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Old 06-01-2020, 07:25 AM   #1 (permalink)
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2020 Explorer wheel well air curtains

My wife's new Explorer came with wheel well air curtain deflectors that supposedly shoot air around the wheels and lower the drag at high speeds. They also changed the rims to a flatter 10-spoke design which should help the air past the wheels. I did notice two small openings in each of the wheel wells where the air passes through, but they seem pretty small to be effective.

A pic of her new one and old one next to each other shows the openings on the sides where the old one had a solid bumper. Time will tell if the openings are really effective (or if they just end up getting plugged up with road debris) but a highway test at 70 mph with cruise on said I was averaging 32 mpg, not bad for a big heavy vehicle

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Old 06-01-2020, 04:30 PM   #2 (permalink)
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My wife's 2018 Hyundai sonata has that too.
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Old 06-01-2020, 05:07 PM   #3 (permalink)
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There are plenty of references showing air curtains working.

You could always do what I did in my book - tuft the side of the car and then take photos with the air curtains open and then blocked.
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Old 06-01-2020, 05:42 PM   #4 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JulianEdgar View Post
There are plenty of references showing air curtains working.

You could always do what I did in my book - tuft the side of the car and then take photos with the air curtains open and then blocked.
That's not a bad idea, I may give it a try!

I'm pretty curious about them and I assume they have at least some effect for Ford to bother doing the R&D to incorporate them

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