[DOF_power]

CUP: Stockcar Engineering Magazine is Launched

Famed Racecar Engineering Magazine has launched a new publication dedicated solely to the advanced state of NASCAR technology. Stockar Engineering debuted this month as a free insert in Racecar, with plans to publish new issues of Stockcar every 2-3 months.

Speaking with the man behind Stockcar, Deputy Editor Sam Collins, SPEEDtv.com asked how a magazine known for Formula One and Le Mans technology decided to create the first magazine dedicated to the growing field of NASCAR-related developments.

"It came from Belgium! I’ve started racing a Super Late Model Toyota Camry there and realized that there was scope for me to use some high tech parts on it, so I decided to find out what the Cup teams were up to. It turns out a lot of European F1-style technology is being used in NASCAR. Data logging, wind tunnels, CFD, thermal imaging, and loads of stuff is being used in really clever ways. It wasn't long ago when

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people regarded F1 and NASCAR as polar opposites in terms of knowledge and technology, but after they read Stockcar, I think that everyone will find something of interest in it.

It really is time to stop calling Stock Cars old fashioned and low tech."

Issue number one of Stockcar features three weeks of team and factory visits by Collins. "The first issue is a tour of the cutting edge of cup technology, looking at Aerodynamic development with the CoT, with comments from some of the top teams including Hendrick and Penske. We look into how advanced technology from Europe is boosting engine performance in Cup (did you know Hendrick makes inlet manifolds in clear plastic then uses high speed photography to visualize what is going on inside - that’s right – running a Cup engine with a plastic inlet!) We look at how data logging is banned in NASCAR, but every team uses it! What’s going on? Pi Research explains.

Also, AP racing has introduced a clever new brake caliper for intermediate tracks, and how they developed it is fascinating. And understanding tires is the most difficult thing in NASCAR, yet teams go to great lengths to understand these rubber mysteries. We delve into all of these topics and try to peel back some of the most current tools and methods Cup teams use to win races"

While Racecar and Stockar are published in England, both are available in the US. Stockcar can also be had for free by signing up online. "You can get it anywhere – Barnes and Noble is our main outlet. Currently, its free too!

Excerpts from issue number one:

"Tractors," he said. "Just a bunch of tractors, and anyway they only race for the last 10 laps." These words were spoken to me by the editor of a leading British motorsport publication when the subject of NASCAR arose over lunch at Silverstone. "I mean, they can't even turn right properly – what possible interest can there be for Racecar Engineering?" he argued.

Admittedly, at first glance, compared to 2008 Ferrari F1 machine, a stock car does look rather old-fashioned. Nevertheless there’s rather a lot of interest in NASCAR, and oval racing in North America is awash with advanced technology, particularly in NASCAR's Sprint Cup series. Even with the introduction of the still controversial Car of Tomorrow, the rise of technology in the world

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of the good ol' boy continues unabated. Indeed, one leading Formula 1 engineer recently exclaimed "they have more technical freedom in NASCAR than I do in F1!" And he wasn't joking. While many of those who have been raised on a diet of European road course racing continue to regard stock cars with disdain, more and more followers are realizing that oval racing represents a serious challenge.

Many people on both sides of the Atlantic are unaware of just how high tech the top classes of NASCAR have become. Aerodynamics and electronics are obvious areas where new technology is evident, but in engines, transmission and even brakes, new ways of working are beginning to appear.

Many visitors to the race shop of Hendrick Motorsport in North Carolina are surprised to find a composites shop hard at work, supplying carbon fiber components to a number of teams. “We do bracketry, air cleaner housings, small components like that, and of course our seats,” explained a team member. Hendrick makes seats for its drivers. “We have a vested interest in keeping our drivers healthy, and that was really the main emphasis behind our composites program – the safety aspect,” said a spokesman. But composite seats are just about all the teams can use, as major components are still largely made from metal, as decreed by the regulations. Consequently, it is not common knowledge that Hendrick has a composites capability outside of stock car racing.

Race within the race

The same team has developed its own multibody dynamic simulation in-house to circumvent a restriction on testing at the tracks visited by the Sprint Cup. “Simulation has been around for quite some time, but in Cup racing it is becoming increasingly widespread,” explained Rex Stump, Hendrick’s top chassis engineer. “It will soon come to the point where simulation is the basis for everything, like it is in F1. It will be total simulation.” Getting accurate simulation, however, relies on getting accurate data in the first place and that’s something the teams cannot do due, once again, to the testing restrictions. This problem is most acute for those who operate the many seven-post rigs used in NASCAR.

“It’s pretty much the same with any simulation program, there’s always going to be a limitation, like here we’re not applying engine torque and braking torque,” said Hendrick engineer Darian Grubb. “We know we are not picking up the lateral forces so we have to work out how to account for that in our simulations, to try to get as close as we can. At the end of the day it’s still

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down to the crew chief’s gut feel and the drivers’ feedback of how it’s going at the weekend. Its a pretty hefty task for all the engineers to keep up with all the technology we are pumping at them – we have so many shock graphs, bump-stop graphs and seven-post data. It’s basically information overload.”

But not all that data is based on the best sources, as Hendrick chassis engineer Jon Plyler pointed out. “A lot of the data we are using comes from older data, and we actually have to transfer the drive files and things we created with the old car and try to transfer it to the CoT – the loads, the load profiles, track profile. Then you also have tracks that get resurfaced and change their characteristics. We have to try to simulate but a lot of the time we are not going to have the best data. We have to make the best of what we have. Some teams have tried unlikely methods to get the best data they can about the courses they race on. The big key to what’s out there is the track surface itself, but to laser-scan a track to get that level of detail is cost prohibitive. Then if they resurface the track or the track changes over time, that data is useless.”

Techniques trickle-down

Formula 1 techniques are not just limited to car development. The very methods of working have also been studied by some teams. “Our teams work well with us,” said Darian Grubb. “Any time we go testing, the car comes directly back to the seven-post rig and the guys are good about not touching the car at all. They load it, bring it back and unload it and we do the track profiling. A few years ago we couldn't do that as we didn't have a rig in house so a lot of times we wouldn't have the exact car that logged the data. Now, any time a test car hits the racetrack it comes directly to us, so we get the best drive file we can.”

“We do a good job of managing engineering resources,” said one crew chief. “Our design department, for example,

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is very small compared to a Formula 1 team. I went to Europe last winter to look at the way they work and the differences are amazing. The design group we have works on projects that encompass all four teams and even with our nationwide series team the workload is spread and we have the freedom to do what we want to do. In F1 everyone works in a little niche.”

Much of this method may be due to the smaller budgets. Even the largest Cup teams only operate on around a quarter of the budget of a midfield Grand Prix team. But as the budgets increase, so does the technology, and you’ll hear more and more European accents in Mooresville these days...

[thunderfoot]

Where can I find this magazine? Is it on the book store shelf?