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jfengelyesterday at 7:32 PM5 repliesview on HN

That implies that air resistance is the overwhelming contributor at high speeds. Is that the case?


Replies

gpmyesterday at 7:39 PM

It's the majority, but overwhelming or not surprisingly appears to depend on car model, at least per some calculations someone on reddit ran [1].

I'd add though that rolling resistance tends to be higher, on average, in winter too. When there's often a bit of snow on the roads... Less so on high speed highways admittedly.

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/l2cq6b/comment/...

aucisson_masqueyesterday at 10:47 PM

Oh yes, by so much.

Even at 30kmph it's already the majority of the resistance and it scales exponentially with speed so you can imagine how much it matters.

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kalenxyesterday at 7:34 PM

Considering air resistance is proportional to the cube of the speed, it would be highly surprising to not be the case.

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baqyesterday at 8:05 PM

Define ‘high speeds’. There’s a reason race cars look like they do, to the point of having serious problems driving at speeds just a bit below highway speed limit.

Sarisyesterday at 7:36 PM

Yes it is.