From a strictly technical point of view, which form of racing is the most advanced???

Question

For me it's a toss-up, and a lot of you may disagree, between Top Fuel dragsters and Formula 1.

Top fuel because they are taking a basically 50-60 year old engine design and producing 8000 horsepower and moving cars to over 335 MPH in a mere 1320 feet.

Formula one, because the technology that goes in to producing one of these cars in incredible. 19,000 RPM engines, 7 speed sequential gearboxes, telemetry sensors on every moving part, and aerodynamics testing that rivals any aerospace company's.

Any opinions on any other forms of racing?

Answer 1

Racing with the clock. Setting world speed records. No vehicles are technically superior.

Answer 2

Top fuel.  I found this interesting.

A short list of Top Fuel dragster facts:

* The 500-inch Hemi makes more horsepower than the first 8 rows at Daytona.

* Under full throttle, a the engine consumes 1 1/2 gallons of

nitro per second, the same rate of fuel consumption as a fully loaded

747 but with 4 times the energy volume.

* The supercharger takes more power to drive then a stock hemi

makes.

* Top Fuel engines turn approximately 540 revolutions from light to light!

* Including the burnout, the engine must only survive 900 revolutions under load.

* that a fuel pump for an NHRA Top Fuel dragster and Funny Car delivers 65 gallons of fuel per minute, equivalent to eight bathroom showers running at the same time

* that the fuel-line pressure for NHRA Top Fuel dragsters and Funny Cars is between 400 and 500 pounds, about 20 times greater than the pressure on passenger-car fuel pumps

* that depending on size and angle, the large rear wing on an NHRA Top Fuel dragster develops between 4,000 and 8,000 pounds of downforce?

* Even with nearly 3000 CFM of air being rammed in by the

supercharger on overdrive, the fuel mixture is compressed into

nearly-solid form before ignition. Cylinders run on the verge of

hydraulic lock.

* Dual electronic magnetos apply 44 amps to each spark plug. This

is the output of an arc welder in each cylinder.

* At stoichiometric (exact) 1.7:1 air/fuel mixture (for nitro),

the flame front of nitromethane measures 7050 degrees F.

* Nitro methane burns yellow. The spectacular white flame seen

above the exhaust pipes at night is raw burning hydrogen, dissociated

from atmospheric water vapor by the searing exhaust gases.

* Spark plug electrodes are totally consumed during a pass. After

1/2 way, the engine is dieseling from compression-plus the glow of

exhaust valves at 1400 degrees F. The engine can only be shut down by cutting of its fuel flow.

* If spark momentarily fails early in the run, unburned nitro

builds up in those cylinders and then explodes with a force that can

blow cylinder heads off the block in pieces or blow the block in half.

* The engines twist the crank (torsionally) so far (20 degrees in

the big end of the track) that sometimes cam lobes are ground offset

from front to rear to re-phase the valve timing somewhere closer to

synchronization with the pistons.

* To exceed 300mph in 4.5 seconds dragsters must accelerate at an average of over 4G's. But in reaching 250 mph well before 1/2 track, launch acceleration is closer to 8G's.

* Drivers must shut off before the finish line, or even dual

parachutes will not stop the car.

* If all the equipment is paid off, the crew worked for free, and

for once NOTHING BLOWS UP, each run costs $1000.00 per second.

Bear in mind here that the engine behind all this Herculean output is a

modified offshoot of a common American big-block V-8

Answer 3

F1. For instance, the steering wheels cost £50,000 to produce because it has an onboard computer in it etc.

The wheel nuts also cost around £500. Titanium i think

Answer 4

i think its rally racing

Answer 5

top fuel and drag racing in general is an exercise in displacement, not many innovations in the nhra and ihra are going to be making it into the real world, they still use distributor caps for ignition and carburetors for aspiration, these things haven't been used in a production car for 20 years,

most other series are spec series where one car has been designed and tested and then sold to the teams, not a lot of innovation to be had there, but F1 and Le mans prototypes are the tops in my opinion both are built and designed by individual teams, with each team trying to figure out the answer to the question how do i beat  the other guy? both use advanced composites and alloys in construction case in point all f1 teams have figured out how to make a 2.4 liter engine produce 700+ horse power, that's a smaller engine than any car i have owned, for years diesel cars have been on the road. great gas mileage but they have always been slow and noisy beasts, yet Audi has figured out how to make one that is faster than the rest of the field and makes less noise that the tire hum, that's technology and innovation at its best

Answer 6

any race with Danica Patrick.

Answer 7

I agree F1 is the most advanced, but other series have a ton of advanced technology in them also. The field at Le Mans will be technologically impressive, to say the least, and off road racers are using Indycar technology to go faster. Top Fuel dragsters are amazingly impressive, but some of their technology is behind the times. I remember Don Garlits experiments with aerodynamic cars and none of them seemed to help much or else they'd still be around. I'd have to say the most advanced thing about a Top Fueler is the clutch management system. Pretty wild how they keep it all stuck to the race track most of the time with 8000 hp.

Answer 8

Without doubt Formula 1.  This is fairly easy to evaluate by seeing how much money is spent on developing the cars,  Formula 1 by far spends more on development than any other form of auto racing.  They also have the very best engineers and mechanics performing the development.

Answer 9

Wonder feels that Top Fuel dragsters and Formula 1, are comparable to Drag Racing and dressing up in Drag racing outfits.

Top fuel because they are taking a basically 50-60 year old engine design and producing 8000 horsepower and moving cars to over 335 MPH in a mere 1320 feet.

Formula one, because the technology that goes in to producing one of these cars in incredible. 19,000 RPM engines, 7 speed sequential gearboxes, telemetry sensors on every moving part, and aerodynamics testing that rivals any aerospace

And also dressing in Drag race clothes because that is so naughty.

Answer 10

Drag racing because theres so much to do in such a short length of time and track 1320 ft or 1/4 mile there is so much that can go wrong driver and car wise. So everything has to be just right.