Commercially produced aerodynamic pickup bed cap

[bondo]

Originally Posted by slowmover

Gonna have to put a scrolling LED "message" that shows the crowd the average mpg as you roll

This truck is currently averaging XXXX mpg

Congrats on sneaking a turbodiesel under the hood!

.

I will offer a scan of the two receipts of the gas purchases, one from filling up on Friday the 2nd upon arrival in Johnson Tennessee and then one from filling back up upon arriving back in Little Rock on Saturday the 3rd. The fuel gallon amounts are highlighted.

The one from the Road Runner in Gray, Tennessee is for the 26.6 gallon fill up after driving 644.7 miles on the way there. The second shows the 25.55 gallons it took to re-fill my tank after arriving back in Little Rock. This leg back was a distance of 656.1 miles with about 12 miles of it trying to circle around the traffic jam in Nashville.

And man, if I could get turbodiesel mileage out of the V8 in my F150, that would be awesome!

Bondo

[slowmover]

If it wasn't clear, I meant to indicate the message board be mounted on the back of the truck.

And man, if I could get turbodiesel mileage out of the V8 in my F150, that would be awesome! I'd say you are. Show me other full-size pickups besides CTD's and a few LB7 D-Max's in this range. I imagine someone is tenderfooting an EB (Ecoboost) Ford and seeing your miles, but that's the only gasser doing it.

And I couldn't agree more about the problems of banking. It's endemic.

.

[pryan37bb]

I spent about half a day reading through this thread, some very interesting and exciting stuff going on! I just got a Ram 1500 Regular Cab with a Hemi V8, advertised 20 hmpg but mine's probably less than that because it's 4x4. I recently took it on a 1,500-mile trip starting in New York and ending in Florida with a detour in Alabama. I'd had several hundred pounds of stuff in the bed wrapped up burrito-style in a tarp. The Aerolid would've worked much better for my purposes, regarding both the cargo and fuel efficiency.

Several thoughts I had after reading the thread. First is for Bondo, Have you considered using Lexan panels spanning most of the roof part of the Aerolid for better rear visibility? One of my favorite things about the Regular Cab is that I can turn around and see so much more than in any other car I've driven, so the Aerolid would be more appealing to me, and I would imagine to others, if it restricted visibility less. I'll admit I don't know much about the materials involved, which is more expensive or harder to work with, etc.

Second is more of an open question, since several people mentioned it. The idea of extending the lid past the tailgate to further reduce the wake got me thinking about airplane wings. I've no engineering background, but I have taken several classes on aerodynamics, and I wondered if the air would be traveling too far a distance (assuming the lid extended all the way down near the level of the bumper, which would make the truck look like an airfoil; since this is most aerodynamic, this is what I assumed was meant). Would the air still stick to the surface? I would imagine air traveling that far along a sloped surface would start to separate. In that vein, I would wonder if vortex generators would fix that problem; VG's positioned near or behind the tailgate might re-energize the boundary layer while adding very little drag at most speeds.

Third is related to second, and is also for Bondo, regarding the boat-tail trailer hitch attachment. Have you done the yarn test with this new design to ensure separation isn't happening near the end? I would imagine if there's a little gap between the lid and the boat-tail, that alone might re-energize the boundary layer, so I'd be very interested to know more about the new attachment.

[slowmover]

One of my favorite things about the Regular Cab is that I can turn around and see so much more than in any other car I've driven, so the Aerolid would be more appealing to me, and I would imagine to others, if it restricted visibility less.

Pickup trucks tend to have large mirrors. Using them well is skill acquistion consisting first of proper posture, and second of proper mirror adjustment. Seeing through the back glass is optional, at best if one has serious need of a pickup truck. With a set of Multivex aspherical overlays on the outside mirrors, turning one's head becomes the dangerous maneuver. I had them on my last truck and they were a revelation.

Visibility through a cap (or any load, especially a tall trailer) is irrelevant to pickup ownership.

One should train to be able to back into any space with the solo truck using only the outside mirrors. Practice.

.

[pryan37bb]

Originally Posted by slowmover

Pickup trucks tend to have large mirrors. Using them well is skill acquistion consisting first of proper posture, and second of proper mirror adjustment. Seeing through the back glass is optional, at best if one has serious need of a pickup truck. With a set of Multivex aspherical overlays on the outside mirrors, turning one's head becomes the dangerous maneuver. I had them on my last truck and they were a revelation.

Visibility through a cap (or any load, especially a tall trailer) is irrelevant to pickup ownership.

