QFC43 - A Car With Seoul [Results!]

Seoul, South Korea, Winter 2024.
QFC43
A car with soul.
A young and newly well-off couple wants a premium car that is comfortable and prestigious.

Co-hosted with @iivansmith

Minho Park is a newly successful up-and-coming lawyer whose law firm has started gaining traction. His lower-class upbringing and extreme work ethic has gotten him to where he is today, and imbued in him a sense of financial prudence. He grew up with his father, who was able to afford a small light sports car that he has obsessively taken care of. Like father like son, Minho loved driving it and learned to appreciate what sporty driving dynamics mean.

Eunji Lee is an architect and interior designer who’s been steadily gaining more and more high-value projects. Her privileged upbringing comes with a wide network and rich friends - including a taste of the finer things in life and a need to keep up socially. Eunji would need the car to be easy to drive to different project sites and practical enough to carry her friends when going out.

They both regularly use public transport currently, but feel the need of a private vehicle due to the increased need of sudden client meetings or project site visits, some of which are far away from public transport or outside the city. Eunji’s friends have also started to buy their own cars, and the couple would like their own as well now that they can afford one. Although Eunji mainly wanted a car that was comfortable and prestigious, Minho wanted one with character, not just another soul-less appliance that got you from point A to B. He knew it would be hard to find a sporty car that is both practical and comfortable in this day and age, but he would really appreciate it if the car has nice and sporty driving dynamics.

:star: :star: :star:

Drivability

Both Minho and Eunji will need to drive the car every day to meet with clients, visit project sites or the occasional late night outing with friends. They want it to be easy to drive in any scenario - narrow city streets, congested traffic, tight parking spots, and highway cruising.

Comfort

They both are willing to pay a premium for much better comfort, and will use the car very frequently - sometimes in traffic, sometimes out of the city, and would like it to be a very comfortable place to be in.

Prestige

Social status and image are important things everywhere, especially in Korea. Eunji would like to show she can keep up with her friends whilst Minho figured it might help his career image as well.

Safety

They would appreciate good active and passive safety features and not have to think about being unsafe.

:star: :star:

Design & Styling

Both of them would really appreciate a well-designed car that looks expensive and classy and not some crazy aggressive over-designed cheap-looking appliance.

Reliability

With extremely hectic schedules, they both really do not want to deal with any issues at all.

Sportiness

Minho would really appreciate if the car had the driving dynamics he once loved in his father’s sports car.

Practicality

Eunji needs to haul her co-workers, clients, and friends around quite frequently.

:star:

Fuel Economy

They would rather spend the money on other things such as Subways and soju.

Service Costs

They are willing to maintain it well, but keep it reasonable.

Rules

We are designing and making a car for the 2024 year, but we will use Automation’s 2020 year.

  • Model & Trim Year: 2020
  • Engine & Variant Year: 2020
  • Max Wheelbase: 2.8m or below. (110 in)
  • Body Styles: Sedans, crossovers, wagons, hatchbacks, small SUVs.
  • Fuel Type: 91 RON preferred, 95 RON allowed. (1.04x Fuel Eco penalty)
  • Seats: At least 5 seats.
  • Doors: At least 4 doors.
  • Tyres: Non-race radials ending in 5. (No semi-slicks)
  • Emissions: WES11
  • Max Loudness: 40
  • Max Budget: $30,000
  • Minimum Quality: 0
  • Techpool: $45M, Combined
  • Minimum Techpool: 5

(The default techpool of +5 everywhere gives a combined $26.36M. An additional $18.64M should be plenty enough for individual brands to specialize in their particular expertise and bring costs down to match the budget. However, you are not forced to use the techpool if you choose not to - you can keep it at 5.)

Remember this is for a premium car, not a luxury one.

Submissions
  • Model and Family names: QFC43 - forum username
  • Trim and Variant Names: Free
  • A forum post ad on this thread is required, showing at least one picture of your entry.
  • All submissions must be sent in via DM to @Oreology.
  • Submissions open on March 30, 2024.
  • Submissions close on April 11, 2024. (GMT-11)
    QFC43 - A Car with Soul Countdown Clock
  • No re-submissions!
Changelog & Notes

The priorities above should counter-act each other, and a well balanced car should do well enough. They are not looking for a luxury car, just a more premium and sportier option to a typical utilitarian car such as a Toyota or Honda. The one-star priorities are still important, although those in the two-star category take slight precedence.

