Help Finding Research for Research Assignment

[Uber-Dan]

Hey all,

I am doing a research assignment in Physics on whether swimming with a woollen swimsuit, swimming bare-chested, or swimming in an LZR Racer swimsuit makes results in faster swimming. I have found all of the theoretical information that I need, to do with the physics behind it, but I can't seem to find any journals or reports that talk on the difference swimsuit material makes on swimming speed, that is, that have done experiments and gained tangible data. I can do without it, but as my report would be better with it, I thought I'd check if anyone knew of any such reports, experiments etc that I could checkout on the subject. All I have right now is that the LZR racer swimsuit should be faster according to the physics, but apart from Olympic records set using the suits, I have nothing definitive that says that it has been tested and is faster. Feel free to ask if you need clarification or have any questions, but other than that, thanks in advance.

[Ghideon]

2 hours ago, Uber-Dan said:

All I have right now is that the LZR racer swimsuit should be faster according to the physics, but apart from Olympic records set using the suits, I have nothing definitive that says that it has been tested and is faster.

I don't know hat papers you have studied so far but here is one test where Oeffner and Lauder at Harvard used a robotic device to allow for dynamic and controlled conditions:

Quote

We use a flapping foil robotic device that allows accurate determination of the self-propelled swimming (SPS) speed of both rigid and flexible membrane-like foils made of shark skin and two biomimetic models of shark skin to measure locomotor performance. We studied the SPS speed of real shark skin, a silicone riblet material with evenly spaced ridges and a Speedo® ʻshark skin-likeʼ swimsuit fabric attached to rigid flat-plate foils and when made into flexible membrane-like foils. We found no consistent increase in swimming speed with Speedo® fabric, a 7.2% increase with riblet material, whereas shark skin membranes (but not rigid shark skin plates) showed a mean 12.3% increase in swimming speed compared with the same skin foils after removing the denticles. Deformation of the shark skin membrane is thus crucial to the drag-reducing effect of surface denticles. Digital particle image velocimetry (DPIV) of the flow field surrounding moving shark skin foils shows that skin denticles promote enhanced leading-edge suction, which might have contributed to the observed increase in swimming speed. Shark skin denticles might thus enhance thrust, as well as reduce drag.

 http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~glauder/reprints_unzipped/Oeffner.Lauder.2012.pdf