inputs on the Pod, and wire Base [ENTITY] to the baseplate.

For this next step, pull out the Ballsocket Advanced Tool. Copy all of these settings into the editor, and make a preset.

Force Limit: 0 

Torque Limit: 0

X Minimum: -180

X Maximum: 180

Y Minimum: -0.0100

Y Maximum: 0.0100

Z Minimum: -0.0100

Z Maximum: 0.0100

X Friction: 0

Y Friction: 0

Z Friction: 0

With the Ballsocket Advanced tool, left click the side of the baseplate, and then left click the side of the front wheel on the respective side. Repeat this for both front wheels. Now that we're done, we can add the car's powertrain.

PART 2

For this part, you will need 3 components. Engine, Straight Gearbox, and a Transaxial Differential. If you want to follow along with me, I chose a 1.5L I4 Petrol engine, a 4 Speed Straight Small gearbox, and a Differential Transaxial Small . The setup I'm going for will be Front Engine Rear Wheel Drive (FR), and this guide will be primarily for that setup. I will make a guide in the future for more advanced drive layouts.

Make sure that your gearbox's torque value is greater than the torque of the engine, or else the gearbox will slip.



Start placing your components on your plate. Place the engine up at the front, place the gearbox close to the connecting rod of the engine, with the larger side facing towards, and place the differential all the way at the back in between the rear wheels.



Link the Engine to the Gearbox, by right clicking the Engine first and then the Gearbox second. Link the Gearbox to the Differential, and then link the Differential to the Rear Wheels. Once this setup is done, we can start wiring.

Spawn the Basic ACF Control chip on the plate or on the baseplate. Then, wire the following things.

E2 Inputs

ThrottleKey - [W on Pod Controller]
ClutchKey - [Shift on Pod Controller]
BrakeKey - [Space on Pod Controller]

Engine Inputs

Throttle - [Throttle on E2 Chip]

Gearbox

GearUp - [Mouse1 on Pod Controller]
GearDown - [Mouse 2 on Pod Controller]
Clutch - [Clutch on E2]
Brake - [Brake on E2]

Differential

Clutch - [Clutch on E2]
Brake - [Brake on E2]

Before we can finish the car, we must adjust the weight of the baseplate. Pull out the Weight tool, and check the weight of the Engine, Gearbox, and Differential. Add all of those values together, and set that as the weight of the baseplate. Now that we've finished the car, you can take it out for a drive.

To use the clutch, hold shift and then release while holding the throttle key. To shift into reverse, put the car in it's top gear.

4. End

Thanks for reading this guide. If this helped you, leave a like. I would really appreciate it. It makes me happy knowing I helped someone out.

If the E2 has any errors, google how to enable Propcore, and then add that into the console. If you don't have access to the server's dev console, you may have to ask an admin or the server owner to enable it.

That's all, and expect future guides to come out with more in depth ACF tutorials.

[idiot 3 alt (7)]

https://youtu.be/DdmNYNkcwKE

[wake up its 2008]

this guide is retarded shit, it doesnt tell about making an turret and instead an retarded car that will be annihilated even by even an 20mm hesh autocannon

[dsaS]

https://youtu.be/DdmNYNkcwKE

[idiot 3 alt (2)]

https://youtu.be/DdmNYNkcwKE

[Cap'n CornFlake]

In your previous guide, we used Gates and Constant values. Can you explain why this more recent guide replaces that with an E2 Chip?

[AdventureBoots]

Thanks a million, I needed this.