I used to have some data kicking around my computer but I did a quick Google search and found that Car & Driver was a huge source of this type of data. And I love that you can get some of the data with their original hand written data sheets. BTW, here is @MJFenton's finished activityHey #MTBoS, I need help finding some data. For a car accelerating from 0 mph, I want velocity as a function of time. Help? Link?— Michael Fenton (@mjfenton) February 5, 2016
And the teacher version.I just put together a new modeling lesson based on the Porsche 918 Spyder. Take it for a spin? https://t.co/iMiS7ZRaAs #FeedbackWelcome— Michael Fenton (@mjfenton) February 10, 2016
The Analysis
Let's start with the data set from the above post. You can certainly do Desmos Need for Speed activity. The analysis in terms of determining a function is a little intense (IE not a standard function model). You can see some of the more exact analysis via the two links in the tweet below.But if you didn't want to go too deep you could just use it to talk about non linear relationships or you could use it to talk about rates of change as speed data comes up a lot in calculus.@davidpetro314 Here’s a decent fit: https://t.co/dLVznfpk1d And @squishythinking suggested this improvement: https://t.co/9ydyQdcZlf— Michael Fenton (@mjfenton) February 13, 2016
I have also found more data sets from different cars and you can see how they compare to each other on this Desmos file.
Download the Data
There actually is a lot of data that can be found on the Car & Driver site. Many of the cars in this link have data sheets (you really have to search around on each page to find the data sheet). But I have downloaded a few of them (seen in the Desmos file above) and created a Google Sheet for each so you can copy and paste the data where ever you want.Porsche Spyder Data Sheet Google Sheet
Dodge Challenger Data Sheet Google Sheet
Chevy Camaro Data Sheet Google Sheet
Cadalac CTS Data Sheet Google Sheet
Chevy Malibu Data Sheet Google Sheet
Honda Fit Data Sheet Google Sheet
All Google Sheets
All data in CODAP file (with graph)
Let me know if you used this data set or if you have suggestions of what to do with it beyond this.
