kusee pee

For IB cars my fav is the Weissach tail from the SC of the same name, closely followed by the carrera 3.0 tail. The former is hard to come by, hence I've just fitted the latter to my SC. But I agree that tails are very car-specific. For me, anything too far from a period look is against my preferences. Overall I prefer a tail to a clean lid.

SARGEPUG

Isn't that the same thing?? The air the wing catches, keeps it down, hench it wont lift. haha

theiceman

i dont think so .. i think if you were to weigh your car standing still and at motion it would get lighter ,, as the car lifts. ( if you could do that of course ) . the wing would cause it to get "less light" by removing lift.

To provide downforce the car at speed would appear heavier than when stationary as the force pushes it down.
I dont think any of the wings on our cars provide down force. This may be way off base but this is how i reasoned it in my tiny mind.

especially if you take the wing off and look at it in a profile shot .. The car as basically an upside down airplane wing. The air going over the top has a lo further to go than the air going underneath there for the pounds of pressure per square inch is less on the top than on the bottom "lifting" the car.

whalebird

Ed and Ice are right. There is a difference between downforce and negetive lift.

Ed Hughes

Yep, many racecars, for many years, have had aero and ground effects features that do provide downforce, enough that some could run upside down at speed. We can only really hope to help Mother Nature retain her gravitational pull.

theiceman

not exactly downforce but awesome

whalebird

Thats why they have to weld the manhole covers down on city street tracks(long beach). GTP cars could pull them up at speed.

SARGEPUG

Was that a stock color wolf??

Mark Harris

I pulled a manhole cover in a school zone while street racing a guy on my way to work today. I hate it when that happens because it's only right to circle around the block and put it back.

(My targa has a carrera tail with the correct chin spoiler)

kevinr1247

yes this happens to me all the time. That's why I'm deleting the tail!

SARGEPUG

Read this and go up to "Airfoils".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downforce#Rear

Ed Hughes

OK, read that, and look at the pics they show. Then go to the R&T or C&D article on the Porsche ducktail, and some other published data that shows Porsche was able to reduce lift on the cars via the tails in the 70's and 80's.

I'm going off memory, but the car in the mag test took 250 or 300lbs of lift (measured via an articulated bicycle wheel affixed to the back of the car) and took it down to 80 or so.

Now, with a GT3RSR, anmd certainly Formula and prototype race cars, there are aero aids that provide true downforce. But the rudimentary achievement of a basic tail, at the speeds our cars run, is that it is a "spoiler" that negates lift. The shape or a 911 and an airfoil are quite similar.

g-50cab

Ed Hughes

....and there it is! Well, I got the amount of lift right, I guess I was optimistic on the spoiler's effect, in my case-the duck. The brain ain't as sharp any more.

But, this shows that lift starts to come on strong at about 75 or 80mph. A tailed car can feel much more sure-footed at highway speeds in this range. As noted earlier, the pop-up tails come up at about 50.

Caferacer

It looks even more like an airfoil from the back which makes me wonder if I could go Wright Brothers in reverse. Maybe with a Steve Wong chip.

Seriously, I wonder if anybody ever turned it backwards in the wind tunnel to see what kind of lift it generated. It might need one of those NASCAR roof flaps to stay planted.

Edit: never mind. The leading edge looks less like an airfoil from the back.