Perhaps Byron Short has the results of the "Grape Latexing" thread he could
send you. Lots of geeky stuff, I was lost about half way thru.
I recall the conclusion was to have a narrow car and be close to the cones.
Basically, buy a Miata and practice.
You know you've been on Team.Net too long when you remember Grape Latexing,
Lipra Loof or David Stamm.
I think Sipe might actually be Stamm :-)
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>From: Craig Blome <cblome@yahoo.com>
>To: autox@autox.team.net
>Subject: Question: Physics of Slaloms
>Date: Fri, Oct 15, 1999, 12:38 PM
>
> Hey all,
>
> I've been trying to figure something out about slaloms
> and getting myself confused. All of the stuff on
> course design I've seen (e.g. RHJ's notes) treat a
> car's path though a slalom as a series of semicircular
> arcs connected together, presumably with the car
> traveling at a constant speed.
>
> Problem is this: At the junctions between arcs, the
> car would have to have an instantaneous change in
> lateral acceleration from full-left to full-right in
> order to make this work. That obviously isn't
> possible. The only way to get smooth changes in
> lateral acceleration would be to have the car take a
> sinusoidal path through the slalom, which looks a bit
> different. Is this a better model of the car's path?
>
> Reason I'm asking is, I'm attempting to work out a
> physical explanation for whether a narrow car is
> faster through a slalom than a wide one. I know
> empirically that tends to be true, but I'm thinking it
> might not be solely due to the smaller side-to-side
> distance traveled. I tried using the semicircle
> assumption and the math got WAY ugly.
>
> Anyway, TIA for any help or references y'all can give
> me.
>
> Craig "yeah, I KNOW I should get out more" Blome
>
>
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