I'm trying to get some downforce, asked James Clay for help and he recommended a customer of his selling this wing. I don't have exact dimensions but it's almost as wide as an E36, sits about 6-8" above the trunk and is about 10" deep. It looks like carbon fiber but it's not...still pretty light though.

I'm all over it but I'm concerned about the shape of it. Seems like it's more for bling than zing, I wonder if that shape will create excess drag. On the other hand, James Clay likes it (his customer is a DE guy though). Thoughts from the gruppe?

I'm trying to get some downforce, asked James Clay for help and he recommended a customer of his selling this wing. I don't have exact dimensions but it's almost as wide as an E36, sits about 6-8" above the trunk and is about 10" deep. It looks like carbon fiber but it's not...still pretty light though.

I'm all over it but I'm concerned about the shape of it. Seems like it's more for bling than zing, I wonder if that shape will create excess drag. On the other hand, James Clay likes it (his customer is a DE guy though). Thoughts from the gruppe?

Krisko, I would stick with the M3LTW wing. Never have experienced it myself but a few I-Prepared and I-Stock folks I knew in New England swore by it. THere is a guy on Suzy's E36 M3 list who posted one for sale for $250. Let mek now if you want me to check up on it.

Krisko, I would stick with the M3LTW wing. Never have experienced it myself but a few I-Prepared and I-Stock folks I knew in New England swore by it. THere is a guy on Suzy's E36 M3 list who posted one for sale for $250. Let mek now if you want me to check up on it.

Yeah, PM me the info. I've heard mixed opinions of the LTW wing, creates perhaps too much drag for the downforce benefit. Also, if I when LTW I'd likely get adjustable.

Yeah, PM me the info. I've heard mixed opinions of the LTW wing, creates perhaps too much drag for the downforce benefit. Also, if I when LTW I'd likely get adjustable.

I will do an archive search tomorrow for you.

Looks to have a pretty aggressive wangle to it. Tough to say how good it is without actually comparing it to something else (whether on the track or in a wind tunnel). If it's not too agressively steep, I'd consider having someone to fab up some different mounting brackets to move it higher off the decklid.

If it's not too agressively steep,

I'm told it's adjustable but it's not something you can do on the fly. Would you roll with it? I think I have some more like a WC spoiler in mind, a straight piece instead of shaped like that.

Don't suppose you have any target negative lift numbers in mind. :stickoutt

More pics of that wing miht help. From the front profile, it looks like not much in terms of chord thickness but lots of extra angle at the rear, which is never terribly helpful in terms of drag. Same goes for the rather small end plates.

What do the rules say you are allowed to do/use? max width, height, chord length, end plate size, etc...?

I know nothing about this particular wing in question, but at first glance, and with your comments on the lift/drag ratio of the LTW wing, I'd guess that you'd probably be better off with a generic "wing". Make it as wide as possible, as long a chord as possible, mount it as high as possible, and put the biggest end plates on it the rules allow. Not sure what kind of chord lengths or profiles are generically available, but with all the pep-boys wings out there, I'm sure someone has some *copy* of something proper. (be it intentional or not.)
If thats not enough downforce, thats what wicker bills are for. ;)

I can't run a wing with multiple elements, wider than the car or taller than the car...I think that's all the rules. I get the impression that this wing would be at least as good as a generic LTW but I guess it's really impossible to tell that without some hard data or at least a driving impression from somebody that knows racecars.

Here's the only other pic I've got.

ive heard some good things about wings designed like that, who makes that one?

I'm told it's adjustable but it's not something you can do on the fly.

Adjustable, sure...but I'm just concerned with the extra turn-up in the back causing a lot of drag.

More pics of that wing miht help. From the front profile, it looks like not much in terms of chord thickness but lots of extra angle at the rear, which is never terribly helpful in terms of drag. Same goes for the rather small end plates.

Bingo.

What do the rules say you are allowed to do/use? max width, height, chord length, end plate size, etc...?

Width = Max width of fenders.
Height = Even with roof line.
No restriction on chord length or end plates. For that matter, you can use as many elements as you want as well.

The extra turn-up may help if you mount the wing on the stock mounts (look at World Challenge Touring wings...they are mounted low and have a short chord because of the rules, and thus have a big turn-up on the rear). But, since you aren't limited by those rules, so your best bet is to try to mount a generic wing with a longer chord as high and wide as the rules allow. And then, as Techno says...if you need more downforce and don't want to go with near stall wangles, you can rivet a nice little wicker bill on for extra downforce and very little increase in drag.

