Mercedes W202 C-Class - Aero Build Thread
 

So, I've got a new (old - very old) car
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Hucho
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and some aluminium composite board...
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The old beast gets 20mpg(US) around town and 31mpg(us) on the motorway cruising at 70ish - I got used to high 40's MPG(US) with my old car so time to get modding.

I though a build thread may be better than individual parts builds as I did with my old car. I'm a grown-up now so progres is likely to be slower...

The board will be saved for an undertray project which I am not sure about beause (1) my car is RWD so has a driveshaft and diff to keep cool / clear; and (2) the exhaust is massive and hangs way lower than the rear bumper.

I have form building trays, so hopefully I can get it done and dialled in:
http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...1-a-12816.html

There's a good pic of the wake of the same model C-Class as mine in Hucho at pp.314

Tomorrow (when I'm not at work) I plan to complete some / all of the following:

(1) grille block (manually adjustable).
(2) air dam (as a sticking plaster before the tray build).
(3) R-wheel skirts - perhaps, Hucho says they are worth a measley less than 0.01 cD.

What I will probably end up doing iinstead is:

(1) building an MPGuino and identifying the car's connections.
(2) ripping my (OEM cassette) radio out and soldering an AUX input to the soudn processor chip.
(3) putting lots of snowboarding stickers on the car.
(4) trying to find some 15" pizza pans cheap - though the stock wheelcovers seem pretty flat.
Wish me luck....

I wouldn't bother with pizza pans, if you really must just use excess composite board to fill in the openings.

good advice I think - looking at the wheel covers, I'm not sure of the relative advantages of moon discs

So.... Not much aeromodding has gone on, but I HAD to do something about having no aux in on the stereo....

That gave me the chance to run MPGuino wires for the VSS (fed to the stereo) and through the bulkhead for the injector feed.

The MPGuino build is coming on slowly as the wiring for the LCD is "old school" (16pins rather than 4) - is up and running on a breadboard:

http://i826.photobucket.com/albums/z...120_020615.jpg

Also couldn't resist sticker bombing the horrible (but real) wood on the dashboard...


http://i826.photobucket.com/albums/z...119_125726.jpg

http://i826.photobucket.com/albums/z...119_161434.jpg

http://i826.photobucket.com/albums/z...119_230154.jpg

Must be worth 10mpg at least!

For improved mileage you are supposed to put the repulsive shït on the back of the car.

More like -10mpg due to the stops required to puke :thumbup::eek:

Simon

My eyes hurt.
Could have sanded, stained and rattle can cleared the wood but I know that's a lot of work. I drove mine for two years without a dash with the cluster resting on a piece of pink foam, but my zebra wood trim look real good:thumbup:

Anti theft device!

So things have been quiet on this one for a while... This is quite a long post summing up my experience over the last few months.

I ran an air dam for about 8 months with no significant gains. It was pretty low as you can see on the grass:

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The MPGuino is dialled in and pretty consistent with my "pump maths" readings.

Without the air dam I'm seeing UK MPG varying between 25 (town) and 40+ (straignt roads in warm weather not exceeding about 40mph).

In winter I'll be lucky if I top 30-35mpg in general use. To decrease warm-up time I tried a partial grille block on an aftemarket grille. That caused a hesitant engine on light throttle. I'm guessing that is probably because it made airflow turbulent at the intake, which is situated behind the grille (but in front of the rad).

My next project will prpbably be looking at an undertray, however, I can see from Hutcho that Mercedes put a fair bit of tunnel time in on this car.

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The area I think can be improved is underneat the back end - there is a bumpercover and exhaust hanging further down than anything else. It's a relativeley messy area. I will photograph the underbody next time I get it up in the air.

The underbody is reasonably flat and flow is helped by flat covers under the engine, and fuel pump area.