As everyone has said, all of this is very hard to do from first principles. Even looking up data (much beyond what you've already done) would probably be hard.
I'd try actually driving some cars to see how they react. Every car I've ever driven has a very noticeably nonlinear throttle response...
Corvettes have had single leaf springs for many years (transversely mounted). They're made out of some composite material, so they're actually much lighter than the equivalent multileaf metal spring.
You're the one who said the higher gears don't work at the strip. If I put in really sticky tires in the program, then higher gears do improve ET's. Another thing is that if the car is launched very softly -- just feather the clutch off idle -- then higher gears improve your times also (but...
I have a program which calculates 1/4 mile times etc. I looked up the 03 viper specs, found someone's dyno printout, and saw what it gave me. I obviously have to make some unknown tire and driver reaction assumptions, but the changes are what's important.
Baseline w/3.07:
0-60: 3.9
0-100: 8.6...
The characteristic angular frequency of a spring-mass system is sqrt(k/m), where k is the spring constant and m is the (sprung) mass. The quick and dirty answer to your question is therefore:
Favg=(momentum change)/(time change)=dp/dt
dt=2pi*sqrt(m/k)=0.3 s
dp=M*v=M*sqrt(2gh)=7000 kg m/s...
Are you saying that the temperature significantly affects the losses, or just that all the extra torque causes more gear friction (and therefore heat)? If its the first one, are diff coolers therefore useful for improving power even if not required for reliability?
Yes, a stationary sail will be accelerated. The Doppler shift I'm talking about is the incremental one from the velocity picked up just after an absorbtion.
Another way of looking at this is that all of a photon's momentum can be an absorbed by a massive object. Its energy, however, cannot all...
Greg,
I reread your post, and I guess I answered something you didn't ask :) Anyways, the photons do not have exactly the same frequency before and after. Reflection is an absorbtion/reemission process, so the the emitted photons will be Doppler shifted.
I think he's going senile. There's some odd statements in his argument.
He's first assuming that a mirror does not allow redshifts. That makes no sense.
Then he talks about an aborbing object ceasing to absorb energy once its heated up. That's not true. An object in thermal equilibrium emits...
Interesting idea, but I think the currents and coil sizes required would be prohibitive. It would require either massive currents and/or a lot of lever arm or hydraulic mechanisms.
And it would still need lubrication as EdDanzer stated above (same as manual transmission).
I think this is actually useful, but not for fuel economy. The top Mercedes are now being sold as luxury cars that are also speed demons. Gear ratios would usually be selected very differently for those two applications.
Lets look at the design requirements:
Shift and cruise at low rpm...