ToyotaNation truck forum freakout: "would you put this (aero) cap on your truck?"

[bondo]

Nice job ChrisD!!!!!!!!

Lowering the truck and adding the excellent side window you designed, make the aerocap look bad ass!

Didn't know the lid could look so good!

Thanks,

Bondo

[elhigh]

They may not be able to follow aero, but they can understand power. That "rolling bubble" of air the truck's motion generates in the bed takes power to create. The bed cap effectively replaces the bubble while requiring no energy to keep it there, and with less turbulence. They can understand using less power. These are the same guys who'll pull the balance shafts out of an engine so there's 3hp more and less rotational inertia for drag racing; they should be able to understand this.

[MetroMPG]

That's a really good point, elhigh.

And because I'm always thinking about efficiency, I often forget to mention it in this context.

But an aero cap would effectively give these guys more power to burn at higher speeds. More passing power. Faster 0-60, etc, etc.

[Chris D.]

I've at least got alot of people thinking twice about MPG and its turned into a bit of a contest on there on who canpull the most MPG out of their tacoma..

Got a guy in a 1995 lifter 4x4 on 32's? pullin 20mpg.. Thats excellent IMHO..
hes on here too now..

People will come along for these..

If you had some wind tunner testing pictures of these in action,
it would definatly be a good thing to post up..

another thing you could think about making would be truck bed rear wheel skirts..

I just started my mock tonight..


I also just won an auction for a vacuum guage

[8307c4]

Just throwing stuff around, maybe it helps, maybe not.

Weight is a consideration but not when the aerodynamics are that good.
But then it comes down to pleasing looks and cost, so we compromise.

This cover is Lamborghini technology, you can not and will not get a better aerodynamic flow than this. Go look at a Lambo sometime, from just behind the top of the roof it slopes down at a straight angle line just like the cap.

And if you play with an aerodynamic car-modeling simulator you will see why:
It is the best aerodynamic line, nothing beats this, absolutely nothing.

So why does a Lamborghini turn me on, but this cap doesn't do much for me?
I didn't say it did nothing for me, but most of it is purely due to obvious FE.

Is it perhaps that Lamborghini realized a minor loss of drag coefficient in favor of looks might sell better? Evidently cost comes to mind at this point, few Lambo owners care about FE, but a cap that sells for this purpose can't cost a whole lot.
That is, a $400 tonneau cover yielding about 12-14% improvement would take 3-4 years to pay for itself, see where I'm coming from?

I suppose in ways this might yet be the best compromise as is, too.
But the balance that has to be struck here is between looks, cost, and FE.
Then again maybe once fuel hits 6 and 8 a gallon suddenly it sells like hotcakes but if you modified it then it doesn't, you never know.

Now the top or roof of that cap does lift, yes?
Because you see my tailgate is broken, I can open it but not the normal way, and I prefer to leave it shut while it still functions some kind of way.
Oh, and the reason I have a truck is for cargo... That is, sometimes some thing is going back there that just might challenge the confined areas towards the back of the cap, so the top lifts to accommodate for this, then it stays in that position without getting all banged around...

Peace out, all spam aside it is a great idea.

[Warhawk626]

No offense to any members of that site..but to me it appears to me that most of the members are the type that talk about their offroad prowess online and then go drive around with their shiny rims and blast rap music. If I were the creator of the aerocap I wouldn't really be concerned with those douchebags.

[ttoyoda]

Personally, I'm thinking its a general lack of education in the realm of physics (IIRC, US is at the bottom of that education quality list).

I'm thinking you are right.
Actually I am sure of it.

Maybe I will go over there and fuss with them. Or maybe not.

Edit: Went and looked at the comments. That's a not. It is amazing some of those people can metabolize oxygen.

[Chris D.]

these last 2 responces were right on the money lol

[ttoyoda]

Chris D.,
Those are real nice wheels.
Are those wheels you have in your wheelskirt mockup stock on that truck? If not do you know what brand/model they are? Looks like the rim is steel? Is that correct?
Thanks for any info.

[whokilledthejams]

Yesterday, I sent my F150-driving brother the link to the thread here about the aero-cap, and he really liked it. He also thought it was funny that I post to a fuel-economy forum, until I pointed out that he's the sucker that got pressured into a totally unnecessary vehicle by an ignorant UAW member (i.e, his ex's dad who works for Ford).

Those toyotanation guys are just plain stupid. No sense in mincing words when dealing with misinterpretation of Mythbusters (who, generally are fairly thorough, even if the show turned to focusing on explosions). They need to go back and add tonneau covers, regular caps, and an aero-cap to that test, however. Tailgate up vs. tailgate down is all well and good, but if morons take that to mean tailgate up = best, then the presentation is more flawed than the methodology.