Civic DX Aero mods

[BrianAbington]

As I said in the success stories section...I made an air dam for my car.

Here are the pictures of the finished product. There are no build pics because my camera was dead and I didn't feel like waiting for it to be finished.

It is not as tapered out like it appears to be.





Holes for the radiator


Sits pretty low.


This is the initial stage...I will rebuild it to be more durable but as a proof of concept I like it.

I personally don't care about A-B-A or tuft testing. It took me from 40-46 mpg so I'll keep it.

[Regenerit]

Props to you for installing a full size air dam that is not colored the same as your body color. i would personally be embarassed to have such a large obvious fixture like that on my car. sorry. Maybe one day I'll try and do a full size one. For now, I have just a half size air dam going around my front with none of my underside grill blocked. http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...tml#post302290

I do hope to go bigger in the future but for now, this will have to do.

Do you plan on painting your dam to the color of your car? And nice grill block, did you personally choose to have ron paul on there?

Oh, and last note, with my block which is about 4 inches off the ground, I still have contact with the road every now and then when I'm entering parking lots and stuff.

[BrianAbington]

When I rebuild it it will be black, this was just thrown together in prep for a long road trip. I wanted it as low as possible, so I started with about an inch of clearance, but I plowed the gravel in the alley, so I came back, cut, drove again, cut more, drove again. It still scrapes on approaches and dips, and cracked in a couple places...but again this is more for proof of concept. The rebuild will be stronger, about another 3/4" shorter and black to match.

The looks I get are hilarious. Everybody stares at it, teen boys and rednecks laugh at it, and soccer moms give me that look of dissapproval that only they can.

The ron paul sign was in front of my house but was damaged by someone throwing a jager bottle at it, so I replaced it and cut it up to make the upper block.

[Regenerit]

Wow, the ron paul jager part is awesome. lol I can definitely imagine people giving you the oddest looks. Mine isnt as apparent but I've caught at least one driver giving it a second look as they were driving past me. I think that if I decide to make an air dam in the future that goes more forward than my current one, im going to have to make it a bit shorter because it will be even easier for it to bottom out since it would jut out more than my current dam. It definitely seems to be that the 4" is the minimum to clear most areas but even then, it can still drag at higher speeds when traveling on uneven surfaces.

What material are you using for the air dam in the finished product? And are you just using screws on the bumper? Any nuts, washers, etc?

[BrianAbington]

I'm hoping to use some free coroplast, I'm waiting for the nebraska primaries to be over so I can hopefully get a huge election sign. If I can't I'll either buy some coroplast or abs. I just used self taping screws. The bumper was badly cracked so I am okay with screwing directly into it.

[Regenerit]

Ah ok, so far I have used coroplast and it has worked wonders due to its lightweight easy to shape design and also being able to get it for free from my local politician's office was a real nice bonus! It turned out to be a bit thicker and more resistant to bending than the coroplast I bought (not to mention expensive) so I'm really happy for the donation. I used bolts and nuts to get the coroplast in and so far it has worked nicely. I also used zip ties to sow the different pieces of coroplast together to make my air dam so if you are unable to find a large piece, then you can try and use zip ties to mend pieces together in an overlapping fasion.

[California98Civic]

Nice tester! Bold. Big gain to go with it. Design reminds me of the cardboard airdam I built with students as a proof of concept for them. We saw big gains too. Your design reminds me of the Insight at this year's "Green Grand Prix" ... here's a photo from that thread:


When you redesign maybe you might imitate this bolt pattern. But be aware. This low you are gonna scrape every dip and hit every parking block. I raised my airdam an inch or two to avoid that. It was a pain.

Great stuff though!

[BrianAbington]

If I can find material that is flexible enough that my girlfriend can hit dips at speed when she drives the car and not break it, I wouldn't mind being that low.

My car is rusty in the rear, and has a mangled front bumper so I don't mind going all out on the external modifications. I honestly like the attention it gets because I know people will ask me about it.

[Sven7]

You might try the particle board down to about 6" clearance and use lawn edging below that. Or the whole thing in coroplast. Remember if it extends below the lowest chassis/suspension component, it's adding frontal area.

[BrianAbington]

I'm gonna do some slight reworking on it tonight.

I hit an unavoidable landscaping brick that was in the highway on the way to work, the break point in the middle worked as I designed it to, so it only broke out about a 1ft wide section right below the radiator inlet holes.

While I have the saw out I'll shorten it up about another inch to stop the bit of scrapping that still happens.