[s-cars] Belly pan blues (95 S6A)

Taka Mizutani t44tqtro at gmail.com
Thu Jan 11 14:36:34 EST 2007


Dave-
What is your evidence that a belly pan made of metal would cause excessive
lift?

At what speeds?

How much lift?

What is the differential between the OEM plastic belly pan's generated
lift/downforce vs. the metal one?

How do you know that lift is even generated and if so, that it is due to the
belly pan?

Did you or did you not take into consideration the fact that the MBZ race
car generates downforce?
That said downforce being disrupted by the bumpy road caused excessive air
to flow underneath the
car, something that apparently was not anticipated?

Audi UrS cars do not generate significant downforce. Your hypothesis that a
metal belly pan would
cause lift at all, much less lift significant enough to lose control of the
car is not based on sound
principles.

Taka


On 1/11/07, Dave Forgie <forgied at ae.ca> wrote:
>
> I knew somebody would take exception to my "back flip" hyperbole.  My
> point was if you go out and reinvent the wheel without the proper
> tools,
> e.g. a wind tunnel, then there could be bad consequences.  Admittedly,
>
> not as extreme as in my example, but nevertheless, added lift can, in
> no
> way, be a good thing.
>
> On the Mercedes thing, who do you think said "OH, SH*T!!" first, the
> driver or the engineers?   I think the engineers watching the race live
> or
> on TV. They would see what was happening earlier than the poor
> driver who was very likely very confused why there was no road noise
> and the steering suddenly became very light while the rev limiter was
> being hit.
>
> Dave F., P.Eng.
>
> >>> "Taka Mizutani" <t44tqtro at gmail.com> 01/11/07 10:32AM >>>
> I think equating a metal belly pan to the back flip action of the Benz
> you
> mention
> is a little bit beyond hyperbole and is overly alarmist.
>
> I agree that the OE belly pan is probably the best solution, esp.
> taking
> into account
> cost.
>
> Taka
>


More information about the S-CAR-List mailing list