Sim-Lab XP-1 Pedals Review

Sim-Lab’s first and currently only sim racing pedal set makes a pretty big statement. Sim-Lab have made it clear that they’re aiming to expand beyond the cockpit and sim rig market that they became famous for. Their target is to offer a complete sim racing ecosystem, consisting of hardware such as wheel bases, steering wheels and pedals, as well as their incredible range of cockpits.

The XP-1 pedal set paves the way for this hardware lineup, and does so in style. This is a mid-range load cell pedal set, equipped with a 200kg load cell on the brake. They feature a stunningly gorgeous design, huge layers of adjustability and an extremely robust and premium construction.

The question is, where do these pedals fit within the sim racing market, and do they outperform the competition?

Sim-Lab has sent over the XP-1 Pedals for me to review, and they’ve got some pretty big shoes to fill after my recent review of the Sim-Lab Mercedes-AMG F1 wheel, which I absolutely fell in love with. Despite these pedals being a review unit, as with all my reviews, this doesn’t affect my review in any way, and I will call out any missed steps if there are any.

Watch our Sim-Lab XP-1 Pedals Review

What are the Sim-Lab XP-1 Pedals?

I’ve often said that upgrading your sim racing pedals is easily the most important thing to do when improving your sim racing setup. A good set of pedals have the highest potential to improve your driving, your consistency and your lap time.

For this reason, they are one of the more important decisions you need to make when upgrading, even more important than choosing a wheel base.

One key element to look for in a sim racing pedal is a brake pedal that is as close to realistic as possible. The XP-1 pedals do that in various ways. There is a 200kg load cell incorporated directly into the rear of the pedal arm, rated for up to 100kg of brake pressure.

You get a dual-stage damper, which lets you feel different stages throughout a single braking input. And you get a considerable amount of adjustability. You can completely change how the brake feels with interchangeable dampers and springs as well as tool-free adjustments to the stiffness and pedal travel.

All of these features are housed in one of the most robust and premium-feeling full-metal designs.

I’m going to say right off the bat, these pedals aren’t console compatible in any way. Like most premium pedals, you have direct to PC compatibility, allowing you to use them as a part of any sim racing ecosystem.

How much do the XP-1 Pedals cost?

These XP-1 pedals are priced pretty darn competitively, and I think Sim-Lab have positioned the XP-1 pedals right around the sweet spot. In terms of value and performance, these pedals are competing directly with Heusinkveld, Cube Controls and even Asetek. While brands such as Fanatec and MOZA have slightly more focus on ease of use rather than ultimate adjustability.

A set of two pedals will cost you £338, €490.76 or $399, and are actually on sale at the time of this review, dropping the price down to under €400, although I’m not sure how long this sale will last. So all the prices I’m mentioning are focused on the pedals RRP.

You can then grab a set of three pedals for £508, €589 or $549. It is worth noting that the pedals don’t come with a heelrest or baseplate, and this is an additional cost at £135, €156 or $169.

How does this price compare to the competition?

Looking at its biggest rival, the Sim-Lab XP-1 pedals vs the Heusinkveld Sprint pedals. Both come in a standard two pedal configuration. Both allow for an incredible amount of brake pressure, and both feature a premium, all-metal design.

So you may be surprised to learn that the XP-1 pedals out price the Sprints by over €150. They’re priced almost identically to the very comparable Asetek Forte S pedals.

Unboxing and what’s included

Let’s jump into the unboxing and see what’s included. I have the base spec two pedal configuration with no additional extras. This is the entry point for the XP-1’s with things only getting better from here.

Even at a base spec, you get a lot of kit that is often considered extra for many brands. Inside the throttle box, you get the usual cables, a set of additional dampers, and a control box to connect all of your pedals into.

In the brake box, you get more cables, a very generous amount of interchangeable springs and dampers, and a huge variety of mounting hardware. You then get the two pedals themselves which are well protected and ready to mount onto your rig.

The design & build quality

As soon as you handle the XP-1 Pedals, you can feel the incredible quality. I’ve raced for a couple of years with the Sim-Lab P1X Pro as my main sim rig, and you can tell that these pedals are from the same manufacturer.

The sturdiness and robustness of the construction are incredible, and small attention to detail in the design, such as the branded washers, really screams quality. In fact, every part of the pedal that you will ever interact with is incredibly tactile and premium.

Each pedal feels pretty heavy to handle, partially due to the immense amount of metal used in the construction. This gives me confidence that even after hundreds and thousands of hours of abuse, these pedals will still be performing well.

