Eric -
I, at one time, had two spoilers for my B. One was the fiberglass 'Special
Tuning' air dam, the other was a piece of metal a friend of my father's had
made for me.
With the homemade spoiler (which left about 6" of clearance) in place, my B
topped out at in the triple digits. That was assuming once had balls large
enough to keep the gas pedal pressed to the firewall as all the air
underneath the car began to unload the rear suspension and cause the back
end to raise what felt like 1 to 3 inches.
The 'Special Tuning' air dam eliminated this hair raising experience, but
cut the top speed to double digit range. However, the air dam soon ripped
on speed bumps, cat, etc. I got tired of messing with it and threw it away.
Where am I now? I have the homemade metal job, to which I bolted a 4" stip
of plastic across the front. Special Tuning 'feelings' without the fear of
potholes. By the way, I never noticed a difference in cornering with the
different air dams.
All of this reminds me of the summer I first bought my B. Dad had used some
thin sheet aluminum to hand craft a spoiler (the original one was missing).
The thing made my B look ready for Nascar, I swear it had about 2" of
clearance.
Until one night, on a dark Louisiana back road, machine met armadillo in the
middle of a high speed corner. It took me several minutes to bend the
spoiler off the front tire and get going again.
Poor armadillo.
Thomas Pokrefke, III
1970 MGB
Mr. Gaylord...please make the rain stop!
-----Original Message-----
From: Eric <eric@erickson.on.net>
To: mgs@autox.team.net <mgs@autox.team.net>
Date: Saturday, June 24, 2000 10:29 AM
Subject: Doing the Front Spoiler thing
>OK, yes it is a saga or sorts. There is a question or two at the end of
>the rave (along the lines of "the only stupid question....")
>
>I have just fitted my new front spoiler, removing the front bumper and
>associated metal and bolting on the hunk of plastic... looks so groovy
>that I don't know why someone suggested putting the bumper back on :-) -
>wait until the light of day, I may change my mind.
>
>But *this* is when I start thinking how easy is this thing going to be
>to get past the scrutineers at my next race meeting (in a week's time)?
>
>I believe that the spoiler will be enough to bump me into what they call
>"modified Marque" class whereas prior to this I was fastest (of a tiny
>field) in the "standard" or "Unmodified" Marque class. I preferred this
>to being SLOWEST in this next class up. Hell, the "modified" guys (one
>down from the 'race prepared' class with slick tyres, etc.) are doing
>five to ten seconds faster than me... and I don't think this black
>plastic thingy called a spoiler is going to make me catch them.
>
>So, the question.....
>
>I know you haven't seen the spoiler that I have, but it leaves a decent
>five inches or so clearance from the ground (no 'ground-effect here to
>any degree:-). One of the reasons I want to try it out is to see how
>much more air it may gather (air dam in the front) to keep the engine a
>little cooler. Hell, if it helps any I will put in ducting to cool the
>brakes more, too.
>
>Any thoughts on what this is going to do, aerodynamically to the car?
>They are designed to suck the front down a tad (at the slow speeds we
>do, I don't know) to help handling, but what will this do to my
>straightline speed - slow me down?
>
>I guess I can just suck it and see, but if any of you have front spoiler
>experiences, I would love to hear.
>
>
>Eric
>'68MGB MkII
>
>PS Yes, I think I have prepared myself, even with this large ground
>clearance, to accept the fact that I will possibly destroy the thing if
>I go off the track in the wrong place.
>
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