suvh8r

I would imagine so, as there is more weight swinging around back there. The tires can only hold a cornering force so long before grip gives out. Increasing the weight in the rear means more force that the tires have to deal with meaning less grip.

mvf4s

go for a run and carry a 25lb dumbell and tell us how it goes.

Ckcrigger

More weight in front, understeer.
More weight in back, oversteer.
Remember, you're changing the weight distribution of the car.
Take the extreme example of a tractor-trailer without the trailer.
You won't be able to swing the back out without superhuman effort.

More weight in each corner, harder to change direction... more rotational inertia as mentioned before.
Think, is it easier to take a long heavy bar and swing it side to side vs a light
one? No.

More weight high (like on the roof) will make the car lean more during cornering.

The best place for weight is in the gym.

But if you had to add weight to a 50:50 balanced car, you'd put it in the dead center both front to back and side to side. And as low to the ground as possible.

If you really want to prove this to yourself, look up the SCCA (sports car club of america). The winners of each race get penalized weight to make the next race more competitive. Where do they put the weight? Aha!

s2kpdx01

adding weight will not always make your car slower. If you add gasoline (weight) your car will be faster then another car, that runs on gasonline, that doesn't have any.

OR

If you added weight to the car, but you had a Mr. Fusion and he turned that extra weight into energy (E=MC^2). You could turn that excess mass into enough energy to rocket your car through a worm tunnel and end up at the end of the race before the other turd even started.

so......
in conclusion, my answer is dumb just like this thread.

under-rated

You took your car to the track didn't you?

Rotational mass, esp large diameter wheels would have the biggest impact on acceleration!

Tedow

Upon further reflection, I think Payne may be right...partially. It may not be as simple as my first statement. With more weight on the rear tires, they will get better traction. However, the increased mass at the back of the car will also give it more inertia. So how about this statement: More weight in the back of the car gives improved grip during steady-state turns, producing understeer...but during transitions in direction, the additional inertia of the back of the car makes it more prone to spinning. Does that sound reasonable? Where's a real race-driver when you need 'em...

ruexp67

Adding weight is NOT always bad because it CAN turn itself into something useful. Virtually every race car has some sort of wing on it to add downforce. Another way to add downforce is to add more gravitational pull to the same spot.

Logically if you did not have a wing, but added weight to the trunk it would have a similar effect. It would add traction. The reason they do not just add weight to race cars is that they HAVE plenty of traction down low, it's at the higher speeds that they need more. A wing will give them less traction at slow speed (where they have enough) and add weight gradually as speed increases (and traction decreases.) Keep in mind that racing slicks, drag radials, and other racing specific tires offer more grip than the standard tires. So if you added more traction you could theoretically get more performance.

However, in any car, speed has a lot to do with the power to weight ratio. This is why racers try to keep their cars light.

As mentioned above SCCA racers place the penalty weight in the center of the car down low. This keeps the handling characteristics consistance from race to race. However, for the general novice I would reccomend (if you have to add weight) to add it over the rear wheels to improve traction. Now, more weight in the trunk would get you more traction and this could actually lead to understeer as the rear wheels bite BETTER than before even with the additional mass. However, increasing the weight in the trunk would lead to less and less advantage in traction and lead to oversteer. I have no idea what the break-even point in an S2000 is.

Slithr

Just a note. A wing is better than more weight for traction because the wing adds very little inertia compared with the amount of downforce. However, you do pay a drag penalty. If weight were better, you wouldn't see any wings on F1 cars.

BlueS2000Boy

thanks for the info guys....

nodisguise

[QUOTE=ruexp67,Aug 20 2004, 06:55 AM]Adding weight is NOT always bad because it CAN turn itself into something useful.