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Hey guys, brand new to this sight. I'm an engineering student who participates in FSAE. My team is teaching me some great stuff about designing a car from the ground up but I was hoping to find some more information on vehicle design/dynamics to continue my education on my own. However I'm finding it difficult to find the kind of information I'm looking for. Do you guys have any good books you've read and would recommend for me?
I don't hang out there but the FSAE forums must have book lists. Anyway, in my opinion, start with the Carroll Smith books. If you want to go into the more eye glazing details of Vehicle Dynamics then Milliken and Milliken RCVD is probably the best of the heavyweight books in general. I would only bother with that if you are in on the tire testing syndicate (or you test our own), otherwise any extra fidelity in the analysis of the kinematics etc will be swamped by the uncertainity in your tires. Did I mention that 70% of the steering and handling of a car is in the tires?
I don't know of any good general books on vehicle design as an overall process, but then I've never looked. If it doesn't use a top down approach and a V (cascade requirements) then it is probably not up with the modern way of doing things, which has been around since WW1.
You need to balance the understanding with the doing as they are activities at opposite ends of the spectrum as a student. As you gain experience, they slowly come closer together (i.e. you actually understand what you are making).
The unfortunate fact is that as a student its impossible to build a car AND understand it from first principles in the time you have. You need to compromise on the search for knowledge in order to get the car done. At the same time, sometimes it pays to compromise on the build time to better understand certain theories. Where you draw this line is the great question.
At one end of the spectrum, there is the book by Pashley (the link from Mr Facts). This book is great if you want to build a car. Very practical, and almost a step by step guide to building an FSAE car. However, in terms of the vehicle performance/vehicle dynamics point of view you won't learn anything from that book at all. In fact the suspension geometry is generated by a blind application of "rules of thumb" which have worked in the past and the rest of the car is basically done the same. You will build a working car using the knowledge in this book, but you won't learn anything about performance/vehicle dynamics at all and you will probably develop some bad habits in terms of part/system development. Its absolutely not an engineers book.
At the other end of the spectrum, there is Milliken/Pacejka. Extremely theoretical, and with an (almost) genuine first principles approach to vehicle dynamics and suspension. But if you start as a student with only this book as a guide to building a car you will never end up with a car because by the time you have read and understood everything on tyres, steady state stability and control, transient stability and control etc it will be mid year and there will be no time to design the car. Perhaps you will have the perfect design, but you can't race a CAD model.
In the middle of the spectrum there is Carrol Smith's set which are a decent mix of theory and practical, but there are a few academic mistakes in there and a bit of handwaving. But at least you might have half a chance of putting a car together and explaining it if you follow his way of thinking.
I personally went down the Milliken/Pacejka route - but I do have all the other books mentioned. Depends what you want at the end a car or a good knowledge of vehicle dynamics...