One should train to be able to back into any space with the solo truck using only the outside mirrors. Practice.

That's a good point. I am new to pickups; my last car was a Jeep Grand Cherokee SE, and a Chevy Cav before that. My mirrors see well enough that I don't really need to turn my head to confirm, but it's a force of habit, just to make sure, I guess. And rear visibility certainly wouldn't be a deal breaker for me if I were going to buy an Aerolid, which I would if I had the money and if they were available for my truck. Maybe by the time I've graduated college, both of those will have happened (hopefully!)
But back to your point, I probably would learn to trust the mirrors and stop turning to check if that time comes. My mirrors are big enough that side blind spots are just about non-existant.

[bondo]

Welcome to ecomodder pryan37bb.

Thanks for your input on the Aerolid. You are right on about the lack of rear visibilty. Lexan would be a good material to use. Safety glass is best.

One problem with increasing the size of the back window is torsional flex. In a perfect world one would always close the roof of the Aerolid by pulling down on it at the rear center only. But we not not live in a perfect world and the roof will be closed by pulling down on one side or the other causing the roof to twist. This would snap a cold peice of lexan. I have a design for a larger rear glass plane to be made from flat safety glass but it will cost thousands for the vendor to tool up to produce it.

It would help aerodynamics to extend the roof of the Aerolid aft. The new extension box that sets on the open tailgate does just that. I have tuft tested the extension and the air seems to remain attached all the way back. I include a link to a video of the tuft testing on youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Erv5in7dX1Q

slowmover I do need to get that led sign to read out 25 MPG, 25 MPG, 25 MPG, 25 MPG ............

Bondo

[round.boater]

Could have used one of those tailgate extensions on our road trip this last weekend...
My wife told me I needed to get a recording explaining the lid I went through my shpeal so many times while in the parking lots at Mesa Verde. As always, lots of interest and people asking why ARE doesn't make one.

[CFECO]

For a flat safety glass, I'd look at the old Jeep C J windshields. They should be plentiful and cheap. Found some for $80 at Jeep Windshields.

[bondo]

Originally Posted by round.boater

Could have used one of those tailgate extensions on our road trip this last weekend...
My wife told me I needed to get a recording explaining the lid I went through my shpeal so many times while in the parking lots at Mesa Verde. As always, lots of interest and people asking why ARE doesn't make one.

Hey round.boater,

Good to hear from you. Thank you for keeping up your fuel log. I check it whenever I see you have logged on to ecomodder. Your 2006 F150 with the 4.2 liter 6 cylinder and the manual transmission is rated at 19 mpg by the Department of Energy. Your lifetime average of your truck is 22.21, even counting the time before you got your Aerolid. The math comes out to a 16.9, call it 17% increase in fuel efficiency the Aerolid has afforded you.

The extension box is good for another 6-8% increase in fuel efficiency. That would kick your average up to around 23.37 to 23.75 mpg for an average. Those two times you got 25 mpg in the summer of last year, shows what the Aerolid is capable of by itself in perfect conditions. With the Aerolid extension combination, you may easily see 27 mpg in ideal conditions for freeway travel. That would be an 8 mile per gallon increase over the DOE rating for your truck.

I still intend to get you one of the aero extender boxes but I have some fastening geometry to work out first. Thank you for your patience. As always, thanks for getting out there and talking to people about the Aerolid who come up to you and ask about it. You may want to take your wife's advice. I have the same thing happen. I get emails almost every week from people who would like to buy one. Again, the greatest hurdle for me to produce the Aerolid is money.

To chase venture Capital or talk to maufacturers futher, like ARE, I must get my Patent issued. Without it, I have zero leverage. It has been a battle. The Patent Office is basically denying all kinds of Patents so they can generate more income from Inventors who have to re-file to keep thier Patent Application alive.

This is what I had to do. Being out of work since April, with no unemployment, those duplicate $250.00 an hour Attornies fee's are gouging and his rates are lower than most. My Patent application is still pending and hopefully since the new Patent Reform bill was signed into Law two weeks ago, there may finally be some due diligence practiced by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Off to paint a house on this beautiful day. Just because I don't have a job doesn't mean I am not working. Again, good to hear from you.

Bondo

[bondo]

Originally Posted by CFECO

For a flat safety glass, I'd look at the old Jeep C J windshields. They should be plentiful and cheap. Found some for $80 at Jeep Windshields.

It is people like you who make this country great!

Bondo