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Old 09-20-2011, 03:18 PM   #29 (permalink)
Daox
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We really have three options here. The turbine in the grill would be better than nothing. However, it won't be as good as a grill block.

Best to worst:

1) A grill block reduces the energy required to cut through the air by redirecting air to aerodynamically cleaner areas of the car.

2) The turbine may marginally reduce the energy required to cut through the air (overspill around the turbine like the grill block). At the same time, it will create drag by taking the air that passes through it and generate electricity at a pretty horrible efficiency. I think most windmills are ~30%. I doubt this is any better. Keep in mind that you've already spent energy to get your vehicle up to speed with an inefficient ICE (~30% efficient), so you have those losses on top of it. Air that has passed through the turbine will have very little pressure left and therefore is of little use for cooling since you need a pressure differential across the radiator to get flow.

3) An open grill will just waste energy as we all know most grills are way oversized and can be blocked quite a bit without any problems.
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