IRL and Indy Lights
brsw...@indiana.edu
>How do the Indy Lights cars stack up to the IRL cars in terms of
>horsepower, top speed, etc. I know they are very different, but would
>like to know the botton line. Not HOW they are powered, but how they
>would compare. Come on engineers..this one is for you! Thanks.
An IRL car would dust an IndyLights car. Since we can only use ovals for
comparison, as we don't know how the IRL does on a road course, we can use
these numbers. On ovals, IndyLights runs about 83% of CART's speed.
Similarly, on a good day, and especially with the Hanford device holding
the CART car back, an IRL can hit maybe 93-95% of CART's performance,
maybe more. Does anyone think that the IRL would have any difficulties
hitting 225 at Michigan? They could likely do every bit of that. Would
they kill each other? Of course, but they'd go out with a bang, and they'd
get fairly close to the Hanforded 233 Fernandez ran.
Perhaps this counts as a legitimate comparison: Loudon is a 1.058 mile
oval with 12 degrees of banking. Milwaukee is a 1 mile oval with 2.5
degrees of banking. At Loudon, the 3,4, and 5 qualifiers all had 159 laps.
At Milwaukee, Derek Higgins had the best lap of the race with a 147. Do
the extra 10 degrees of banking squeeze out an extra 12 mph? I say not.
How about at Charlotte? The IRL guys were busting off laps in the mid
220's, while at Michigan, the IndyLights guys could only manage low 190's.
I'd say on short ovals, or any time acceleration is needed, an IndyLights
car closes the gap, and maybe even starts to surpass the IRL car.
These are just oval comparisions, so the power-to-weight ratio isn't much
of a factor. I have read on this group that an IRL car is the heaviest of
all formula cars, so this weight works to its disadvantage anytime the IRL
car needs to climb up and down in the speed range. On road courses, the
IndyLights guys seem to approach 90% of CART's lap speeds, which is
impressive, and their high power-to-weight ratio would probably let them
be able to blow an IRL off a road course.
On ovals, then, the IRL wins easily. On a road course, it's either a draw
or the IndyLights guys win.
jtees4
Paul Winalski
IRL cars have more power and better aerodynamics than Indy
Lights cars. As a comparison: the IRL gets speeds in
the 160s-170s at NHIS. The Indy Lights, when they raced
there, had qualifying speeds in the mid-150s.
--PSW