Foxxrocket

It's common knowladge that dark colors absorb heat from light rays, and light colors repel it. But I've never given it any thought to how much, or little it effects to motor temperature under the body. Has anyone ever tried doing this to see how much the temps vary from shell to sell with the same car? And is they a change, no matter how small?

seaball

iTrader: (9)

i think the effective heat transfer from conduction and convection will be magnitudes above what heat energy is removed by radiation. that said, i don't believe you could hold enough of the variables constant to ever determine an answer here. for instance, the ability of humid air to pull heat away versus dry air is probably much more detectable than that which you speak of. especially if you are using a fan.

in short, i don't think it can be done reliably by anyone reading this message board.

sportpak

iTrader: (26)

What on Earth would lead you to that conclusion??

a_main_attendee

iTrader: (2)

+1

Worth even considering? nope, i wouldn't think so.

TimV

iTrader: (49)

Shouldn't make a difference. Colors affect heat absorption from light rays, not from radiant heat. Since the motor emits radient heat, not light rays, the body color should have no effect on the temperature.

But all in all, there are way too many variables to effectively test this. I know I won't be losing any sleep over it.

flatspunout

iTrader: (38)

Heh, wait til SystemTheory gets ahold of this thread

-rocky b

reenmachine

iTrader: (26)

Pshaw. Back when I worked at JPL I was involved in a LOT of testing like this. I ran tests in tightly-controlled environments in thermal-vac chambers up to full-size spacecraft level. Send me about $500k and I can have the answer for you.








Either that, or you will never see or hear from me again.

Trips

iTrader: (16)

Doesn't anyone gear for lap times anymore? On race day i want to put in the most laps, not come off as close as possible to some magic number on a temp gun.

To answer the original question here... I doubt body color would matter... while it will be a little warmer under a dark body than a light one with the car at rest, our cars have so much airflow under the bodies that it would make little or no difference over the course of a race. Once the car is moving, body color should be irrelevant.