Quote:
Originally Posted by sendler
I'll be interested to see if the air dam helps or hurts you. Clean air passing under a car is not a bad thing depending on how well it exits the rear.
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To keep a clean airflow passing under the car so you don't need to use an airdam, you'll need to meet several criteria. You need to have a low stagnation point on the nose to divert most of the air over and to the sides of the car so the air passing under the car isn't being compressed between the car and road and exiting to the sides of the car between the wheels. This compression and air exiting to the sides creates drag and unsafe amounts of lift at higher speeds. Also need totally smooth underpanels and you need to exhaust the radiator air someplace other than underneath the car. On the Aerocivic, the radiator air is exhausted into the front wheel wells and into the right rear wheel well. Then the front air splitter/front wheel skirt/double side skirt/rear wheel skirt/rear mini-boattail creates a "pontoon" around the wheels on each side that channels the air passing under the car, keeping it smoothly flowing straight back and exiting the car under the boattail.