The problem here arises from the fact that the aerodynamically flawed body of the newest Corvette becomes even more of a brick than without any ground effects at all and any so called downforce measures result in so much turbulence that the result does not come even close to justifying the means.
Of course, like with the base Stingray, the same school of thought or more accurately, lack of such has been gratiously extended by the same vendors to the flagship Z06 buying crowds. In reality, the problems related to aerodynamics mean very little to the buyers since subjecting the newest flagships to the conditions where aerodynamics would come to play are a very seldom exception to the Cars and Coffee rule.
Nevertheless, here is a funny example when bad can become even worse and the phrase "what the fuck were these guys thinking" becomes full applicable.
As shown in the photos, the idiotic splitter does not even come close to lining up with the "fangs" of the front bumper lip. Is there a purpose to doing this? Any tricks of the trade that make this visual abortion superior to others?
Absolutely not, this is just a clear case of the "creator" (how can one exactly create a knock off?) experiencing a mental pause while "designing" this part. From the structural angle, this is actually counterproductive but certainly, may induce a certain amount of curiousity among innocent bystanders.
Kudos to the vendor (Caravaggio?) for accomplishing a seemingly impossible task of making something already fully fucked up and non functional into even a worse abortion. Hmmm....
I'd be curious to know if a splitter as useless looking as this has any aerodynamic effect at all over just a plain front bumper. It just seems to me that most "functional" splitters come out much farther from the front bumper, are lower to the ground, and are thinner than this. Clearly I'm not all that familiar with aerodynamics, but this just seems like the equivalent of a fake air duct, hood scoop, etc.
ReplyDeleteThe splitter has to protrude about 4-4.5 inches from the bumper to be effective and it has to be as low as possible while cleanly separating high and low pressure zones. With the idiotic fangs and splitter that doubles them up, nothing is clean not to mention the center piece is missing (new Camaro Z28 and Viper ACR got this part correctly, with Mustang GT350R almost there as well).
DeleteThat's kinda what I figured. So its a useless, just like the car itself. Gotcha.
Deletea splitter starts making a difference as soon as it protrudes from the bumper (which is why many bumpers have a wedge or lip at the bottom, serves the same purpose). The more it protrudes, the more downforce is produced (to a certain point, it relies on the high pressure created by the front of the car so there's no sense in sticking it several yards out in front). As Peter points out, a certain size might be necessary for a splitter to be noticable but as for the size required I'd advice you to look up articles on the matter. The problem is that the lower it sits and the further it reaches, the more likely you are to tear it off at the next speedbump which makes a great trackday splitter a terrible solution for a street-driven car. That said, this one doesn't stick out very far so it could be assumed that it is more for looks than for function.
DeleteGood post. NASCAR has some good analyses of splitters and air dams, based on practical applications plus there are some computer simulations and modeling available to realize how ass backwards GM went with the newest Corvette. The trick to a functional splitter is to have it low and allow it to make it clean cut while maintaining low center of pressure on the front of the car.
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