Additional note - please do NOT bother with interiors, this is a QFC!

  • Added new requirement: Must have 4 doors.
  • Increased max wheelbase to 2.8m (110in) from 2.7m.
  • Changed minimum seats to 5 (from 4). (full 3-bench rear)
  • Added countdown clock for submissions closing.
  • Clarified that a 95 RON vehicle will receive a 1.04x penalty since the couple prefers the cheaper 91 RON.
Inspirations
15 Likes

Just a cent regarding techpool: Especially when dealing with a “2020 but actually 2024” scenario, shouldn’t we be given some more? While Automation’s tech progress largely stalls past (and even before) 2020, I believe we ought to get more quality on existing parts, less cost if somebody wants to use standard HUD and so on.

Usually QFCs go with default pool - but if we have more than that, why not go a bit further…

5 Likes

The maximum wheelbase is actually the figure after rounding to the nearest 0.1m if I’m not mistaken.

Also, with the requirement for at least 4 doors, shouldn’t the minimum seating requirement be increased to 5 (full-sized) seats or more?

I almost forgot that semi-slick tires are not pure race tires, but allowing their use here would make no sense anyway, given the context.

1 Like

Whaaaaat, I’m sure we can find a use for Cup 2 Rs on entry-level premium cars (clueless)

I’m gonna assume “4 doors required” means “4 doors minimum,” since everything other than a sedan here is gonna be 5 doors, pretty much.

Another point: Our clients are looking for a premium (but not luxury) car, so a maximum wheelbase limit increase (probably to 3.0m after rounding to the nearest 1/10 of a metre) may be in order.

4 doors minimum because of the sedans, we know hatches etc. can be called 5 doors.

1 Like

5 seats minimum is good, will do a change on that

1 Like

Definitely not lol, this is for a young couple living in a city with tight roads and don’t want a big luxury vehicle.

Smaller premium cars like the Audi A3 stated in the inspirations

1 Like

With that in mind, a minimum wheelbase limit (~2.5-2.6m after rounding to the nearest 0.1m) could be considered - anything below C-segment in terms of overall size (whether it’s a sedan/wagon/hatch or an SUV/crossover) may well be off-limits.

Just a cent regarding techpool: Especially when dealing with a “2020 but actually 2024” scenario, shouldn’t we be given some more? While Automation’s tech progress largely stalls past (and even before) 2020, I believe we ought to get more quality on existing parts, less cost if somebody wants to use standard HUD and so on.

From our testing, the current budget and techpool is definitely sufficient for a standard entry-level to mid-range “premium” car (see Inspirations). We are open to changing it, but would like more input from others regarding budget & techpool. (so if more people have any suggestions please do say)

With that in mind, a minimum wheelbase limit (~2.5-2.6m after rounding to the nearest 0.1m) could be considered - anything below C-segment in terms of overall size (whether it’s a sedan/wagon/hatch or an SUV/crossover) may well be off-limits.

I don’t think a minimum wheelbase regulation is necessary, due to the needs of 5 full seats and practicality being a factor, I expect most entries to be around 2.5m to 2.8m wheelbases anyway.

3 Likes

Is there a penalty for 95 ron if 91 is preferred?

1 Like

Merely expecting that could also lead to some oddball entries (if not fascinating, admittedly). I have a feeling that what amounts to a Honda Life with the interior and engine of a Lexus RX could be a little strange, yet be somewhat viable given the current priorities…

That's not a bad idea, actually...

Such a small thing might get knocked down by prestige unless it has additional weird choices like active suspension, 20" alloy rims… there could be some weird cheesiness here. But maybe quirky is key.

Either way, love the premise! I’m personally eager to see if I can squeeze a land-yacht into a sub-compact footprint with athletic Euro-esque dynamics… on a budget!

2 Likes

I want to make things interesting and ask this: Are 3 other people willing to work with me on this one?

Is there a penalty for 95 ron if 91 is preferred?

Yes! Since premium fuel costs quite a bit more in RL and in the priorities fuel economy is a factor (they wanna spend it on Subways and soju instead) we will put a penalty modifier to the fuel economy figure if you’re using 95RON, but that is still TBD how much it will be.

