The 2012 NASCAR season features a major change that you will probably never notice. For the first time in NASCAR’s history, car will be outfitted with fuel-injected rather than carbureted engines. This move was made to bring stock cars more inline with production vehicles. While both carburetors and fuel injectors have been around for a while, all cars produced in the USA since 1990 have come with fuel-injected engines.
Other than a new technology for pit crews to master, what difference will this change make on racing? Pat Goss explains why the switch might make for more exciting and strategic racing.
So, even if you don’t know a socket wrench from a sock, or the difference between an oil and an air filter, you can now talk with some confidence about NASCAR’s new fuel-injected engines.
You have questions, Pat Goss has answers.
This is the first year that NASCAR has used fuel-injected engines. What does that mean and what advantages does it give the drivers?
Well, fuel injection is a more precise way of metering the amount of fuel that goes into an engine. And of course there are varying types of fuel injection, some a lot more precise then others. As far as race cars go, the biggest single advantage, unless they do something to alter it some other place in the car, is that they should be able to go a little bit further on every gallon of fuel.
