rear skirts on Model S
 

What if the Tesla Model S had Fender Skirts?



http://roa.h-cdn.co/assets/16/15/980...2158-tesla.jpg
'But there's always something to improve on.

Back in 2011, General Motors studied whether fender skirts would be a viable way to improve fuel economy. Its engineers found that to incorporate them, cars would need narrower tires in the back, running higher tire pressures simultaneously. (The original Insight ran 165-width tires all around, with the rears mounted narrower than the fronts.) Both options could mess with a car's handling abilities, especially on a powerful, rear-driven machine like the Model S. Of course, said GM's Ed Welburn, designers could widen the rear bodywork to fit both larger rear tires and fender skirts—but doing so would actually cut down on aerodynamic efficiency.

Plus, it costs extra money. In the cutthroat money-squeezing hell of the automotive production trenches, that is never a positive.

Plus, it might look, you know, weird. Homebrewed fender skirts are one thing, but Tesla owners have dabbled with their own Photoshopped versions themselves. "Wow, I think the technical term there is fugly," said one critic. "I wouldn't drive that car even if it went 1,000 miles on a charge."

But hey, if a team of whip-smart engineers can eke out every last drop of wind-cheating aero, all in the name of range extending, then why not? Maybe there's a future where the Model S proudly bears an ancestral resemblance to the Insight, the Figoni et Falaschi-bodied Delahaye-bodied Delahaye, the 1972 Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight Regency. (But not the Chrysler PT Cruiser.) And maybe the trend will ignite like a SpaceX rocket, and the fender skirt will proudly make its return back to America's highways and byways.

Elon, Franz: have your people call our people.'

GM wouldn't spend the money to put fender skirts on to improve efficiency; but they would for "style".

I can't wait for laws to be updated to allow removal of side mirrors if adequate video monitors or blind spot detection is in place.

Perhaps car companies with these technologies could design minimalist mirrors that aren't really meant to be used in the meantime, until the law catches up with new car design.

Nobody has noticed that's the model 3?

Looks like the new updated grille-less Model S with the new updated wheels to me.

They shipped with skirts? I hadn't noticed due to the kawaii overload.

I know you're a fender-skirt kind of guy. I tried to join the club. I've got a set from Glass Action in AZ. It turns out VW Beetle rear axles come in short-short, short-long and long-long. :confused: The wheel and tire clear but the axle swings up and down right where the fender-skirt clamping mechanism wants to be. :(

These nay-sayers need to see a bubble skirt with skegs. ...tied into to a diffuser.

That is the refreshed Model S. The prototype Model 3's we have seen have only body color noses - no black arc and no T logo.