Building Cars
Glass Cockpits
When I first saw on twitter that Brian France had said NASCAR was looking at “glass cockpits” for the future, I was a little mystified. (You can see exactly what he said on @nateryan’s twitter […]
The Building Speed Blog
Collisions
Safety: It’s not just how fast you go – it’s how fast you stop.
One of the biggest concerns in motorsports wrecks is peak force – that’s the maximum force experienced by a driver in a collision. As the diagram to the right shows, the force you experience in […]
Aerodynamic Forces
Rules Changes…Again
NASCAR issues rules change on Wednesday – one of which extends an earlier rule change to try to improve aerodynamics at intermediate tracks. The other is designed to cut off an entirely new direction of research before it starts. […]
Busch, Kyle
Infographic: Current Drivers’ Rookie Years
Just out of curiosity, I pulled up some data from racing-reference.info on different drivers’ rookie years in the Cup series. The data are from each driver’s first full year as a Cup driver. I picked […]
Aerodynamic Forces
200-mph Laps at Michigan Are Not Like 200-mph Laps at Superspeedways
People worry that 200-mph laps at Michigan International Speedway could make cars airborne, as can happen at superspeedways. Should they worry? […]
Michigan International Speedway
Michigan International Speedway Pole Speeds
There’s been a huge increase in Michigan International Speedway pole speeds this year. Is it the biggest increase ever? […]
Michigan International Speedway
Michigan: Don’t Believe the Speeds
All the talk at Michigan about high speeds and the hoopla over passing the 200-mph barrier prompts me to offer this caveat: Take the speeds you hear with a grain of salt because the average lap speeds are estimates, not measurements. […]
Aerodynamic Forces
The Myth of the 200-mph “Lift-Off Speed”
The speeds at Pocono were high, but the speeds at newly repaved Michigan are even higher. Nine drivers posted lap times over 200 mph on Thursday, leading to media and driver hysteria about the high speeds. What is the lift-off speed at Michigan? […]
Engines
Pocono: The Shifty Triangle
NASCAR engines like to run at about 8000-9500 rpm (revolutions per minute); however, the tires on the car rotate around 2400 rpm at 200 mph. The gearing in the transmission and the rear end gear reduce the rotational engine speed, with different gears providing different reductions. When you talk about the size of a gear, you’re actually talking about the relative sizes of a pair of gears. The gear on the left in the diagram has 20 teeth, while the gear on the right has 10 teeth, so this gear would be a 2:1, meaning that the smaller gear rotates twice every time the larger gear rotates once. […]
Bristol Motor Speedway
The Reason for Decreasing Cautions
This was the first year that most people noticed a decrease in the number of cautions, but (as I’ve pointed out), 2012 is merely the latest in a six-year trend of decreasing cautions. The same downward trend is evident in the Nationwide Series. This year is perhaps notable for it being so extreme.
The data clearly shows the trend: The question, of course, is why?