Full boat tail on a Matrix

[Weather Spotter]

Originally Posted by brucey

Can't wait to see the ABA testing! Good idea with watching the snow bounce off the car. Pretty simple test. (: Looks to be working quite well.

I am not sure I want to invest in the time needed for ABA testing. I would have to take the tail off and on, it a hassle, and I would have to put the hatch back on and the hatch glass. It is doable but not fun. The time needed would also be about an hour, which will let the car cool off a lot. I think I also need to wait for warmer temps to do it in. I also want to have it painted first, which also needs warmer temps.

From what I can tell it does seem to be working nicely. I need to work on the rear tires to reduce their wake. I think I also need to make a smooth belly pan for it now. That might also help the bottom air flow.

On a side note, I parked it back in my normal spot, the tail hangs over the end of the built up area I park on. This area is about a foot tall. This makes it so I should be able to work on the bottom side of the tail without having to take it off

[Cd]

Pretty clever idea of using the snow to see the flow behind the car !
Are you going to tuft test it next ?
Tuft testing shows what's happening more thoroughly, and shows just where the flow patterns are on the car.
With a smoke ( or snow ) test you can see the flow just above the car, but you are still pretty much blind as to where your problem areas are.

Here is an example :

There is plenty of turbulence behind the cab on this truck, but the smoke seems to make a perfect arc . It only shows half the story.

An ideal test would be to have both a smoke test and a tuft test at the same time like this one :

[Weather Spotter]

I might do some tuft testing. The snow is nice as it gets the full underside involved. I can also see the sides and top and how the flow works after the tail. Tuft testing might be good to iron out the bottom by the tires. We will see what I get done

[KITT222]

Excellent work! That looks perfect. Maybe for the rear wheel turbulence, you could get some mud guards, and close the other end on the inside of the car, so the wheel has it's own little area, and some air deflectors in front of it might help. I have an idea for spring loaded ones in case of snow.

[Weather Spotter]

Share more about the spring loaded ones please

[skyl4rk]

looks good!

can't wait to see some fillup results

[Weather Spotter]

I am waiting for some numbers too!

I fixed my kill switch today, a wire had been pulled off.

[KITT222]

The idea for the spring loaded deflectors are basically mounted to the car on a hinge, and they are far enough from the wheel so they can be flat against the underbody without touching the wheel. Then there is a spring attached to it halfway down the material, and mounted to the car further towards the front than the hinge, to make a triangle with the spring, upper half of the air deflector, and underbody being the planes. The spring has zero load when the plane is in its proper place, or there is a slight load in case the hinge isn't strong enough to prevent too much push back from air resistance. It could get hit, and come back into place. I plan on making a mock soon, and eventually using the idea on my air dam (since I plan on lowering the Vibe) and other air deflectors.

[Weather Spotter]

Kitt222, that should work, I will wait to see your mock up first

I hope to work on some tire spats tomorrow. I also might add some thin sheet metal to the back end so I can put on my "I Get 4_ MPG" stickers. I hope to make the first number a 5 soon

[KITT222]

The first mock is going to be small. Very very small. But it will make proof-of-concept, and be easy to make, then I'll move on to a bigger one before the full-size one. It could also work the other way, with the spring compressing instead of expanding while hitting something.