Quote:
Originally Posted by Otto
Starting with a clean piece of paper and given what is known about air curtains, undertrays, nose stagnation and compression of airflow, etc., and given conventional car shape, what would such a face look like?
In other words, if Hucho, Julian Edgar, NASA nerds, and the best minds of Porsche, BMW, Audi, Toyota, and Ferarri all got together with the best minds on this website, what would they come up with, vis most efficient car nose shape?
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It dates to World War-I.
It was on a British warplane, with forward machine gun position, and pusher-prop. They hadn't figured out yet, how to synchronize shooting bullets through the rotating propeller.
Anyway, Hucho called it both 'Optimum' and 'Ideal'. The 1922 Jaray and Klemperer basic bodies use it, Walter Lay used it in 1933, Kamm did research with it in 1935, Schl'o'rwagen 1938, Lancia Aprilla by Pininfarina 1944, 1978 Hucho basic body, SMART Fortwo, Aston Martin Cygnet, many many others have used it.
If you're not going to skirt the front wheels, then the air curtains are a palliative to the drag created by the open wheel arches.