Dean Snaith said:
an accurate reading for wind speed and also a display showing the amount of drag in grams.
Could someone please explain what this means and how I can use the figures?
Dean are you a non-science major who's been thrust into this program unprepared?
That's okay it has happened to me .
Following is so very elementary it is either just what you need, or a farce.
If the latter please do not take offense - it's just a shot in the dark.
You mentioned "figures"
can you post one, and give us a little more about your background?
I looked up 'F1 in schools' , looks like a great science program
but school administrations do not always match assignment to background.
Dont take following as "talking down"
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Okay, maybe this is the snag
engineers love to see everything on a graph, not a spreadsheet
Basics of a graph:
It shows the interrelationship between two things that you measure , those two things are called your "variables"
To make a graph one establishes two scales one horizontal and one vertical
like this
Horizontal scale is named the "abscissa"
vertical scale is named "ordinate"
but hardly anyone calls them that
we say horizontal and vertical because that's more mnemonic, or often X for horizontal and Y for vertical.
and where they intersect is called "origin" or sometimes "zero, zero"
To gather data for his graph
one controls one of his variables , observes and writes down how the other behaves.
He gets a series of paired values for his two variables.
For each pair of values he puts a dot on his graph.
it is traditional to use horizontal for the controlled variable
and vertical for the observed variable
so one chooses scales for horizontal and vertical that encompass all his numbers
On the numberless graph here
horizontal is controlled variable, speed
vertical is observed variable drag
probably for a seaplane taking off from water -
you can see drag first increase with speed than decrease as the hull transitions from displacement to planing .
(Ever water ski? If so you've
felt that transition...)
and as hull leaves the water there's no more water drag .So you'll measure drag at increasing speed and graph the results
kid with lowest drag curve wins.
Does your F1 apparatus also measure vertical force?
Good multi-axis wind tunnels go back to Wright Brothers
if you're near Dayton Ohio go see theirs at Air Force Museum.