an odd creation

[todd00]

check out this odd little metro. 75 mpg

http://www.1989geometro.com/

[packrat427]

Yes that is a little odd , kinda reminds me of a old can am car :lol:

[htchbck]

his wheel well cover things remind me a lot of the Ford Probe concepts when they were taking the whole "streamlined" thing way beyond the limits of extreme

[Safety Guy]

This link goes to the Toyota truck aero article and I got this from the comments afterwards:

http://www.evworld.com/view.cfm?section=article&archive=1&storyid=870&first=7985&end=7984

phil knox:
John,your Triumph project sounds interesting and ambitious.I've messed around with some of the things you mentioned so I thought I'd throw it out there in hope that it may help.I have 345'000 miles of data on my CRX.The streamlining I did to it added weight and did not degrade urban efficiency.Highway mileage has beenas high as 84.5 mpg.I hold a Utah Salt Flats Racing Association club land speed record with it.At 100 miles per hour,the windshield wipers,door handles,antenna,side mirrors,and license plate made absolutely no difference to top speed.Also,I tried the RED LINE racing full synthetic oil in the transaxle and it showed no measureable improvement.SLICK-50 showed absolutely no measureable change in performance.An aero facia,partial front wheel pants,wheel discs,rear wheel skirts,and partial bellypan while demonstrating "some"measurable speed increase,nothing did as much for speed and fuel economy as the "boattail" behind the CRX.And most motorists don't realize the significance the back of their vehicle plays on performnce,economy,and enviroment.A modest "tufting" study,with yarn and Scotch tape will tell you if you have attached flow on your Triumph.If so,you might consider looking at the back of it as a source for unlocking free horsepower,efficiency and range for thoses future batteries.Good luck,let us know how it goes."
07/Jul/2005
[8329]

As opposed to all the work on that Aero Metro, I wonder what a 2 to 4" chop job on a Festiva roof, with the appropriate slope to a smaller hatchback would do? You could replace the rear side and hatch glass with plexi or poly windows easily enough. The rest would be primarily metal work, which should not be as difficult as cutting the whole car in half. It should work if neither front seat passenger needs a lot of headroom (which Festivas have quite a bit of to begin with), while eliminating headroom from the back seat (which you'd probably take out anyways to reduce weight).

If the Metro got about a 29 percent increase in fuel economy, the chopped Festiva should get maybe half that. Maybe 15 percent with sideskirts and grille blocking?

Karl

[Safety Guy]

Oh, on grille blocking:

I've had my fan on "default" running (the thermswitch is bad so I unplugged it) all the time now. It not only keeps me much cooler in slow traffic in the heat, but also helps at freeway speeds! Partially because the temp does not get so hot before getting on the freeway, but also I think because the running fan still helps get air through the radiator at higher speeds. I think this is because the non-running fan actually inhibited the air at higher speeds--creating a hotter engine even then. (Of course, taking the fan and fan shroud/mounting assembly off completely would help that as well if I didn't need it for city driving.)

With a dead fan, I was getting temps in the upper two thirds of the guage. Now with the fan on all the time I'm getting lower third at the most. Quite a difference.

Karl