While I know design is subjective, I firmly believe that these XP-1s are up there with the best-looking pedal sets on the market. I had the same thoughts when I first reviewed the Asetek Forte pedals, as they boasted a unique design flair, and these XP-1 Pedals sit in a similar category.

One small ommission in the design came in the pedal face plates. I raced mainly in boots, but the times when I did casually jump onto the rig and race in just my socks, I could really feel the holes that sit at the center of each plate.

Braking hard meant the center of your foot would almost be compressed into these holes, and can feel uncomfortable over time. This is strange as it’s something almost no other pedal manufacturer does, with most brands choosing to mount the face plates from the rear. I’d also love to see more variety in the plate design to differentiate between throttle and brake. Hopefully, additional plate accessories and options are something Sim-Lab will add over time.

Adjustability

There are multiple points of adjustment across each pedal, with the toolfree adjustment knobs featuring a textured design for additional grip while coming in a lovely Sim-Lab blue colour. Yes, there is an all-black kit available if blue isn’t your colour!

The front adjustment knobs allow you to adjust the pedal travel very qucikly. While the knobs at the rear of the pedals affect stiffness. With these adjustments not requiring tools, you can quickly swap from a short-travel formula-style pedal and a longer travel GT or road car pedal feel pretty quickly.

Beyond these toolfree adjustment points, you get access to a huge range of other adjustments. You can move the whole pedal up and down at the rear which adjusts the pedal angle across a pretty large range.

There are also multiple hinge points available on each pedal. Lowering the hinge mounting for the pedal arm will soften the pedal pressure, while raising it stiffens the pedal up. Moving the hinge point also changes the curve or linearity of how the pedal feels to press.

As I mentioned earlier, you get a lot of different springs and elastomers included, giving you a lot of choice of how each pedal feels. There are multiple long throttle springs, and a range of short springs and dampers for the brake. Switching these in and out will affect how stiff the throttle and brake feels, and you can crank things right up with the stiffest 70A elastomer, which felt too stiff for my liking.

Quite often, these additional elements will be considered an extra “brake kit” or “performance kit” accessory, so its really nice to have so much included with this XP-1 Pedal as standard.

Each pedal plate also features multiple points of adjustability with both height and angle adjustments available.

It took me a bit of back and forth to find the sweet spot, but with all of the possible adjustments, I’d be amazed if any sim racer couldn’t get comfortable.

The control box

One strange area where the quality doesn’t quite stack up is in the control box itself. Its extremely lightweight and plasticy, making it feel very at odds with the durable and beefy metal construction of the pedals themselves.

This box is good in that it serves as a single point to connect all pedals, resulting in fewer cables going to your PC. This nod towards good cable management is always appreciated in my book.

I understand that this control box is generally hidden away and not interacted with once set up, but compared to, say, the Simucube Link Hub, the quality is night and day. I was even conscious of breaking the plastic mounting holes when attaching it to my rig, as they felt rather flimsy. But to be fair to Sim-Lab, nothing has broken, and the control box is serving its part as designed.

Mounting the pedals

Unlike some pedals from brands such as Asetek, Fanatec, and MOZA, the XP-1 pedals don’t include a rigid baseplate or heel rest as standard. The base set, which I have just includes the two pedals, with individual mounting slots at the base of each pedal.

This gives full flexibility on the positioning and how you mount the pedals. However, this approach does have one minor issue. This comes down to the lack of heel rest. Without one, you can feel the blue adjustment knobs when sim racing in socks, and this can be a little uncomfortable.

This didn’t affect me massively as I tested these pedals primarily wearing racing boots. Although I did need to install an additional piece of aluminium profile to use as a heel rest. The good news is that this issue can be completely solved with a little more cash, as you can buy a heel rest, or a complete baseplate directly from Sim-Lab.

When it did come to mounting the pedals, the slot gap on either side of the base is pretty much perfect. The slot runs from the front to the rear of each pedal, giving you a huge amount of flexibility over the positioning of each pedal. This is exactly how sim racing pedals should be designed, and even big players such as Heusinkveld and Asetek don’t offer this same level of positional adjustment.

Software

Jumping into the software, this is the second time I’m using Sim-Lab’s own Race Director software. Things inside Race Director are simple and easy to use, a refreshing experience compared to the bombardment of options that the MOZA mBooster Active Pedals Pit House software offers.