I can't run a wing with multiple elements

Sure you can...Prepared class rule 7.B:

Spoilers and wings are free providing they do not exceed maximum body width and are no higher than the roofline. Dive plates are allowed. Additionally, no aerodynamic device may be installed which has the capability of being controlled, altered or adjusted by the driver or any other means while the car is in motion. Maximum body width is defined as widest point of the beam of the racecar at the front or rear structural quarter panels or doors, including allowed flares. Mirrors or other similar items are not considered part of the body for width determination.

This thing is fairly short, no higher than 8". Should I still be concerned about the turn up in the back of it? I figure it might be worth a shot if I'm able to adjust the angle.

It sounds like the opinion so far is to pass on it. Is anybody aware of a simpler straight wing out there? Anything on this (http://www.aprperformance.com/products_list3.asp?CategoryID=1&SubCategoryID=2) page worth considering?

This doesn't look too bad and has taller mounts:
http://www.aprperformance.com/images/products/AS-105504.jpg
http://www.aprperformance.com/products_detail3.asp?CategoryID=1&SubCategoryID=2&ProductID=AS%2D105504

It wouldn't be very hard to change out the endplates to something a little less bling and likely more helpful.

This probably isn't too bad either:
http://www.aprperformance.com/images/products/AS-105502.jpg
http://www.aprperformance.com/products_detail3.asp?CategoryID=1&SubCategoryID=2&ProductID=AS%2D105502

Both are 16 inches high and have a large range of adjustment.

A single long chord would be nice. Speaking of, why don't they list that dimension on the wings?

Proper end plates will make a substantial difference too.

How would you improve on the end plates?

mostly just bigger. bigger in the right directions is the key. :)

Be careful with these APR wings, I am pretty sure they are not engineering for racing speeds you will be encounteirng, and are mostly street wings.

If you don't have the money for a nice Pennon, gt-racing, or crawford WCT style wing, get a ltw replica for the time being and save some money. Its worth the extra investment to get a proven wing that was designed for this application.

If you don't have the money for a nice Pennon, gt-racing, or crawford WCT style wing,

IMO, a WC Touring wing would be a waste of time. They are built within a very strict set of rules and designed to be mounted pretty low. Even a LTW replica wing would probably be a better choice.

Be careful with these APR wings, I am pretty sure they are not engineering for racing speeds you will be encounteirng, and are mostly street wings.

I've known a few people to use them and be pretty satisfied.

Who's using them, would be interested to see how they have those setup.

I meant to use that style of wing, not the short/small wings in WCT, sorry for the confusion.

How much do those wings run, i thought thier high quality ones were over $1000 anyways. gt-racing has some nice ones for pretty cheap actually.

The gtc300 wing shown above is 67" wide, and chord legnth unknown i cant see it lists it anywhere. Also they come with a standard mount which may not be suitable for this application. If its a great deal, buy it and sell it to someone with a showcar who likes these things, they pay top dollar :)

We have 3 full carbon fiber APR wings on 3 racecars and they are awesome! The quality is the best that i have ever seen! Ours cost was about $650 each. They could be a bit higher but I would reccomend tham. Just my .02.

We have 3 full carbon fiber APR wings on 3 racecars and they are awesome! The quality is the best that i have ever seen! Ours cost was about $650 each. They could be a bit higher but I would reccomend tham. Just my .02.

Nice, how much do they weigh?

Which ones did you get for $650, the carbon ones shown above?

Did you sell your car yet by the way?

Carrerax, you have PM.

Is the PTG style wing no longer viable? Too much drag for the downforce?

...

Is the PTG style wing no longer viable? Too much drag for the downforce?

That's kind of the consensus. I guess for $1000 you can do better.

I have a deposit on the car and it will be going to a good home! I am really really going to miss it. As far as the wing, I cant remember the cost but it is the full carbon fiber one that was very expensive. i think there is a more expensive one but this one is awesome.

These guys make a good assortment of wings. Their manufacturing process takes three weeks though WINGS (http://www.gt-racing.com/)

Also - MA Shaw has some Porsche wings also - call them and talk to Mike.

These guys make a good assortment of wings. Their manufacturing process takes three weeks though WINGS (http://www.gt-racing.com/)

Also - MA Shaw has some Porsche wings also - call them and talk to Mike.

wow amazing prices on that site, i know for sure once i get some extra money and im ready to lose the world challenge wing i might be giving them a call. another option is to build one your self out of aluminum. its actualy pretty stright foward and then can talyor the airfoil exactly to your needs

Perfect timing, I am shopping for a wing. :eek:
I like this one
http://www.aprperformance.com/images/products/med_CS-105504.jpg
Or should I save $300 and get the aluminum one?
My car would looke like the MR2
http://www.aprperformance.com/images/gallery/mrs3.jpg
Or better

wow amazing prices on that site, i know for sure once i get some extra money and im ready to lose the world challenge wing i might be giving them a call. another option is to build one your self out of aluminum. its actualy pretty stright foward and then can talyor the airfoil exactly to your needs
How? What kind of tools? Where do you get the material from? I'd like to try to build one, as long as there is no welding involved. I haven't learned that yet. :(

Perfect timing, I am shopping for a wing. :eek:

Or should I save $300 and get the aluminum one?
My car would looke like the MR2

Or better

Or save a couple bucks more and get a Pennon :)

I checked their site, but no pricing. How could I know if they are cheaper? It looks like they do a great job.

