sc1 aero mods

[arcosine]

I want to do something like this:

Before 1998 SATURN SC1




After



After to many



I used drywall screws through the bumper and chassis, hotmelt and wire ties to attach the belly pan and rear wheel skirts. I was watching crs and SUVs driving in the rain on the feeway a few weeks ago. There is a surprising amount of turbulent spray coming out of the front wheel wells. The bigger the gap between the tire and fender, the more spray. I saw a UPS truck that had bristols between the tire and fender, filling the gap. I might try something like that with smooth hub caps.



The belly pan and skirts have made a difference, the car coasts farther, and I have to use more brake, I am driving faster with less throttle. The car gets up to 70 -75 mph with little effort. I am sure I could get super mileage of I had a kill switch to coast with. It would be really nice now if it had another higher gear. I could try taller tires, but handling would be affected.

I had a belly pan on my old saturn wagon and I could see leaves blowing out in back of the car, the air underneath was actually going back wards! I think the pan in the SC1 might be throwing up debris from the tires, as I don't seem to get s many tailgaters and cars stay a good distance behind, about 10 car lengths.

The right side mirror somehow broke off yesterday and I cut wires off. I can hear less turbulence on that side now. It was previously damaged when I first pushed the car into the garage and it was too far to the right.

Tony

[Cd]

Very, very nice.
Funny - just hours ago, I was thinking about aeromodding this very same car in PhotoShop. :-)
I like the full belly pan, but if this year Saturn is like the previous years model, the car is a ' bottom breather ' and you could completely close off the front end without the car overheating.


That is some heavy duty coroplast. Where did you find it ?

[arcosine]

No, just regular 4mm stuff from the sign shop, about $ 23 for a 4x8 ft sheet. The grill is blocked mostly, and in winter it is just a hair above 1/4 hot. There are pictures posted of the rear of the pan. Hotmelt gets brittle in 7F weather and i lost a skirt on the way to work the other day. Now it has screws holding it.



The black coroplast is about 6 to 7 years old, I took it off the old wagon and reused it on sc1, so its seen at least 6 winters. It didn't hold up so well near the muffler so I put some aluminum sheet there. Under the engine, it sagged and curled up. I had to cut openings to change the oil. I think the rear pan has more effect than the front pan, as I noticed a bigger increase in coasting with the rear on.

You can see the hitch in the photo, it hangs down below the bumper. I would like to raise it up into the bumper.

You can form coroplast with a hot air gun.

[Cd]

My next question was going to be how that you planned to have an exit for the air once it enters the engine compartment . I didn't know you had a full grille block.
Without the block, there wouldnt be anywhere for the trapped air to go ( except maybe out around the wheels which might cause even more turbulence in that area.)

I like the look of the car with the wheel covered. Some cars look odd with wheel skirts, but your car looks cool.
( the EV-1 was marketed through Saturn after all )

[arcosine]

I think the stripe helps the looks.

The air exits just before the cat theres about a 3 inch gap between the frames about 3 feet wide.

On the wagon I made a shark gill exit from coroplast.

Cars are fine, but my first love is HPVs

[Cd]

I like the bristle idea to fill the gap around the front wheel.
Something else you could try would be to create a partial skirt made of flexible rubber that just touches the top of the tire.
As the tire moves up and down over bumps, the skirt would flex.

[arcosine]

Yes maybe some TPE cut into strips.

[arcosine]

Saturn s series tire sizes
tire size aspect ratio rim diameter tire diameter height (in) ratio mpg change %

175 70 14 23.65 -0.41 1.03 -1.7 %
185 70 14 24.20 -0.14 1.01 -0.6 %
195 60 15 24.21 -0.13 1.01 -0.5 %
185 65 15 24.47 0.00 1.00 0.0 %
155 80 15 24.76 0.15 0.99 0.6 %
185 75 14 24.93 0.23 0.98 0.9 %
195 65 15 24.98 0.26 0.98 1.0 %
165 80 15 25.39 0.46 0.96 1.9 %
195 75 14 25.52 0.52 0.96 2.1 %
195 70 15 25.75 0.64 0.95 2.6 %
185 80 15 26.65 1.09 0.92 4.5 %
205 75 15 27.11 1.32 0.90 5.4 %
195 80 15 27.28 1.41 0.90 5.8 %
215 75 15 27.70 1.61 0.88 6.6 %
225 75 15 28.29 1.91 0.86 7.8 %
215 80 15 28.54 2.04 0.86 8.3 %

[d0sitmatr]

if Im seeing this correctly on the belly pan, you run the chance of serious parachuting.
otherwise looks pretty good.

[arcosine]

No its screwed down and vented in the rear, grill mostly blocked. I guess there are always armchair critics. It's been on the other car for 6 years. There is a net venturi effect pulling it down, though and the skirts get pull out, because one side rubs at low speeds and not highway speeds.