Initially you’ll need to update the firmware, which is done via a seperate piece of software. This isn’t ideal as I’d much rather stay in one app for the entire experience, but its a route that some other sim racing brands also take.

After the firmware flash, you can calibrate the pedals which is a 5 second process, and then adjust various settings. You have control over deadzones and input curves, and that’s about it. This is pretty standard for a load cell pedal, and all you really need.

Once you’ve found your happy place, you can save your profile to quickly load again in the future. I found this useful when switching between a short throw F1 pedal and a GT-style pedal.

This whole process was simple, using the clean UI of RaceDirector, and involves zero fuss. I like it.

Performance review

So then with the pedals calibrated and configured, we can jump onto the track. To test I loaded up a good test for both pedals, ACC in a GT2 car around the Nordschleife. If any situation is going to test these pedals out, its going to be this one.

I want to start with the brake pedal, as this is really what you’re paying for. This brake pedal is broken down into a few parts. At the base of the pedal, housed inside the gold clyinder is a load cell sensor rated upto 200kg of pressure.

This is then topped with a combination of spring, elastomer and the locking nuts. The spring provides the majority of the resistance and is responsible for a lot of the travel. You then have the elastomer which is the damping block. These two elements combine to create the two stage brake that Sim-Lab boast with the XP-1.

The pre-load spring compresses first, giving you the first stage, and then the elastomer starts to compress as your force increases. This helps you with consistent braking into every corner, as you can feel when you’re reaching maximum pressure.

It also helps a lot during the decompression phase. As I released the brake pedal, I could feel the resistance changing under my foot. This helped with the most crucial part of the braking phase, trail braking.

With a range of different elastomers and pre-load springs, there is a lot of scope to dial in the resistance and brake feel. Using the softer springs, the pedal was pretty easy to depress all the way, while using the stiffer damping options really firmed things up.

Having become used to active pedals since both Simucube and MOZA released their force feedback pedals over the past year or two, using a completely mechanical brake pedal again certainly took some adjustment. Gone were the effects that told me when I was locking a wheel or triggering the ABS. Instead, I had to pay much more attention to my braking action once again.

Despite this re-learning process, I felt as confident braking with the XP-1 Pedals as I ever have with a purely mechanical sim racing pedal.

My experience with the throttle is very similar. This is a buttery smooth pedal thanks to Sim-Lab nailing the mechanical elements. Everything felt well oiled and the application of the throttle every time felt pretty close to perfect.

After my first lap, I did crave some additional resistance in the throttle, which was easily achievable with a quick change to the stiffer spring that was included. Undergoing this swap, and mechanically adjusting the pedal, gave me the exact feeling I was after.

Having used pedals such as the Asetek Forte and Simucube passive throttle, I can say that this Sim-Lab XP-1 Pedal is very comparable. If anything, this throttle pedal felt slightly smoother during its application than other pedals I’ve used.

Are the Sim-Lab XP-1 Pedals worth buying?

The XP-1 Pedals sit in a very unique space. You may look at them and think you’re not getting as much value compared to a Fanatec or MOZA pedal set, which comes with three pedals and a base plate as standard. In comparison, with the XP-1 Pedals, you’re dropping down to two pedals, and no baseplate, while also spending more money.

However, the XP-1 Pedals deliver a fundamentally better experience than most lower-priced pedal sets. Pairing the incredible build quality that Sim-Lab is known for with a huge level of adjustment and exceptionally high performance allows these pedals to stand above the competition.

So, we switch focus to more premium pedal sets from Heusinkveld and other premium brands. The XP-1 competes toe to toe with these brands and outperforms them in some areas, all while costing significantly less than those premium options.

Like I say, these pedals occupy a unique and often desirable space in sim racing. This is a true high-end sim racing experience, at a price that’s much lower than other premium competitors.

The pedals themselves are stunning to look at, and offer all of the customisation that you’ll ever need from a load cell pedal set. Does this make the XP-1 Pedals the all-round best load cell pedal set. Quite possibly.

Frequently asked questions

Review written by Felix König

About Felix König

Felix König is a professional Esports sim racer from Seattle, WA, and is the founder and editor of Sim Race Reviews. In addition to over 10 years of professional sim racing and competing in both iRacing and Assetto Corsa Competizione competitions, Felix has been sharing his sim racing knowledge and expertise with other sim racers. His passion lies in sim racing, and in particular in the plethora of sim racing hardware from racing wheels to pedals and more.

View all articles written by Felix König

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