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the Car?
The Driver and Car Handling - accelerating,
(Introduction to the article in the Technical
braking and cornering.
Pages.)
From a control point of view, cornering is the
most demanding and interesting for analysis.
A new perspective.
Dale Thompson
Racing Car Technology
www.racing-car-technology.com.au
info@racing-car-technology.com.au
Note: In vehicle dynamics terminology, cornering or turning
of the vehicle is referred to as yaw or yawing of the
vehicle.
For more details see our w
CofG
Vehicle
C/L
Inst. Dir.
Travel
Vehicle
path
Vehicle
C/L
CofG
R
Vehicle path, Inst. Dir. Of
Travel, turn radius, R all the
same as previous diagram.
But now the lateral force
acting on the tyres forces
slip angles, , front and
rear. The vehicle rotates in
the direction of the turn.
The car is now pointing
into the corner.
Inst. Dir.
Travel
Vehicle
path
The neutral vehicle
maintains the
intended path
Instantaneous Turn
Centre
For more details see our w
Vehicle
C/L
CofG
Inst. Dir.
Travel
Intended
Vehicle Path
Oversteer
Vehicle Path
Vehicle
C/L
CofG
Understeer
Vehicle Path
Inst. Dir.
Travel
Instantaneous Turn
Centre
For more details see our w
Intended
Vehicle
path
Attitude Angle
Attitude angle, the angle between vehicle centre line and direction of travel, is
also known as float angle, body slip angle, beta angle. It is a function of
the front and rear slip angles, as shown in previous diagrams.
The attitude angle varies at different points along the centre line of the car. For
our purposes, we consider it at the centre of gravity. In the next slide we
demonstrate how unbalanced lateral forces at the front and rear tyres will cause a
change in attitude angle, and thus be an instant indicator to the driver of the
understeer/oversteer balance of the car.
Balanced, or unbalanced
lateral forces at the
tyres
Moments around the centre of
b
CG
Front
Attitude Angle
FR
FF
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The article further explores the notion of the attitude angle being the
primary source of feedback to the driver. The driver can feel the
change in attitude of the car, over and above the expected attitude
angle generated by the vehicle when in neutral steer. The driver is
extremely sensitive to the car balance, but largely unaware of
overall grip. But give him/her a little extra grip and he will use it and
go faster, while reporting the car unchanged.
Although a very intuitive concept for drivers, it remains largely
ignored by mainstream suspension tuners and race engineers. This
may be because of the difficulty of constructing a reasonable, easy
to understand model. By taking a new perspective on understeer
and oversteer, as per the diagrams in this intro, we offer a model
that can predict and explain the motion of the car.
To get the full article, please subscribe on the front page of our web
site. Or contact me direct about subscribing without using Paypal, if
you prefer. info@racing-car-technology.com.au
For more details see our w
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