My T-100 grill blocks over the past few years...

[BamZipPow]

Originally Posted by Goldenstate

BamZipPow,

I notice that you have also included some serious side skirts below the body of the truck.

What has been the mileage increase from this modification?

I have considered doing the same to my F150 but was not sure if it would be worth the effort. Would you do the side skirts again?

Goldenstate

A few things I noted when I went through my series of side skirts. The center point between the front and rear wheels would scrape when encountering steep driveways/ramps/speed bumps. FRP doesn't give at all and cracked when bumped. Coroplast faired the best of the materials I used as far as durability. I think that conveyer belt material might fair better than Coroplast. I'll have to try my hand at combining the conveyer belt with some FRP. My side skirts are about 4-5" lower than the belly pan.

During high cross winds, I encountered significant steering bias which I contributed to the side skirts (without any true testing). I modified the side skirts by removing about 75% from the front to just before the bed. During a test run with cross winds, the steering bias was minimal. I'll have to do another test run with full side skirts in the future to see if the steering bias is still there. So yes...I would still do the side skirts.

I wasn't able to attribute any significant mileage gains as I didn't put them on as a separate build but in a combination with multiple aerodynamic attempts at the same time (belly pan/rear skirts/dropped air dam).

I think the key will be how you will be able to support the side skirts and allow fer road contact if you do go low enough. I think the gap between the bottom of the skirts to the road is about 5"...just enough fer my toes to fit under when I'm opening the truck door.

[Weber95]

Originally Posted by BamZipPow

Inspiration is one of the key points to innovation. Glad to be of some help.

About the grill blocks, your front grill looks exactly like mine on my truck. How did you fasten the pipe insulation to the grill? And for winter months and a short drive of no less than 3 miles that the engine never gets fully warm on. What % of the upper grill should I block, tempatures range around here from 20*F to 37*F in winter. But then again winter is almost over do I really need it?

[BamZipPow]

Originally Posted by Weber95

About the grill blocks, your front grill looks exactly like mine on my truck. How did you fasten the pipe insulation to the grill? And for winter months and a short drive of no less than 3 miles that the engine never gets fully warm on. What % of the upper grill should I block, tempatures range around here from 20*F to 37*F in winter. But then again winter is almost over do I really need it?

I did mine more fer seeing what aerodynamic improvements a grill block would accomplish and still provide enough air fer cooling requirements. So you will have to experiment on what yer goals will be fer yer grill block.

I found that zipties or velcro ties worked the best to secure the pipe insulation to the grill once I inserted a PVC pipe inside the insulation. I tried zipties fer durability or velcro ties fer easy removal. I did experiment with a locking cam setup behind the pipe but it was too complicated fer easy removal.

I did install a digital thermometer probe under the hood just so I could keep an eye on what was happening under the hood. Obviously...the probe placement is key so I placed mine between the top of the air plenum and hood. I've seen a range from 30°F to 80°F above ambient while driving distances over 50 miles. Fer warm up times, I can't really say it's decreased the warm up times as I really haven't paid attention/experimented with the grill blocks on or off during the colder months.

The key is to establish a baseline and then see what yer mods will do. If you establish a baseline with yer mods and then take them off...you might be able to extract what the mods did. It will depend on yer data collection and how diligent you are on yer data details.

[Weber95]

Thanks, I think I'm going to go for the pipe insulation with cheap dowel-rods held on by zip ties. The tempatures around here keep fluctuating, snowing this morning then 45*F midday. Even if it doesn't help warm up my commute should be changing to more highway so I can have better aero for that. Oh and I don't have a baseline for the truck yet, I'm working on it, I finally filled up all the way this week. I'm going to start keeping track of my MPG's and working on improving it.

[BamZipPow]

I've found that PVC pipe works well as it's cheap, easy to find, and easy to work with (bend/cut).

Good luck with yer experimentations!

[Weber95]

Looking at my truck, I think the biggest warm up mod I can do is to remove the belt driven fan. It's always running and moves alot of air. I think an E-fan is in order when warmer weather comes my way. Hopefully it'll improve city MPG too.