living with the shame

[axisofunity]

there is such thing as a GT-Tbar which is an NA

Yeah It's my car

[MR2Mania]

hi mate, yeh i can see the 17" holding me back slightly, as for the spoier its carbon fiber and it weighs next to nothing before fitting so no more than the original and as for the body kit, that would just be like me weighing 14 stone instead of 11 really lol...no ice

Karl, my point about the spoiler was more to do with the AERO DRAG! As you go faster, you'll feel it more. Maybe wouldn't be so noticeable on a tubby, but on an NA it'll lose you some straight line speed I would have thought.

[Karl]

hi mate, yeh i can see the 17" holding me back slightly, as for the spoier its carbon fiber and it weighs next to nothing before fitting so no more than the original and as for the body kit, that would just be like me weighing 14 stone instead of 11 really lol...no ice

Karl, my point about the spoiler was more to do with the AERO DRAG! As you go faster, you'll feel it more. Maybe wouldn't be so noticeable on a tubby, but on an NA it'll lose you some straight line speed I would have thought.

believe it or not the spoiler is actually functional and has been tilted to provide down force not drag. it sits higher than most shall we say but its no heavier/useless than any other spoiler IMO

[MR2Mania]

hi mate, yeh i can see the 17" holding me back slightly, as for the spoier its carbon fiber and it weighs next to nothing before fitting so no more than the original and as for the body kit, that would just be like me weighing 14 stone instead of 11 really lol...no ice

Karl, my point about the spoiler was more to do with the AERO DRAG! As you go faster, you'll feel it more. Maybe wouldn't be so noticeable on a tubby, but on an NA it'll lose you some straight line speed I would have thought.

believe it or not the spoiler is actually functional and has been tilted to provide down force not drag. it sits higher than most shall we say but its no heavier/useless than any other spoiler IMO

But downforce = drag!

[Karl]

lol yeh yeh

[MR2Mania]

lol yeh yeh

Mate, in your first post, you said "i dont know what happened?". Well, I'm just trying to help you get to the bottom of it. If your car was bone stock, then it would have been an evenly matched thing with something like a Clio Cup 172, and then I'd say he was the better driver. But since you have all that stuff on your car, I'm suggesting that this is why he had the advantage.

It's down to you whether you agree or not, but that's where *my* money would be!

[Karl]

why are u getting ur back up with me....

Karl

[Karl]

lol yeh yeh

anyway this was in relation to you saying your meant Down force when u said AERO DRAG...i wouldnt use Aero drag to describe down force at all...and down force makes a car faster in theory anyway.

[Lauren]

lol yeh yeh

anyway this was in relation to you saying your meant Down force when u said AERO DRAG...i wouldnt use Aero drag to describe down force at all...and down force makes a car faster in theory anyway.

'Downfarce' (which will be what you are acheiving i should think) in theory makes your car faster round corners as it pushes the car to the road surface.

It will always make your car slower in a straightline as downfarce creates drag, ie aero drag, so more friction against the air which is how it generates downfarce. So your car will be faster at higher speeds with no rear wing at all.

I very much doubt that spoiler creates a massive effect apart from generating more aero drag. Its not like you are going to get up to speeds cornering on the roads for it to have any effect, so really it just becomes a cosmetic addition.

I don't think Dino is trying to get your back up, he is merely stating fact.

[senie]

Tis a well known fact that Rocket ronnie and co remove their spoilers when doing the top speed testing, but keep them for 0-60's and cornering.
Spoilers on normal road cars do not really make any performance difference. Only aesthetic. Maybe on a porsche or F1 car, but not on an average evo, mr2, scooby aor anything like that.

[MR2Mania]

why are u getting ur back up with me....

Karl

I'm not, mate. As Lauren says, I was just stating a fact.

I *did* however think that with the Emoticon you used and the "yeah yeah" in your message that you thought I was talking hot air, hence why I tried to explain further that I wasn't trying to have a go. Maybe I didn't communicate myself too well in that message.

BTW, I'll respond to your PM a bit later. It's not a straight forward answer, so need more time...

[Karl]

Lauren;

"It will always make your car slower in a straightline as downfarce creates drag, ie aero drag, so more friction against the air which is how it generates downfarce. So your car will be faster at higher speeds with no rear wing at all.

I don't think Dino is trying to get your back up, he is merely stating fact."

---

At high speeds a spoiler just becomes an added saftey feature, giving u more traction. i wouldnt use the term areo drag my self when reffering to down force, as aero drag is a more general expression used for any kind of poor aero dynamics (body shape etc). where as downforce is usually purposefully achieved. downforce is the force produced by an object pushing down - drag is an oposite force to the cars acceleration.
am i to believe the rev 1 was first released with no spoiler, and then added later due to poor handaling? spoilers on road cars are not pointless IMO.

