NASCAR seems to think that their switch to EFI has not gotten the warranted level of attention. That’s not us making something up. Here’s proof in the first line of a story that the NASCAR Wire Service put out the other day, “Simply put, NASCAR’s move to electronic fuel injection hasn’t gotten the press it deserves.” Outside of that being one of the funniest things we have ever read, it is also one of the most insane. This topic has been discussed and debated to death fifty times over since the announcement was made. If you remember correctly, when the announcement was made the reasoning from NASCAR brass was to make the sport more “green” and improve fuel economy. Apparently that plan has changed slightly as the wire service story, at one point reads confusingly, “Though there has been much discussion of fuel economy with the switch to EFI, the consensus is that savings will be negligible. Nevertheless, EFI will allow tuners to achieve a higher level of efficiency in their fuel-saving measures.” So if the fuel economy savings will be “negligible”, what the hell difference does the tuners’ ability to, “achieve a higher level of efficiency in their fuel-saving measures,” matter?
Outside of those conflicting and confusing statements, there are a few other gems in this piece of propaganda informative NASCAR journalism. In talking about McLaren, the company providing the ECUs for the cars, we’re led to believe that there isn’t a racing series on Earth that is tougher on cars than NASCAR. Again, we’re not exaggerating. Here’s the text from the story, “Though McLaren has a history in Formula One and other forms of racing, the company had never dealt with a NASCAR engine, which Darby characterized as ‘the biggest, most bad-ass thing in motorsports, other than drag racing.’ McLaren has never had a competition failure with one of its ECUs, but neither has the company dealt with a racing series that puts as much stress on its engines.” Yeah, those 20,000 RPM F1 cars ain’t got shit on a 9,000 RPM OHV V8 motor.
There is some good info in this piece regarding how the teams will be able to access data, share data, and how some will be forcibly shared between all the teams to get, as the piece says, “the little guys up to speed quicker.” NASCAR horsepower tuning Communism! Who’d a thunk it?!
We’re certainly not opposed to the swap to EFI in NASCAR racing, and we understand that the majority of NASCAR fans probably don’t even change their own oil any more so that’s why stuff like this needs to be published and we’re having some fun with the sweeping statements made in this story. It is interesting to see how the economy aspect of the switch was so heartily dismissed by NASCAR itself , though.
The Daytona 500 is mandatory gearhead television even if you aren’t much of a NASCAR fan. The race is one of the integral pieces of the American racing landscape and makes for a good excuse to slurp a couple of frosties with friends on a February weekend. We may even swap our naturally aspirated beer helmet for an injected unit. You know, for efficiency’s sake.
Link: The NASCAR EFI Swap for Dummies….real dummies
I remember reading a very long and intense article written comparing NASCAR and F1 engines. The article compared the internal forces acting on the rotating assemblies of the respective engines. As it turns out, the extra stroke of the NASCAR engine, coupled with the restriction on aluminum/titanium rods and cranks, actually exerts much higher g-forces on the piston at TDC and BDC. Also, the piston speed in feet/second is actually a little higher in a Cup engine at 9500 rpm than in a F1 motor at 18-19,000 rpm.
It’s still amazing that Cup guys were turning these kinds of HP and rpm’s just a few years ago, with engines derived from designs that originated in the 50’s, and doing it without exotic materials.
Found the article: http://www.epi-eng.com/piston_engine_technology/comparison_of_cup_to_f1.htm
Look all this Green and EFI BS wont help at all. Most gear heads arent concerned about going “green” so thats not going to bring in more viewers and in turn more money. Until they go back to there roots of Manufacturer against Manufacturer and have them be true Stock Cars again Nascar will continue to lose viewers. While in the 60’s the cars where modified they where still bodied and framed stock production cars and the engines where still production engines (highly modified of course). This will bring about a vast viewership crowd, take away the 350ci limit, push it back up to 7.0 or even bigger and you will have an excitement for the sport not seen in years
I do agree completely that nothing other than top fuel racing beats the crap out of engines like NASCAR’s Cup Series. RPM has nothing to do with it–the piston speed and inertia in the bottom end of these engines is absolutely insane compared to the average F1 car.
NASCAR engine builders have brought an 80 year old design with antiquated materials to the absolute ragged edge, as opposed to F1 engine builders, which have all the newest technology, techniques, materials and build quality to work with. Building a 350 cubic inch V8 to make 900 horsepower and rev over 9000 rpm, within the rules laid out, is incredibly difficult.
Hell, back before the rule requiring one engine be used the entire weekend, Penske and Hendrick were both pushing 10,000 rpm and 950 horsepower in their qualifying engines.
I stopped watching / supporting NASCAR after Dale Earnhardt Sr. passed away and NASCAR was blaming Bill Simpson on the seatbelts he wore / installed. Nowadays, NASCAR is about a bunch of corporate spokesmen/women that know how to turn left.
zzzzzzzzzzzzz
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