Safety Filter Keeps Triggering

The safety filter protects you by limiting motion when the simulator would otherwise produce excessive accelerations or rotations. If it’s triggering frequently during normal gameplay, your motion profile likely needs some adjustment.

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Understanding the Safety Filter

The safety filter monitors translational forces (G-forces) and rotational velocities on each axis independently. When values exceed the configured thresholds, the filter activates and caps the motion only on the affected axis — other axes continue normally. You’ll see warnings in the Debug Log dock when this happens.

Key behaviors:

• Per-axis isolation — Only the axis that exceeds its threshold is filtered. If heave spikes, only heave is affected; surge, sway, pitch, roll, and yaw continue normally.
• Cue-type isolation — The filter targets motion cues (Primary, Ground) but does not affect vibration or bass shaker cues on the same axis. You’ll still feel haptic feedback during filtering.
• Instant activation, smooth recovery — The filter engages immediately on a spike and smoothly releases once acceleration returns to normal.

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What Causes the Safety Filter to Trigger?

Cause	Description	How to Identify
Telemetry spikes	The game sends sudden extreme values (e.g., during a crash, respawn, or teleport)	Check Source Data dock for sudden jumps in acceleration or angular velocity
Gains too high	High gain amplifies normal telemetry into values that exceed the threshold	Filter triggers regularly during normal driving/flying, not just extreme events
Smoothing too low	Without smoothing, sharp telemetry peaks pass through unfiltered	Filter triggers on small events like curb strikes or gear changes
Input Limits not set	No cap on incoming telemetry values	Source Data shows extreme values (e.g., 50+ m/s²) during crashes
Wrong sim config dimensions	Incorrect physical dimensions cause miscalculated accelerations	Filter triggers even at low gains
Game-specific telemetry quirks	Some games produce unrealistic telemetry spikes in certain situations	Filter only triggers in specific games or specific in-game scenarios

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How to Identify Which Axis and Cue Is Causing It

Step 1: Enable DEBUG Logging

1. Go to Settings → General → Log Verbosity.
2. Set it to DEBUG.
3. Open the Debug Log dock (Settings → User Interface → Show UI Docks → Debug Log).

When the safety filter triggers, you’ll see log entries like:

Acceleration values (current/limit): sway: 7.06 G/6.00 G, pitch: 6689.56/5000 deg/s²
Safety limit exceeded on axis: pitch, sway

This tells you exactly which axes exceeded their limits and by how much.

Step 2: Use the Chart Visualizer to See Spikes

1. Open the Chart Visualizer dock.
2. Add data series for the axes that are triggering the filter (e.g., sway acceleration, pitch angular velocity).
3. Play your game and watch for spikes — you’ll see them as sharp peaks in the chart.
4. Note when the spikes occur (during crashes? On curbs? During normal cornering?). This tells you whether the issue is with extreme events or regular gameplay.

Step 3: Enable Audio Notifications

In Settings → Audio Notifications, enable the Safety Filter notification. This plays a sound each time the filter activates, so you can hear exactly when it triggers while playing — no need to watch the Debug Log.

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How to Reduce Triggering

Try these adjustments in order of priority:

1. Set Input Limits on Cue Contributors

This is the most targeted fix. Input limits cap the telemetry values for specific contributors before they reach motion processing:

1. Open the Profile Editor.
2. Expand the cue that’s contributing to the axis triggering the filter (usually Primary).
3. Find the axis contributor (e.g., lateral acceleration for sway).
4. Set an Input Limit to a realistic value:
   • For cars: 10–20 m/s² for acceleration contributors
   • For aircraft: Values vary widely — start conservative and increase
5. This prevents extreme in-game events from commanding unrealistic motion while preserving the feel during normal gameplay.

2. Lower Source Data Limits

In Settings → Safety → Source Data Limits, you can clamp all incoming telemetry globally:

• Acceleration: Default is 30 m/s². Try reducing to 15–20 m/s² if you see frequent spikes.
• Angular Velocity: Default is 180 °/s. Reduce if rotational axes are triggering.

Note

Source Data Limits affect all telemetry globally, while Input Limits on individual cue contributors are more targeted. Prefer per-cue Input Limits for fine-grained control.

3. Adjust Safety Filter Thresholds

If the filter triggers during motion that feels comfortable and safe to you, the thresholds may be set too conservatively:

1. Go to Settings → Safety → Safety Filter Activation Thresholds.
2. Translational Axes — Default is 3.00 Gs. Increase slightly (e.g., to 4.00–5.00 Gs) if you want to allow more intense motion.
3. Rotational Axes — Default is 2000 °/s². Increase if rotational motion is being filtered too aggressively.

Danger

Be conservative when raising thresholds. Setting them too high reduces the protection the safety filter provides. Only raise thresholds if the motion that triggers the filter genuinely feels comfortable.

4. Tune Your Profile

In the Profile Editor, adjust the axes that are triggering the filter:

• Lower the Gain on the offending axis contributor (e.g., if sway keeps triggering, lower the lateral acceleration gain in the Primary cue).
• Increase Smoothing on the offending axis to reduce sharp peaks. Try values around 20–30.
• Lower Input Gain in Settings → Motion to scale all incoming telemetry down (affects everything, not just one axis).

5. Per-Cue Spike Filter Thresholds

Some cues have their own spike filtering settings that can help prevent extreme values from reaching the safety filter. Check the cue’s configuration in the Profile Editor for any threshold or limiting options specific to that cue type.

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When Is Triggering Normal?

Some safety filter activations are expected and healthy:

• During crashes — In-game crashes produce extreme telemetry. The safety filter is doing its job by capping this motion.
• During respawns or teleports — Games often produce sudden position jumps when respawning. The filter prevents the simulator from trying to match these instantaneous changes.
• During extreme cornering at high speed — Some games produce very high G-force values during extreme maneuvers.

The goal is to eliminate filter activations during normal gameplay (regular driving, steady flight) while allowing the filter to protect you during extreme events.

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Further Reading

For a detailed guide on how the safety filter works and how to tune it, see Spike Filtering.

For a comprehensive motion tuning workflow that incorporates safety filter management, see the Motion Tuning Guide.

Note

Some safety filter activations during extreme in-game events (like crashes) are normal and expected. The goal is to prevent triggering during regular driving or flying.