Aerodynamics

Aerodynamics is one of the most important aspects of a car when getting up to the two hundred mph range. It was only recently that cars have been able to get up to and even exceed two hundred miles an hour. This recent breakthrough in land speed is largely attributed to the aerodynamic friendly designs of today’s supercars. Aerodynamics also allows cars to corner very well at high speeds. In some cases cars have been known to actually handle better at reasonably high speeds because they are forced against the ground harder at these speeds, i.e. downforce.


http://pictures.topspeed.com/IMG/crop/200602/1996-ferrari-f50-gt-20_460x0w.jpg



Here is a diagram showing a very basic idea of how downforce is created.
Keep in mind that in reality there aremany more aspects taken into consideration when dealing with aerodynamic design.



Notice that we are concerned with the components of the resulting force in this diagram. Ideally we would like to increase downforce and decrease drag.

Know let us evaluate the equations for these forces:
Dragforce

Where C is the coefficient of drag, A is the projected area, rho is the density of the fluid, i.e. air, and V is velocity

Downforce

Where WS is wingspan, H is height of wing, AoA is angle of attach, C is coefficient of drag, rho is density of fluid, and V is velocity

Notice that these are essentially the same except that one is concerned with the angle of attach and one is concerned with the projected area.
Also notice that downforce is essentially the same thing as lift, just in the opposite direction. In very simplified terms, downforce is high pressure on top and low pressure on bottum. Lift is high pressure on bottum and low pressure on top.

Heres what happens when downforce turns into lift

hhttp://www.autocult.com.au/img/gallery/nickop187.jpg

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