Deep in the South Bay of Los Angeles, in a nondescript warehouse not far from some truly exceptional Korean food, is what I consider to be the global headquarters of racing simulators: CXC Simulations. Since 2007, a small team of passionate racers led by founder Chris Considine has built the world’s best racing simulators from the ground up, including dozens of one-off special projects. This is one of them.
It began as a $2-million Pro 4 truck simulator built for Norwegian Cruise Lines—which is not the simulator in this story. That simulator, which I drove before it was shipped off to sail the high seas, directly influenced this one. After significant customer interest, CXC turned that one-off into something someone could order. Thus, we have the CXC Motion Pro Truck. This bad boy starts at $600,000 and the order books are open right now.
For your financial burden, you get some of the most advanced simulation systems money can buy. CXC developed a proprietary full-motion platform using six hydraulic rams and custom control electronics. The torque-producing wheelbase is of CXC’s own design, while the virtual reality headset is based on top-of-the-line hardware, but with rewritten firmware to seamlessly integrate with the rest of the system.
All of that runs through a custom-built computer with a dedicated user interface that makes running the truck as easy as mowing a lawn. The entire system takes so much energy that it even has a dedicated high-voltage box.
With Considine as my chaperone, climbing in was as easy as opening the tube-frame door (not present on a real Pro 4 truck), clicking the four-point seatbelt into place, adjusting my seating position, and putting on the VR headset. With a few clicks, I’m tossed into a highly convincing virtual world, complete with the sounds of birds chirping.
Nothing, not even a solid decade of sim racing experience, will prepare you for the Motion Pro Truck. I've never jumped a Pro 4 truck, but if I had to guess what it feels like, it would probably be close to what I experienced behind the wheel of this sim. The motion platform not only yaws, pitches, and rolls based on the in-game physics (and some software trickery in between by CXC), but it also bucks and whips with neck-snapping ferocity.
Jumps have an incredibly convincing stomach-dropping sensation, while landings feel intuitively right with a slight jolt and big plushy motion as the tires settle on the mud. As speed increases, a fan meant to inflate jumpers blows convincingly high-speed air into your face to complete the immersion.
But the quiet magic is in the totality of the calibration. Considine let me go for 25-minute sessions, which is normally plenty of time for motion sickness to kick in. Despite the truck having more than three feet of motion freedom, and the layers of calculus that go into accurately calculating head position relative to body motion while maintaining near-zero latency, the experience feels no different from driving in real life. Well, save for the obvious pixelation that VR headsets are still burdened by.
The point still stands: I could go in this thing all day if it wasn’t for the physicality of the body motions and the weight of the steering. After almost two hours, I had enough. Only then did Considine inform me that it was at only about 20% of its total strength, which is about 50% strength relative to the real thing.
$600,000 is nothing to sneeze at. But CXC says its order books are healthy for folks looking to make their dream garage a little snazzier. As far as how it compares to its $2M big brother, it’s exactly the same in experience. So, really, this is a bargain as much as it is a stunning example of modern driving simulation.
