Re: 4000 turbo conversion advice

[Todd Phenneger <phen9461@uidaho.edu>]

Damn Scott,
    Nice reply.  THanks.  One question.  On  the downforce thing, if you
stick the wing out back then doesn't that effectively ALSO change the Polar
moment of inertia?   ANd, if you take a 1000lb force wing at 100mph and put
it in back over rear axle it creates 1000lbs force.  Move it 3 feet back
from axle and it is more, say maybe 2,000lbs effective force..  BUT, you
also put the same wing 3-feet in front of front axle then do they both but
2,000lbs effective force?  I would think not as my *limited* physics tells
me this is impossible but I could be very wrong.  Seems to me the leverage
would counteract and both would still be 1,000lb effective force.
    BTW, I dont spose you now how the tunnels under a F1 car creat
downforce.  I understand the tunnel that widens to created a vacuum thing
but dont they also sometimes make bottom bend toward pavement to speed up
air.  While that speeds up molecules like on an airplane wing since they
have to go further, under a car wouldn't a vacuum be more effective.  Or is
that much higher drag so they go the bent/wing method.
Thanks
    Todd

Scott Fisher wrote:

> Polar moment of inertia.  If you've got a lot of weight waaay up front
> and waaay out back -- imagine you've tied a bunch of sandbags to your
> front and rear bumpers, just to visualize -- that's called a high polar
> moment of inertia.  It means the car is reluctant to make changes of
>
> go to aerodynamic aids.  The leverage trick, though, is why modern
> racing cars have the rear wings stuck out behind the car as far as the
> rules permit: this gives them a cantilevered effect allowing the
> designer to reduce the size of the wing (thereby reducing drag and
> increasing the available power) while using the leverage to increase
> rear-wheel downforce.  Stick better *and* go faster through the magic of
> science!