Does anyone know anything about this bad-boy?

mostly interested in those rear scoops and that engine. looks like a suby motor.

Interesting.......;-)

Neat functional rear deck lid venting and cooler. Pop up scoops are unique however, you can get the same results without all the mechanical wizardry using 550 Spyder rear scoops .... my .02. ~Alan

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtqCxc60tNs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4Ouq6PQvK0

Kind of like an air brake or flaps on an airliner....

Kinda nice, note no door handles, opens when hand is passed over top edge of the door. Also no tail lights unless they're part of the pop-up scoops and the engine is a 1.9 VW. I watched the other vids on it

Tail lights are there, blended into the body......in the usual place...

(see 36 seconds in)

Not a subie, just a Type 3 cooling setup. Really needs some type of muffler instead of straight pipes, though.

I wonder where he got that slick little 5 indicator light gauge?

I've always been under the impression that the air entering the rear deck grille (and hence, the scoops in this car's case) came rolling in from BEHIND the car and flowed FORWARD to enter the deck lid grille. I can't prove that, but I do know that I have a strong wind blowing on the BACK of my neck, NOT on my face, when driving. If that be true, you can see that those nifty scoops are facing the WRONG WAY!

Sombody needs to settle this air flow direction thing with some science. Attach maybe fifty little tufts of wool twine, with a bit of duct tape, onto the rear half of a speedy and then proceed to an empty freeway and take lots of pictures, say at 35, 55 and 70 MPH.

My college mates and i did this for a project in a Vehicle Dynamics Class, circa 1963. Pretty sure we "tufted" a Corvair, and the air flowed back to front over the rear deck. More likely that was a result of high pressure air versus low pressure air around the rear deck rather than pure laminar air flow.

The 'curl back' effect happens because of the windshield, and the way it forces wind upwards, causing it to accelerate by compression, increasing pressure.
At the same time, the area behind the windshield is the area with the lowest air pressure - and air moves from high to low pressure... you get the picture.



The flanks are mostly compressed of smooth, if slightly accelerated air, and have no low-pressure area to 'curl' into. If anything, the 'swoops' will have lower pressure and will suck more air, more than just the ram air.

A NACA inlet works in a similar fashion, albeit more inteligent and causing much less drag.

I have hidden air intake rams that are under the car. They pick up just forward ot the rear wheels and vent up and over the rear wheels into the engine bay.

My first intent was to just line the wheel wells to minamize gravel cracking the fiberglass from underneath . But they evolved into ductwork very easily.

All that fancey smancey stuff is nice But very unneccary. Mine runs plenty cool.

I've thought about modifying my engine hood hinges so I can pop the hood up a couple of inches (hinge side) when traveling at higher highway speeds during hot weather.

http://speedsterowners.com/files/view.asp?sf=cgperry&f=engine_lid_1.jpg

Bill,,, you link keeps kicking me out,, could you check it to see if it is working for you ??

Ron,, if you put a couple of pneumatic cylinders in to lift the bonnet all the way up,, and then triggered it through the brake light switch,, it would be just like a Bugatti Veyron's spoiler/air brake !!

And MangoSmoothie,, those pop-ups remind me of a Lambo Murciealago's bat-wing ducts, but at a much better price. Very cool,, but Dr. Clock is right about the practicality. I just installed a couple of fans in my 359's engine bay. One on draws air in from the side ducts and vents it towards the engines fan intake. The other directs flow over the oil cooler. When you flip the control switches, it sounds to me like the turbines are spooling up,,, but my wife says it sounds like her vacuum cleaner !!!

Got spring fever,,, and had the speedster out of a first ride last night. We still have some snow here,,, but I could not wait any longer !!
Best regards to all,,
Alan

Can't tell if it's a Type-1 pancake from a Type-3, or a Type-4 from a, well, Type-4. Or maybe a Type-1 with no shroud, but then where's the alternator?

Sorry Alan, I just can't let this one go by - but I do like how you think!

You are very correct that an elevated rear body panel connected to the braking system would indeed make it just like a Bugatti Veyron, but they sure didn't invent that feature.

The original design showed up on Mercedes Benz "Lemans" cars back in 1955. Remember that back then you could legitimately race a full bodied car against an open wheel car, all in the same class. So on long, fast circuits, Mercedes used the full bodied aero cars for better speed and on short circuits they used regular open wheel race bodies. Here is a decent link to that history.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_300_SLR

Has anyone on this forum fabricated some sort of latch that allows the engine lid to be left slightly open? This would be a lot easier to make than fabricating something for the rear hinges.

Great article,, David, thanks,
Here is a model of what that brake looked like. It was pretty serious,, so was the whole car for that matter.
Alan

http://images.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://www.oldirish.com/collection/M13.JPG&imgrefurl=http://www.oldirish.com/collection/mb.html&usg=__LZQY-u8GEg4l9rWuSilrbiD9tvE=&h=448&w=772&sz=59&hl=en&start=36&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=Vt_jvjF7QGzFdM:&tbnh=82&tbnw=142&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dair%2Bbrake%2Bcar%26start%3D20%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26ndsp%3D20%26tbs%3Disch:1

Ron, I have...

If you're doing an airbrake like that (angled with top toward front), you better make damn sure you don't have a gap at the back edge for airflow to get under it. Otherwise deploying it at speed it would create scary rearend lift.

Henry, at IM, is working on a 'quick release' system for my hinges, so I can raise the back end of the engine hood 2 or 3 inches for hot weather highway cruising.

Alan, Try this.
https://www.speedsterowners.com/files/view.asp?sf=cgperry&f=engine_lid_1.jpg