Traction control (long and sorta related to Software Dyno)

[Scott Knight]

Someone poked at it a few days ago here on the list, but in a different
way than I am thinking.  Since I grew up with very fast cars and street
racing, traction control has always been an idea that has intrigued me. 
I fully plan to make such a beast someday, but unfortunately don't
currently have either the time or the knowledge to even begin right
now.  That is why I am in full lurk mode on this list.  Popping out of
lurk mode to get a quick question answered and throw out my personal
idea.  These are just my ideas of fun projects and I am not throwing
them out to disagree with someone else's ideas of what defines a fast or
fun car.

There have been a few ideas thrown out about how to reduce power enough
to be an effective traction control, but I don't really care for the
implications of any of them for my own use.  FWIW, my own use means an
absurdly powered car on street tires...something that could spin them
above 100 mph.  It's one thing to have more power than you can use until
about 30 mph and have to cut back some, but entirely another matter to
be beyond the limit of traction well into a 1/4 mile run.

Let me preface this by stating that I am not a big fan of cutting
spark.  Experience tells me that it is tough on cam drives and main
bearings at the very least.  I also suspect in a conventional V8, the
distributor, oil pump drives and gears take unnecessary abuse.

Two applications come to mind when I am daydreaming: a street racer with
nitrous that is just meant to go fast for the joy of going fast (and
winning a little money to boot).  The other is a driver that would be
capable of running at Bonneville or the Silver State classic and doesn't
rely on nitrous for it's boogie (though there would probably be some on
board for special occasions).  Either way, both vehicles should be
capable of providing enough power to keep the tires spinning until they
are going very fast.

The street racer:

It would have quite a bit of natural power that needs to be attenuated,
but then once the tires catch up, needs to start feeding in the nitrous
without blowing off the tires (and not relying on timers like a
predictable racecar on a predictable track surface).  The reason for not
turbocharging is so that one could actually obtain competition.  Nobody
will race a car they don't know anything about.  Most street racers
think they know all about normally aspirated cars and always suspect the
other guy has nitrous anyway.  Bringing a turbo is just asking to be
ignored.  My thought here is a controllable throttlestop and an
infinitely progressive nitrous system.

The driven car:

It is a different beast and I suspect would almost assuredly be
turbocharged since I don't see a normally aspirated engine having the
manners and range required.  It has to be powerful enough to easily get
over 200 mph, but still have manners that my wife could live with. 
Whether or not it is possible, I still feel turbocharging is the best
bet.  This seems like a simpler one to control since all the power comes
from boost.  Without knowing that much about available wastegates, I can
only assume that there are controllable ones that will do whatever you
want as far as boost is concerned.

Am I all wet, or does it seem possible to do both of these projects with
the same effort?  The first one has at least 2 devices to control with a
little logic, where the second likely has one fewer and is strictly
feedback driven.  Are these even possibilities, or have I been wasting
so many free brainwaves on this?
-- 
Scott Knight  mailto:sknight at mich.com
http://www.mich.com/~sknight IRC:SS396man
'95 Black Impala SS
'94 Ducati 900SS CR