I know their are other varibles but how many 10th of a second is equal to one car link difference in a 1/4 mile race?

I would just like to know if a car is faster by one second, how many car lengths would they be ahead in a 1/4 mile race?

Thanks,
Dean

 

It depends on the final speed of both cars.

 

Watch,

I understand that I have sene a rule of thumb approximation for 1 second equaling a certain number of cars as a rule of thumb.

Lets say car A runs 1/4 mile 13.5 at 105 and car B runs 14.0 at 98, how many car links would that be?

Dean

 

Yep, depends on the speeds of the car. But the rule of thumb is roughly 1 car length per 0.1 sec in the 1/4mi.

 

interesting

 

A car doing 100mph is traveling 146.66 ft per second or 14.66 ft every .1 seconds. However, it's a lot more complicated than that because both cars are accelerating at different rates and are at different velocities. From my limited drag racing experience, .1 seconds is about a car length or so.

 

Assuming this is the velocity at the 1/4 mi mark, calculate the velocity of the other car, and subtract the difference in distance per 0.1 sec.

 

When I raced a supercharged 5.0 at the track, He beat me by 2 car lengths. He finished with 13.2 at 109MPH, I finished 13.7 at 103MPH. I think it's different in every situation.

 

I remember when my nephew and I raced each other in his tricycles. He beat me by a second, but I was only a mere 5 feet from him. It does differ in every situation.

 

A car running 13.2@109 vs. 13.7@103, not accounting for reaction times, would be roughly a 73' spread.

Many people forget that reaction time affects the outcome.

As cars increase in velocity, the 0.100 second/distance changes naturally.

MPH-Distance @.10 of a second
80---11.74
90---13.20
100--14.67
110--16.14
120--17.60
130--19.07
140--20.54
150--22.01
160--23.47

Which is why a car running 14.0@100 vs a 15.0@90 car is really not that much ahead, but a car running 9.0@150 vs a 10.0@140 is slaughtered.