We will begin this course by laying a foundation of the basic concepts in racing cars. The performance of a racing car depends on its layout. In order to ensure that the layout design delivers good performance, the following steps must be executed

• Identify important design objectives for a successful racing car

• Compute loads on a car during operating conditions like

• Acceleration

• Braking

• Cornering

• Study how these loads influence the aerodynamic forces acting on the car

For optimum performance, we must be able to understand the objectives of suspension systems. In this session, we will focus on

• Providing secure locations for suspension attachment to chassis, which can endure road loads and aerodynamic loads

• Designing a double wishbone suspension and understand how geometry changes affect vehicle control

• Using a simple graph sheets or software packages to tune suspension properties for parts like toe and camber

• Selecting suitable structural members by learning to calculate loads on suspension members

• Learning to control pitching of a car using suspension links, anti-squat and anti-dive controls

The primary purpose of a spring and damper in a race car is to optimize contact between the tire and road. In this session we will focus on these parts to understand the dynamic behavior of racing cars by

• Understanding springs, dampers arrangement on racing cars

• Designing spring length and stiffness

• Understanding the reasoning behind choosing a spring stiffness and spring length

• Making simple excel tools to understand primary ride behavior

• Understanding basic types of racing dampers

• Designing an anti-roll system

Understanding vehicle stability is important to know the dynamics of a car. In this module, we will

• Learn about the factors that influence understeer or oversteer like tire slip angle and body slip angle etc

• Estimate the values of understeer/oversteer or neutral steer a race car must have

• Learn about the significance of rolling resistance and camber thrust

• Study the importance of slip ratio during acceleration and braking

• Explore topics such as tire testing for the tire mathematical model: Pacejka tyre model

• Study about the influence of lateral load transfer/suspension roll stiffness on tire performance

• Estimate actual amount of jacking during cornering

In this module, we will focus on learning about the components involved in the front wheel assembly and how they are packaged. We will

• Study about the importance of minimizing the unsprung mass

• Understand racing car steering systems and how to avoid problems

• Evaluate loads on wheel upright and facilitate effective cornering

• Understand steering geometry and which geometry improves cornering performance

• Learn how the anti-Ackerman geometry can help peak cornering performance

In this session, we will learn about the various components involved in rear wheel assembly and understand the relationship between power and torque. We will then learn how they influence the optimum gear ratios for racing. Then we will move onto investigating different types of differentials and how they influence handling behavior. Finally, we will learn how to set the length of the fifth link to set bump steer

In this session, we will understand the elements of a braking system and key objectives in brake system design. We will also study the importance of brake balance and how it is achieved. Then we will evaluate loads on the brake pedal and its assembly.

In this module, we will learn to be covering topics that will make us familiar with the chassis structure. Some of the important modules we will learn about include

• Design objectives of a racing car structure

• Different types of structures like: space-frame, monoque and stressed skin

• Loads on the chassis structure

• Analysis techniques for the frame

• Passive safety structures

For an engineer, it is important to understand how to prepare a new car for testing. CAE and testing go hand-in-hand, and so it is important to test the vehicle and have a correlated CAE model. In this final session, we will learn

• How to setup suspension geometry, including ride height, corner weights, camber and toe

• The benefits of a data logging system

• How to set dampers on track