Front Wheel Deflectors
 

Well I finally got to add front wheel deflectors.
I decided to just extend the ones that were currently on the car so they actually cover the wheel.

They are made of an old mud flap That I had sitting around.

First impressions are that the car coasts slightly better, but I will have to wait till I burn through a few tanks of gas before I know if they help any.

Here are a cpl of pics.

http://www.sippingfuel.com/pics/deflector_1.gif

http://www.sippingfuel.com/pics/deflector_2.gif

They look really good. I think it will be hard to measure the improvement, but they will help anyhow.

Looks like a Pop-Rivet in there. Nice and neat.

Is that rubber stiff enough so it won't be vibrating as you drive?

I was worried about the floppy factor and I've been looking at using
some real solid 1/8" G-10 (fiberglass) board..

I was also thinking about the angle. Most of these little wheel dams,
seem to be flat to the air flow.
I wonder if it would help if the dam was mounted at an angle?
Allow the air to fall off to one side maybe?
But which side? Outside the tire or under the car? :confused:

It is made from an old mud flap that I had sitting around so it is plenty stiff.
I thought of using pop-rivets, but instead I used some wide head sheet metal screws.

Do your bald tires offer less drag? :p

looks a bit like what i had for a while on my prev car, wasn't as well made though.

the car felt much more stable with them, but i didn't have them long enough to see any FE improvement.

let is know what the resuly is, as i might build something similar for my curent ride

c'mon theres only 60k miles on them, theres plenty of life left :D

You may laugh at the 'bold' tires but (i don't have a clear view on them of course) they seam to be worn mainly on the outside. If this is the case maybe you should get you're car alligned again. If you're car isn't properly allignd it will also increase you're fuel use (and you're tires ware of mor rapedly as well).

grtz Dieter

Hi,

I think you'd see a large improvement with some smooth wheel covers, on those steel wheels.