I've read that at 50mph air resistance to an average car is the equivalent of driving through water and at 80mph it's the equivalent of driving through oil.
I can't find any references online to back up these figures. Is there a relatively simple way to explain the calculation to verify these figures, or are they incorrect?
Best Answer
If I understand your question correctly, one aspect that you seem to be asking about is the relationship between and object's speed and the associated air resistance (as in your title) - which is often referred to as 'drag'.
The Physics Hypertextbook chapter Aerodynamic Drag, generally relates drag, defined as:
as being proportional to the square of the object's velocity ($v$) as:
$$R \propto v^2$$
So, you can see that as you get fast, the effect of drag increases faster.
This relationship is from the drag formula:
$$R = 0.5\rho CAv^2$$
(where $\rho$ is the fluid density, $C$ is the drag coefficient and $A$ is the surface area affected)