Expansive R&D Center home to stock car's future

• Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

Editor's Note: The following is the second of a five-part series featuring the NASCAR Research and Development Center in Concord, N.C. Part 2 takes you on a virtual tour of the facility.

It's a nondescript concrete building in the middle of an industrial park, located across the street from the entrance to the Concord Regional Airport, about a well-struck 3-wood away from Jack Roush's headquarters. Because it sits up on a slight ridge, it's easy to miss from Derita Road, if you aren't paying attention to the NASCAR logo on the exterior.

From the outside, NASCAR's Research and Development Center looks just like any other office building. But the difference is readily apparent once you step through the doors to the reception area.

Managing director Mike Fisher recently took me on a tour to show off current and ongoing projects at the $10 million, 61,000-square-foot facility that opened in January of 2003. It's a combination machine shop, warehouse and laboratory. And it's where the future of stock-car racing is being formulated every day.

The building houses offices for NASCAR personnel, including directors of all three national series. But the real interesting stuff starts with an expansive gymnasium-like area that at first glance, looks like a large automobile showroom. That's because, lined up on either side, are cars and trucks -- brand-new models from the factory, lined up side-by-side with their Sprint Cup, Nationwide Series and Craftsman Truck racing counterparts: Chevrolets, Dodges, Fords and Toyotas.

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On the left is the street version of the Ford F-150. To the right sits the race model.

It's easy to see where some of the similarities lie, and in other cases, how different the street version compares to the one that hits the track on race weekends, particularly when it comes to the pickups, which are taller and bulkier than their NASCAR counterparts. Fisher says all of the templates used by NASCAR officials for inspection are based on the cars in this room.

Behind a large glass window to the right is something that looks like the storage room of a local auto parts store. The metal racks are filled wall to wall with everything from manifolds to shock absorbers, each with an identification tag. It's NASCAR's version of the National Institute of Standards and Technology: the approved parts room. Every part behind that glass has been approved for use -- and painstakingly measured for size, volume and weight.

So if there's a discrepancy with a similar part that fails initial inspection at the track, NASCAR officials can bring the offending piece to Concord and compare it with the one in the approved parts room. If it doesn't pass muster, there's a good chance it will end up in the area for confiscated parts. In addition, NASCAR has an area set aside for parts that are pending approval.

Manufacturers must get approval of any design change, and this is the place where those modifications are analyzed and approved or rejected.

Through another set of doors toward the back of the facility is the chassis certification area. It's the high-tech, big-brother version of your local repair shop, only you won't get your oil changed in 10 minutes or less.

There are two large metal plates embedded in the concrete floor that serve as the platform for the portable coordinate measurement machine, which checks each chassis for metal thickness and analyzes each chassis to make sure it is within correct parameters. Fisher says the machine, which makes up to 220 measurements, is accurate to within one-ten-thousandths of an inch.

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Managing director Mike Fisher, far right, explains the R&D Center's chassis certification system.

Each chassis is given a unique serial number and outfitted with 10 small radio frequency identification chips. And a record of the inspection is saved to use for future comparison. In addition to new chassis, cars involved in accidents must be re-certified to make sure that chassis continues to meet standards.

More than 2,000 chassis have been certified or re-certified since the end of the 2006 season, all at no expense to the teams, with a 90 percent success rate. On this day, at least three frames were in line to be inspected -- a new chassis getting a going-over on the machine, another awaiting a sheet-metal shell and one race-run chassis from Petty Enterprises.

A technical inspector uses a robotic arm to locate the chips and touches it to different parts of the chassis as part of the measuring process. The machine is able to extrapolate measurements in three dimensions, which are fed into the computer and displayed on a large plasma screen mounted on the wall next to the platform.

It's a painstaking process, Fisher says, but it's more than worth the trouble. The state-of-the-art measuring system provides consistency unavailable before, and it allows NASCAR inspectors in the field to scan the chips and tell immediately if a car going through the inspection line is one that has been certified at the Research and Development Center.

Through another set of doors and into the heart of the facility, where engineers have at their disposal a fabrication shop, machine shop, powertrain lab and engine room, fluid dynamics lab and restrictor-plate room. Under construction for completion sometime later this summer is a new engine dynamometer that will help NASCAR engineers determine with more accuracy performance throughout the power band of the engine, rather than just peak horsepower.

With everything in this room, engineers can formulate a design on computer and manufacture it for testing.

Spec engine for the Camping World Series

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"We can do anything here that a regular shop can," Fisher says.

The newest project at the facility is under construction. It's a machine that can measure the performance of seat design under loads. A pair of driver seats are nearby, ready to be placed on the device once it's ready for use.

And the new Nationwide Series prototype is sitting off to the side, ready to make the trip to the wind tunnel testing facility. Unlike the Sprint Cup design, it appears to be more of a cousin to the current Nationwide car, a more rounded appearance with a front splitter and spoiler. But it incorporates all of the safety improvements, according to Fisher, and has the same wheelbase as the Cup car.

Fisher also shows off one of NASCAR's recent initiatives, a spec engine that has been approved for use in the Camping World regional touring series. It's the first time the sanctioning body has provided a pre-approved engine as an alternative for competitors.

"It's durable, competitive and costs [approximately $27,000], which is about half what engine builders are charging," Fisher says.

In addition, engineers are busy researching ways to improve SAFER barriers, doing low-speed crash testing and analysis on an energy management development research area at the end of the parking lot, and as always, looking for new and improved ways to increase safety and competition, but within a reasonable cost.

Fisher is proud of his facility. And he has every right to be. The objectives of NASCAR's research and development program are "safety, competition and cost containment." And that's exactly what's taking place in a nondescript building in the middle of an industrial park in Concord, N.C.