NASCAR successfully adopted RFID technology to ensure the safety and fairness of the event
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The National Federation of Racing Cars (NASCAR) has adopted RFID to track the chassis and fuel cells of the National Touring Car Championship to ensure that the chassis has not been replaced or modified before the race. Each participating team uses the fuel cells provided by NASCAR with the same capacity (17 gallons). ). In this way, the organization can better ensure that each racing team meets the competition regulations and ensure the safety of the car and the driver-because the modified chassis or fuel cell can provide a competitive advantage, but at the same time the car is more prone to accidents.
Since adopting this system to track chassis and fuel cells three years ago, NASCAR is now studying how to use RFID technology to improve safety and efficiency and ensure the fairness of the game, said NASCAR safety director Jerry Kaproth.
NASCAR first began to study RFID applications when developing COT vehicles in 2006. COT is a racing car dedicated to touring car racing. It is larger and more square than the previous racing car. COT is safer and maintenance costs are lower. However, NASCAR wants to ensure that the COT cars are not modified by participating teams to improve race performance, such as changing the chassis. For example, a lighter chassis can make the vehicle travel faster, however, because the chassis is unstable, it is more dangerous. In addition, the modification of the car chassis will redistribute the weight ratio of the car, so that the modified car has a certain competition advantage. In addition to tracking the entire chassis, NASCAR also needs to track individual components of the chassis. A total of 10 independent RFID tags are used on the chassis of each NASCAR racing car.
NASCAR uses 10 labels on different parts of the racing chassis
NASCAR also tracks the wings that the team places on the rear of the car (which can increase the speed). By applying RFID tags on each wing, NASCAR can understand the wing user and the return time after the race.
NASCAR selected Franwell as the system integrator and software provider for RFID applications. NASCAR and Franwell tested RFID tags and readers together, choosing the best combination of the two and the best placement of the tags. During the work, the team encountered several problems. For example, the label applied to the metal chassis must also be directly embedded in the carbon fiber composite material of the car wing. After extensive testing, NASCAR finally selected HID Global’s low-frequency passive RFID tag, which can achieve stable reading whether it is pasted on a metal chassis or embedded in carbon fiber materials.
Dell Axim x51v PDA
In order to ensure that the label will not fall off the chassis, the label design adds two layers of security protection: the label adopts a vandal-proof design. If someone attempts to peel it off the chassis, the tag antenna will be disconnected from the chip, making the label inoperable; in addition, when RFID tags are affixed to the chassis, and NASCAR sticks an anti-counterfeiting label on each label. Only when the anti-counterfeiting label is destroyed can the RFID label be touched.
Before a car can qualify for NASCAR, it must first be sent to the NASCAR Development Center for manual chassis inspection. After the chassis inspection passed, the staff placed 10 RFID tags on different parts of the chassis to ensure that the chassis would not be modified or replaced. The staff then used Dell Axim x51v PDA (an RFID reader plugged into the device’s CompactFlash slot) to read each tag, and input the name of the fleet, which corresponds to the ID code of all 10 tags in the Franwell software.
When the handheld reader reads the first tag, the handheld software will immediately display a list of all tags on the chassis and their locations. If an incorrect ID code is read, an alarm will be displayed on the screen. According to NASCAR, vehicles are not allowed to participate in the race unless all 10 tags are read.
When NASCAR distributes the wings, the staff reads the RFID tags on the wings, enters the team name, and corresponds to the tag ID code. NASCAR then used a handheld to check the vehicle, read the ID codes of 10 tags on the chassis, and confirmed that the chassis had not been modified.
After the race, the wings were sent back, and the tags were read again to confirm that the wings were returned (from March 2010, the aluminum tail spoiler will replace the wings, and there is no need for labeling and tracking)
When the tag is read, the read data is stored in the handheld, and when the device reaches the Wi-Fi Internet access point, it sends the information to the SQL server database in the NASCAR data center. NASCAR uses Franwell software to generate related reports based on the read data.
Due to the success of the application, NASCAR has started labeling fuel cells in February 2007. The fuel cell contains a layer of rubber bladder, foam or other substances to prevent the leakage of gasoline. The tag is installed on the metal casing of the fuel cell and is read when it is sent to the fleet. The identity of the fleet is stored together with the fuel cell’s RFID tag ID number. Before the race, the tags were read again during the first inspection, and the teams used approved fuel cells. When the game is over, the tag is read again when the battery is returned.
The entire system was very successful, Kaproth said. COT-labeled vehicles participated in 16 races in 2007, and all 38 races in 2008 and 2009. NASCAR is currently studying the use of RFID to improve the competition process, and currently refuses to disclose specific plans. Franwell will soon provide NASCAR with UHF EPC Gen 2 tags, replacing the LF tags currently used, according to Terri Crawford. In the past, the choice of LF tags was great because they could be embedded in the wings. Since the wings are no longer in use, UHF tags would be a better choice.
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