Why doesn't someone do that? Drive an F1 car upside down! That could get a
crowd excited!
Chris
99BBB
"pws" <pwshelton@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:481dde2b$0$20164$4c368faf@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Chris D'Agnolo wrote:
>
>> Biggest surprise was the F1 car. That just does not jive with common
>> sense and logic. Seems to me that they have horribly tiny frontal areas
>> and there's no flat / blunt surfaces. Maybe I just figured it out; the
>> ground effects intentionally abut a whole bunch of air, with the
>> resulting force of that air pushing the car downward in order to keep
the
>> car on the ground. Hmmmmmmm, I could be right!?! In effect these cars
>> need the huge HP to utilize the air to keep them stuck down! Can you
>> imagine how fast these buggers would be with aero aids that allow them
to
>> slice thru the wind?
>>
>> Chris
>> 99BBB
>
> The aerodynamics on the F1 cars produce so much down force that the Indy
> cars can theoretically be driven upside-down as long as you keep the
speed
> above 81 mph, since roughly 81 mph is when the down force equals the
> weight of the car.
> They produce roughly 2 times their weight in down force once they hit
118
> mph.
>
> From Wikipedia:
>
> The cars' aerodynamics are designed to provide maximum downforce with a
> minimum of drag; every part of the bodywork is designed with this aim in
> mind. Like most open wheeler cars they feature large front and rear
> aerofoils, but they are far more developed than American open wheel
> racers, which depend more on suspension tuning; for instance, the nose
is
> raised above the centre of the front aerofoil, allowing its entire width
> to provide downforce. The front and rear wings are highly sculpted and
> extremely fine 'tuned', along with the rest of the body such as the
> turning vanes beneath the nose, bargeboards, sidepods, underbody, and
the
> rear diffuser. They also feature aerodynamic appendages that direct the
> airflow. Such an extreme level of aerodynamic development means that an
F1
> car produces much more downforce than any other open-wheel formula; for
> example the Indycars produce downforce equal to their weight at 190 km/h
> (118 mph), while an F1 car achieves the same downforce:weight ratio of
1:1
> at 125 km/h (78 mph) to 130 km/h (81 mph), and at 190 km/h (118 mph) the
> ratio is roughly 2:1. Therefore, theoretically, F1 cars can drive upside
> down from 130 km/h (81 mph).
>
>
> Keeping it on topic, can you imagine how the Miata would drive with that
> kind of down force?
> You would obviously need a lot more power to drive your car that starts
to
> "weigh" well over 4000 pounds at highway speed.
> Cornering would be even more fun than ever! :-)
>
> Pat
>
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