strop wrote:gt1cooper is talking in Newtonian physics. Just remember that as far as the planet Earth is concerned, 1G of acceleration at the surface is approximately 9.812m/s/s. Then it should all make sense (once you've plugged in all the numbers and converted the units).
Pretty much. The necessary basic formula to know is that F = (mu)N, or that Force of Friction = (Coefficient of Friction)(Normal Force). The normal force is the force of the ground pushing up on the car, and in an ideal case would be exactly equal to the force of gravity, mass(g = 9.81).
Since force applied = mass x acceleration, and the maximum force applied is equal to the mass times gravity, with a mu of 1, we get that mg = ma, or g = a, which means that mass does not affect acceleration at all when it is traction limited.
If we look at this :
http://hpwizard.com/tire-friction-coefficient.htmlwe can see a general representation of the coefficients of friction for vehicle tires. I do believe it is slightly conservative for the top of the line high performance tires, but outside of that it's fairly good. The easy thing to see is that if we assume 100% of a car's mass is on the drive wheels (all 4 wheels driven, usually), the coefficient of friction there is the exact amount of acceleration in g's the car can ever pull on those tires (ignoring lift, drag, downforce, and assuming that the car is able to hold itself perfectly at the right amount of power to each wheel).
For anything other than a car with all 4 wheels driven, if you can figure out how much mass of the car is on the driven wheels during acceleration, the maximum amount of acceleration in g's will be equal to the coefficient of friction multiplied by whatever percentage of the weight is on those wheels.
Edit: I should also add that the coefficient of friction is not defined by just the tires, but also by the surface they are on. It is the coefficient of friction of _____ on _______ (rubber on asphalt etc.)