Re: Dynosaurus Rx

[Bob Davis <bob@segNET.COM>]

>> 
>I understand what you are saying, however, Scott and I were debating
>whether one could show an advantage of AWD over RWD/FWD on dry
>pavement.  I say to do that on must have _one_ car that can be modified
>to be all three.  If you cannot do that then there is no valid
>comparison between them. 
>

I've been thinking a bit about this issue and have a question.

If an engineer designs a car that he knows (please spare me the pc flame)
will be a RWD car, does he make decisions about the design of the rest of
the car (engine placement, susp geometry, weight dist, etc.) based on that?
 How about FWD?  AWD?

I suspect that they do.  

This leads me to believe that a chasis optimized to use the advantages
inherent to a particular drive layout will perform best with that layout,
and not as well with another (conversion).
By extension, I think that it could be safely said that by using a chassis
designed to accommodate all drive types would be optimized for nothing, and
therefore wouldn't really prove much about any of the different drives
except that they like to have a chassis designed to work with them.  

The test would be useless.

A better test -- build cars with spec engines, brakes, and basic
componentry, but allow the designers to optimize the rest of it for the
drive line chosen.  That way you get to see what the drive type _can_ do,
not what it does when it's designed poorly. (if this sounds a little like a
touring car race series in Brittain, there's probable good reason for it --
except for the spec components.  AWD cleaned up)

I will not defend this position. 
(Huge waste of time.  Nobody ever wins.  I can't believe this one is still
alive -- isn't it about 6 months or a year old?)



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