front grille area

Can anyone shed light on why some 246's have round holes either side of the grille as opposed to the rectangular on 02424 in attached image?
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Hello Paul,

the new front with round holes was implemented mid 1972. So early E-serie Dinos, like yours, still had the old front.

Regards Matthias

 

Thanks Matthias,
Are the holes (round or rect.) there for any particular purpose?
Cheers PK

 

as air intake for passenger cabin

 

...of course!

the novice forgot about the ducts!

 

Any idea as to why the change was made?

Aesthetics?

Performance/structural issues?

Mark

 

yes, to optimise aerodynamics, a little front spoiler was added to achieve better contact pressure at high speed.

regards Matthias

 

Whatever the reasons for the change, I much prefer the later look to the earlier one. I think that the wide "shark's-mouth" opening beneath the grille is cleaner looking (maybe it provides marginally better cooling at speed) than the covered two-piece opening on earlier Dinos. The two round corner openings, which look in profile something like a jet intake, are also better looking than the rectangular openings on earlier cars. My later Dino (04808) has the revised front pan (which also features a more rectangular grille opening), and my earlier one (03964) has the original design, minus the cover over the central under-grille openings. The cover was long gone when I bought the car in 1982, but I prefer the car without it, and had the black lower body paint brought higher up to the top of the center openings, for a cleaner (IMO) look. Fred

 

Hi Fred,
Any chance of a few images of those?
Paul.

 

This is not the main driver for a change.
The most important target was to get air in and through the water cooler.
There are two locations of openings below the front grille with different functions:

1) the ones you can see from the front view and what have been talked about before.
These are for getting the air in the body to the water cooler.

2) The other location is at the very end of the lower car body and invisible without lifter.
The opening there is behind the water cooler and for getting the hot air through the water cooler and out of the body.
The "spoiler" has also not the main function of giving downforce to the car,
it should create underpressure to soak the hot air out of the opening in the body.
In fact Ferrari has done a evolution in several steps at the front area.

For location 1) air intake function:
The 206 had four almost square shaped openings below the oval grille.
The L- and M-Series got bigger openings in the middle which can be almost closed by a removeable cover.
The within the E-Series the switch to the round holes on both sides and the rectangle in the middle.

For location 2) air out function:
You can see on the next pictures that Ferrari started with a completely closed front
at the lower end. The during M-Series they cut a section out and at E-Series the small spoiler was applied to soak the air better out of the opening.
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Here are the pictures from location 1) about the air intake function.
See first 206, the two times L-series with and without cover and finally E-Series.
Best
Nicolai
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Paul, at present I don't have any photos of the front of my earlier Dino, but if you look at the photo you posted in the first post of this thread, imagine connecting the tops of the two central rectangular openings using black paint (creating a horizontal line, if you will, the length of the two openings). At the outside corner of each opening, I had the painter taper the black paint down and around the corner of the pan and front fenders. This gives the front end more of the look of the later series cars. I also had the black paint on the rocker panels brought up higher, as it is on the later models. If you've seen pictures of my red Dino on F-Chat (look up my first thread from August '08), you will be able to see the rocker panel paint. Fred

 

The black coating is a bit different depending on the series.
For Pauls earlier Type it shoul look like that.

 

Forgot the pictures from Matthias car..
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That makes sence too. I can tell you I bought a E-serie GT with a restorated front because of an accident. The former owner modeled the front slightly different than original. The little spoiler was missing.
You coundn`t drive the car at higher speed than 130 km/h. The nose took off and I became really scared. We had to rebuild the whole front to original specification. Don`t underestimate the importance of the front aerodynamics. The Miura had similar problems...

 

This is not my M-serie 1406. M-serie Dinos didn`t have the little spoiler...
This car is #04308, an early european E-serie. The little spoiler came with the E-serie model.
Regards Matthias

 

Paul, does your Dino #02424 have the outflow hole with the little spoiler underneath the front? Would be interesting to know if early E-serie had this feature already.
Regards Matthias

 

Does anyone have a source for the front airintake spoiler?

 

Very interesting guys;

I'm going over to the workshop to do some work later today and will have a look for that little spoiler - you are referring to the image marked '2008/08/13' at the beginning of the thread?

Cant say I remember seeing anything like this during the repaint etc ( but hey, I did forget about those intake vents...

Re the black colour around the vehicle (that Fred talks about) - do I understand correctly that all or some Dinos had this from the factory?

Was this black in 'stone chip' finish?

Regards Paul

 

Hello Paul,
my guess is that you don`t have a spoiler and air-outtake hole behind. Looking forward to your answer.
The matt black colour (no stone chip paint) at the lower part of the body came with all Dinos. If you take the 3 pictures of the green Dino Nicolai posted you are 100% correct for your car.
I took those pictures a few years ago of #04308 because this Dino had still the original paint on, was never restaurated.
Regards Matthias

 

Interesting information. It shows that Ferrari was concerned about air flow through the radiator, even though the Dino is not known for having cooling problems. It makes sense to try to extract the hot air from below the car (at speed) by creating a low pressure area there. With more modern designs, the majority of cool air to the radiator always seems to enter through an opening below the front bumper, while the grille opening is serving mostly cosmetic purposes. The photos of the three stages of development show how the Dino evolved in that direction too. Great photos and description.
Lars

 

that depends on the environment you are in. I live in Houston, TX and the summer months are always a concern.... even worse, sitting idle in traffic creates some very serious issues. Without airflow, over-heating becomes a very real problem.

 

yes, checked, there is no spoiler/opening under there...
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makes sense, thank you for confirmation
;-)