Karl

[Lauren]

Lauren;

"It will always make your car slower in a straightline as downfarce creates drag, ie aero drag, so more friction against the air which is how it generates downfarce. So your car will be faster at higher speeds with no rear wing at all.

I don't think Dino is trying to get your back up, he is merely stating fact."

---

At high speeds a spoiler just becomes an added saftey feature, giving u more traction. i wouldnt use the term areo drag my self when reffering to down force, as aero drag is a more general expression used for any kind of poor aero dynamics (body shape etc). where as downforce is usually purposefully achieved. downforce is the force produced by an object pushing down - drag is an oposite force to the cars acceleration.
am i to believe the rev 1 was first released with no spoiler, and then added later due to poor handaling? spoilers on road cars are not pointless IMO.

Karl

I'm not trying to rib you (well ok a little bit) You don't need extra traction at high speeds in a straight line. I honestly don't think it'd provide any added safety whatsoever. Your car moves forward, anything that gets in the way of a spoiler will cause drag. It has to create drag to provide downfarce. An obvious example would be in F1 or any single seater racing where downfarce does actually count. On a really fast circuit they will run less downfarce as it will affect their top speed.

The rear spoiler on an MR2 is cosmetic and nothing else. I would say the car was released without a spoiler merely to denote it as a lesser model to the GTi-16.

99.999% of spoilers on road cars do nothing whatsoever except increase drag.

I've driven a car with actual downfarce (A formula Renault) and there is a difference, but hardly any saloon cars acheive it, even touring cars. If you do generate downfarce then it will happen at such a high speed ie 100mph plus that you will never make use of it.

[Karl]

i see what your saying. downforce doesn't produce drag, buts its a by product of a spoiler that produces downforce. but at the same time you really would use downforce and AERO DRAG in diffrent context.

"If you do generate downfarce then it will happen at such a high speed ie 100mph plus that you will never make use of it."

oh i agree...but disagree that ive never then made use of it or ever will

[GeoffC320]

I think you will find that a lot of the rear spoilers on road cars (that aren't purely cosmetic) are actually 'fine tuning' devices designed to improve stability. The Audi TT is a classic example - the original (a close copy of their show car) was unstable, hence the small lip spoiler at the rear. It's all to do with the Centre of Pressure.

McLaren added a pop-up spoiler to the F1 road car for the same reason. Incidentally this is also why pop-up headlights have now disappeared from production - at high speeds they alter the aerodynamics sufficiently to cause possible instability due to front-end lift etc.

But few road cars produce downforce even with large wings (stuff like the Escort Cosworth produced a marginal amount); it's getting more common now but is usually achieved with very careful underbody management of aerodynamics.

Any spoiler not specifically designed for the car in question, with at least some wind-tunnel time and consistent fitting points (!) is going to be a gamble at best as to whether it makes things better or worse.

Personally this is one area I wouldn't really mess with as I wouldn't want to find out the hard way that it produced some adverse effects!

[Lauren]

Yep you'd be better off flat bottoming the car with an underbody diffuser like the elise.

[senie]

Just out of curiosity, why downfArce??? not downforce??? Are we talking real driving stiles here???

[senie]

m3-no spolier
m5-no spoiler
911-spoiler at high speeds
tvr-small if any spoilers
F360-tiny boot spoiler
lambo-small or none recently
F1-spoiler-but then this is a f***ing quick car. It needs it.
Everyday days-cosmetic

You need to be doing serious speeds to notice any difference or atleast be cornering atbhigh speeds.

It is a fact of science i'm afraid. Trust me, i'm a doctor.

of love anyway

[Karl]

for the high power cars out there with no spoilers they usually gain sufficiant downforce from attention to other factors/areas such as body shape.

[MR2Mania]

for the high power cars out there with no spoilers they usually gain sufficiant downforce from attention to other factors/areas such as body shape.

Mate, you REALLY need to find out a bit more about aerodynamics!

The best form of downforce achieved on road cars is through flat bottoms and diffusers, as Lauren suggested. They create less drag because they work on the principle of difference air speeds, ie they speed air flow underneath the car and since the air going over the car is faster, the pressure difference causes downforce (ie it sucks the car down on the road).

With spoilers, you are converting the air's speed over the car into downforce. If you look back at Physics, the resultant force in a given direction is made up of 2 forces working perpendicularly to each other. In other words, if you create downforce then you create drag at the same time.

Geoff, the McLaren F1 used an "air brake" purely to give it stability during high speed braking (as you suggest, by moving the weight distribution of the car by using aerodynamics). The majority of it's downforce came from it's diffuser and powerful fans pulling air from underneath the car, creating a sort of ground-effect.