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Old 07-24-2010, 11:15 PM   #45 (permalink)
3-Wheeler
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Location: Southern WI
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AlienMobile - '00 Honda Insight
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jimepting View Post
....I did some testing tonight and I see that the lowest edge of the hatch needs about 5 inches of clearance to swing the opening arc. Are you planning some sort of access door to accomodate this geometric requirement?.....
Hi

You are right about the need for extra arc clearance on the hatchback.

When designing and installing the wood framework for the mounting system, it became apparent that extra clearance would be needed for opening the hatch.

Yes, there will be a section, I don't know, maybe 6 inches or so that will have to flip up out of the way for opening the hatch.

It's kind of nice to engineer some of this stuff as the design progresses, and this is one area where this is true.

__________________________________________________ ___

Also made a decision that I was putting off up until now, and that is the angle of the underside of the tail extension.

Adding more foam blocks to the sides of the extension were getting pretty floppy with no underside support, and so the CAD model was again analyzed.



I decided to go with an underside angle of 13° which is shown in the picture above. This angle was chosen as a compromise between good air flow and scraping driveway aprons.

This angle also keeps the license plate at the same height as the stock Insight. Making the underside angle shallower would get the plate even closer to the ground, and I think the license plate and lights are getting pretty low already, thus the 13° angle.

Jim.
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