(ie. 8.5L/100km 91 RON vs 8.2L/100km 95 RON, the 95 RON car will have a 8.8L/100km equivalent) (but the scaling factor is still TBD)

I might just be misinterpreting the method here, but if I’m not wrong, rather than comparing outright price (say, per 100km), a modifying figure is being given to cars running higher octane fuel due to its higher price. Wouldn’t it just make more sense to scale based on the literal cost of fuel? Many cars list themselves as running “up to XX octane fuel” anyway, and have ECUs to optimize for different grades, ethanol levels (if applicable), etc.

My 2012 Honda CR-V does this (I think it claims “up to 90-something” but is just fine with 89 or whatever the lowest one is.), so a 2024 entry-level sportish-luxury car definitely will too. Well, unless it’s got some kind of cheapo-depot engine to balance the checkbooks…

Admittedly, I don’t know fuel costs in Seoul, but some quick reading shows that normal-grade (91-RON-ish; -ish added because AKI measurements might be used which could vary) is more common, but premium-grade (94-RON-ish) does exist. Some claim that regular is even just a range between 91-94 varying per station, and premium is just 94+. I can’t verify this personally, and I don’t know Korean — just some quick search data. And yes, of course the cheaper and more plentiful range of 91-94 RON fuel is preferable, but the 94+ premium option does exist, and can be found… (though I have a feeling an engine wanting 98 or something already won’t do very well here, haha)

1 Like

Most of the time, I just add something like a 10% premium on SVC for each higher octane category when judging, it is usually easier to manage than messing with fuel econ considering how many people use mpg/uk mpg vs L/100km. Depends on the scoring structure tho.

1 Like

I might just be misinterpreting the method here, but if I’m not wrong, rather than comparing outright price (say, per 100km), a modifying figure is being given to cars running higher octane fuel due to its higher price.

Yes, so participants would have their fuel mileage figures scaled up by a multiply factor. Since this is QFC, I feel it doesn’t have to be exactly realistic or restrictive, so the idea was to allow both types of fuels but penalize the higher RON (by a bit) to make the lower one still seem viable.

Admittedly, I don’t know fuel costs in Seoul, but some quick reading shows that normal-grade (91-RON-ish; -ish added because AKI measurements might be used which could vary) is more common, but premium-grade (94-RON-ish) does exist. Some claim that regular is even just a range between 91-94 varying per station, and premium is just 94+. I can’t verify this personally, and I don’t know Korean — just some quick search data. And yes, of course the cheaper and more plentiful range of 91-94 RON fuel is preferable, but the 94+ premium option does exist, and can be found… (though I have a feeling an engine wanting 98 or something already won’t do very well here, haha)

In real-life, actually the price difference between premium fuel and regular fuel especially in Asian countries are quite big. Me and @iivansmith had a talk about it, and if we actually scale it exactly according to the price difference between premium and regular fuel in RL, it wouldn’t make sense to go premium, as in-game, the difference between 95RON and 91RON is frankly minimal. So, the scaling factor won’t be realistic to real-life price differences (and therefore won’t be as drastic).

Most of the time, I just add something like a 10% premium on SVC for each higher octane category when judging, it is usually easier to manage than messing with fuel econ considering how many people use mpg/uk mpg vs L/100km. Depends on the scoring structure tho.

Yes, similar lines of thought but we felt it was more applicable to adjust the fuel consumption instead of SVC (as SVC can be reduced/increased by other things other than fuel). As for MPG UK/US units, the numbers should be automatically converted in-game so shouldn’t be an issue for us to judge.

The number we’re thinking of is a 1.04x factor. So, those using premium fuel and achieving a fuel efficiency of 8.0 L/100km (29.4 MPG US) will be judged as having 8.32 L/100km (28.27 MPG US) in the stats spreadsheet. This shouldn’t be a massive difference and we feel accurately balances the (quite large) price disparity in real life vs the small in-game difference.

4 Likes

That makes sense to me, thanks for the further explanation!

1 Like

Let’s get this party started…

The Hydrion Manta 417—when you want to roll up without rolling change.






Commentary: I did what I could to disguise the jank on the C–pillar, but there’s only so many fixtures to throw on there before you start murdering potato PCs. And I know I’m always heavy on the fixtures anyway. And, let’s be honest, the Sunflower body absolutely needs a new roofline to hide that awkward rear window.

5 Likes