Cars use frontal area in the calculation of coefficients of drag and lift. You were attempting to muddy the water by using plan area not frontal area.
Typical Aerohead
non sequitur. I agree that the template (in 3D) is unlikely to have flow separation. That does not automatically lead to it being the best shaped body to use. A dog has four legs. Not all animals with four legs are dogs.
Are you serious? Carmakers have used tuft testing for getting on for a century. Every single professional aerodynamicist who reviewed my book complimented me on the quality of the tuft testing I show. One said it was the clearest he'd ever seen. Another Formula 1 aerodynamicist told me that only people who don't know anything about car aero deride tuft testing. Here's an example of a carmaker not using it:
I am not obsessed with lift. It's just that it doesn't make good sense to utterly ignore it, as you do.
Lift is not associated with attached flow? You really believe that? Honestly, if you do, that is about a fundamental misunderstanding of aerodynamics as it's possible to get. Words fail me.
The report has only 13 pages.
Aspect ratio is not relevant here. On the basis of what two professional car aerodynamicists have detailed to me, the description here of the relationship between induced drag and lift is now well outdated. (But from what I understand, this is an area of some disagreement between aerodynamicists.)
Fig 4.54 does not mention lift. Fig 4.55 does though. It shows exactly what I have stated many times.
Lift is higher with a fastback shape than a squareback shape. In fact, it's such a clear diagram of what really happens, here it is:
As this diagram so clearly shows, I am afraid your understanding is completely backwards.
Um, Fig 5.4 is showing aerodynamic
side forces, not lift/downforce. Did you read the text?
This diagram shows the presence of a spoiler
that causes earlier separation, not better flow attachment. That's exactly what I wrote in my book, and when reviewing this part, Dr Thomas Wolf (the current head of Porsche aerodynamics) agreed with my analysis. But hey, what would he know?
So what I am finding, and as someone else here identified a while ago, is that when I spend the time to look up each of the references you cite, you are very often misquoting and/or misunderstanding them.