Month: July 2014

Aerodynamic Forces

Firewalls and Aerodynamics

2014-07-29 dr. diandra 0

My friend at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinal, Dave Kallman (whose online column should be a regular read for race fans) asked about the confiscated firewalls from the Number 11 car at Indy. That reminded me of the first NASCAR race I was supposed to attend as research for my book The Physics of NASCAR. That was California in 2007. I was to follow around the number 19 car, at that time driven by Elliott Sadler and crew chiefed by Josh Browne. […]

Goodyear

The Dirt on Radials vs. Bias-Ply Tires

2014-07-25 dr. diandra 3

NASCAR started transitioning away from bias-ply tires in 1989. So why did they start making a comeback in 2013? […]

Aerodynamic Forces

How Fast Would NASCAR Cars Go at Daytona without Restrictor Plates?

2014-07-11 dr. diandra 6

Doug Yates was guest on Dave Moody’s SiriusXM Speedway last week. He brought up a conversion you hear a lot in the week before Daytona and Talladega. Every 25 horsepower in the engine translates to about a 1 second decrease in lap times. Dave did the math: Removing the plates would increase the engine by 450 horsepower. Four hundred and fifty more horsepower equates to 18 seconds off the lap time, assuming all other things equal. That last part was a very important qualification. It will come back to haunt us in a moment. […]

math

How Much Difference Does One Position Make in NASCAR Winnings?

2014-07-08 dr. diandra 5

Given all the rain at Daytona this weekend, there was plenty of time to think about auxiliary NASCAR issues.  Regular readers know that I’m a huge fan of the racing-reference.info website because they have a trove […]