Quote:
Originally Posted by basjoos
That suction is developed by a wheel spinning within the close confines of a wheel housing. Having a skirt over the wheel well opening does help to increase that suction just as the housing around a squirrel cage blower helps to strengthen and direct its flow.
I get a small amount of cooling airflow through my radiator even with the grill block closed as some air leaks around the edges of the closed grill block. When climbing a long steep hill in the heat, I'll open the grill block and let the front wheel suction do its thing. Then when going down the other side I'll gradually close the block as the engine's heat production drops.
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Bajoos, thanks for sharing the explanation. I don't run a grill block on the ECONORAM mule--testing gave me a negative result--but did put in an under drive crank pulley. In light of that, I may need to incorporate something similar to your wheel well venting at expressway speeds to keep things cool. Although, if I keep working on the aerodynamics perhaps I can push the cooling issue a little farther down the road (so to speak).
@ freebeard, good point. Maybe I'll watch some pickups similar to mine to see how the spray flies out. Or maybe I'll pull a MetroMPG and rig up a webcam and video my own wheel wells to account for the aero panels.
@serialk11r, take a look at the wheel wells of a RAM pickup. The entire wheel well is radiused. But it could probably use a little refinement wrt to the ecomodder realm...