Movable Aero and Adding Fans to Increase Downforce

Movable aero in Race Cars including Fans are banned.

Several road cars use moving aero.

Enzo
P 4/5
458
CGT
Veryon

So does the 599XX (Including Fans)

 

456GT, IIRK uses movable aero on the rear underpanel way toward the back of the car.

 

One problem is that the more you rely on aerodynamic tricks to keep the car stable when driving at the edge, the worse it gets when these aerodynamics fail. Remember the flying Mercedes at Le Mans? Race tracks are rather homogenous, you can control the conditions there and know how far you can go from an engineering point of view. You can't to that on public roads.

 

+1

Indeed - "Sliding skirts" were banned on safety grounds in F1 because when (not if) one of 'em got stuck for some reason the car lost over 2 tons of downforce! Not only do they not turn terribly well at this point, the distance required to slow the suckers down got huge.... Run off areas got bigger, spectators got moved further back and so on.

I hear what you're getting at, and one would hope that any moveable aids could be made reliable today, but the cost / benefit ratio (at least on the street) just isn't there. And we don't even want to touch the "legal implications" when Johnny Hotshot buries himself in the wall as a result of something going awry at high speed (when most needed of course) - There'd be *armies* of attorneys looking to sue someone

OTOH, I'd love to see moveable aero back on the track - I still remember well the Chaparral 2F moving it's wing at Brands back in the '60's - Great stuff!

Cheers,
Ian

 

A: with modern underbody aerodynamics, you can get more downforce than street cars can utilize (with simple diffusers and venturies). Thus, fans need not apply. Secondarily, to get a fan to generate good levels of downforce would require a fairly large amount of HP, HP that would detract from acceleration.

B: IIRC McLaren F1 (circa 19195) ahd movable underbody aero and this had to be removed in order to race at leMans. First producton car that had to be detuned and de-aeroed in order to race.

I, personally, an all for movable aero--just hide it all under the car so it does not detract from the looks/style. Wingletts are horible stylistic devices--just look at any ricer;

 

I don't mind these.
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Been there,,
done that,,

behold,,,
the,

Brabham BT46B, "FAN" car.

Edwardo
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This Chaparral 2J used snowmobile engines to run the fans:
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Oh, he was! As was Jim Hall before him..... IIRC, Bernie (team principal at the time) was telling the jockeys to "slow down" - I believe Niki is on record as saying he could have gone *significantly* quicker, but he had to accelerate all thru the turn as it improved suction - More revs, more suction.....

Cheers,
Ian

 

Not just for ricers any more... have you seen the current DTM cars? They have more winglets per car than I can count...

Rick
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I saw the 2J run in the Can-Am at Elkhart Lake when it first ran. Besides the advantage of the extra downforce, the debris field it put out of its fans and into the faces of the other drivers led to its being banned. Sure wouldn't be look upon too kindly on the street either.

 

And look ugly as heck.