Imagine you just got hired to develop the race car setup in a new racing team. They are inexperienced, but willing to do what it takes to win. Also, they got the cash to boost their performance, they just don’t know what to do with it, hence, they hired you.
On march 24, 2015, I got an email that would change my career as a motorsport engineer! It read:
“Dear Rodrigo
I saw your website and enjoyed your work a lot. I am a racing driver…
If you are a keen motorsport fan, or a Vehicle Dynamics enthusiast, you probably have heard of the use of simulation in racing. On the recent days, the word “simulation” has been more and more on the motorsport media, in all sorts of levels. But do you know how […]
Let’s say that you are a race engineer and your driver is having trouble to go around the slowest corners on the circuit. In a brief feedback after the first outing (a set of laps in a session) of the free practice session, the driver complains about excessive oversteer […]
Now that you already know the fundamentals of data acquisition and the basics of data acquisition hardware, let’s move on and start to look at what data traces will look like. To begin this series on analysis of data traces, it’s only fair to look at speed data first. Speed is a channel available […]
Have you ever heard of neutral steer, understeer and oversteer? You probably have heard these terms, and you might even know what they mean, but do you know how it happens or what a racing car’s suspension has to do with it? If your answer to the latter question […]
Now that you already know the fundamentals of motorsport data acquisition and why use it, let’s have a more in-depth look on the subject. In this post, I will talk about data acquisition system (DAS) hardware. This is the actual tool the engineer has to collect […]
Race car design is one of the most fascinating and yet one of the most complex aspects of the racing world. The design teams in the many motorsport categories are constantly developing new solutions with one single goal in mind: to make a car that, in combination […]
Race cars in general have a peculiar shape that distinguishes it from any road car on the planet. This shape might be different in each one of the wide range of motorsport categories around the world, but some aspects are still present, regardless of category […]
If you are a motorsport fan, you probably have seen the practice sessions during a race weekend. They generally start on Friday and precede qualifying sessions. During the practice time, an inattentive watcher would say that the cars are just going around the track […]