I checked their site, but no pricing. How could I know if they are cheaper? It looks like they do a great job.

Pick up the phone and call them? They produce custom wings for racecars. It's not a place where you choose your standard application and click "order" on the website.

That said, Pennon, along with many high end race parts manufacturers, lives by the rule of "If you need to know the price, you can't afford it anyway."

In the end, a wing is going to be a waste of time on a DE car. Gaining the last 2/10ths in your laptimes isn't gonna win you a FIA DE Superlicense and a straight shot to F1. To top it all off, the air going over your convertible is so dirty anyway, you aren't going to get a lot of benefit from a wing.

I checked their site, but no pricing. How could I know if they are cheaper? It looks like they do a great job.

What company are you looking at?

Krisko stay away from the ricer wings like Matt and Steve run...lol ;) :stickoutt ...j/k guys! Seriously a M3 LTW wing will do a good job and they are fairly easy to come by...the PTG evo wing works well and a lot of racers use it (Montana, Randy, myself, Watts, Holder, Hamm, Munson etc...etc...) hey if it's good enough for PTG, it's good enough for you and me ;) :)

Pick up the phone and call them? They produce custom wings for racecars. It's not a place where you choose your standard application and click "order" on the website.

That said, Pennon, along with many high end race parts manufacturers, lives by the rule of "If you need to know the price, you can't afford it anyway."

In the end, a wing is going to be a waste of time on a DE car. Gaining the last 2/10ths in your laptimes isn't gonna win you a FIA DE Superlicense and a straight shot to F1. To top it all off, the air going over your convertible is so dirty anyway, you aren't going to get a lot of benefit from a wing.
On a Sunday? You are right, if I need to know the price I can't afford it.
I am getting the hardtop, like the MR2 in the pic. Wing won't help much either? Just for looks? Stick to APR or no wing at all?

What company are you looking at?
Pennon. Where did you get your wing?

Pennon. Where did you get your wing?

Matt's got a Pennon wing...it's a real nice wing and helps a good deal I'm sure...

Pennon. Where did you get your wing?

He got his wing from Pennon and I got the same exact one. The length is 60 inches, stantions are 12" high and the chord is either 8 or 10". I forget. For the complete wing with mounts and endplates, it runs 1425 from Pennon.

hey if it's good enough for PTG, it's good enough for you and me ;) :)

PTG ran that wing a long time ago under stricter rulesets. You don't see them running something like that these days. There are better options on the market for the the same or a little more $$ these days.

I had a top-notch DSR fellow tell me that putting a wing on the top of the back of the car doesn't do much good unless you clean up the air coming out from under the car. Is there any truth to that in the context of a formerly street car?

I had a top-notch DSR fellow tell me that putting a wing on the top of the back of the car doesn't do much good unless you clean up the air coming out from under the car. Is there any truth to that in the context of a formerly street car?

That doesn't make any sense to me. I think the issue about a wing on the rear of the car is that it has to be high enough to make a difference. The air right above a trunk is 'dirty' so there's no downforce to be had there, you need to get the wing at least 8" off the trunk.

What your DSR friend told you is more applicable to the type car he is running where wings often serve as more of an underbody extractor (for an example of this, see the old BMW LMR). It's not all that applicable to a GT car where the wing is often mounted so high that it couldn't possibly be affected by or affect the airflow from underneath the car.

If wings didn't do much good, you wouldn't see GT type cars running them in series where flat-bottoms and diffusers aren't allowed.

What your DSR friend told you is more applicable to the type car he is running where wings often serve as more of an underbody extractor (for an example of this, see the old BMW LMR). It's not all that applicable to a GT car where the wing is often mounted so high that it couldn't possibly be affected by or affect the airflow from underneath the car.

If wings didn't do much good, you wouldn't see GT type cars running them in series where flat-bottoms and diffusers aren't allowed.

Giddyup :)

Aero is a black art at this level. Stick to what you know works for this level of competition, anf for DE's, dont waste your money. If you are racing bmwcca and are seriously at the end of tweaking your chassis (which noone has gotten to yet) then make aero your prime concern...otherwise slap on the standard mid-high speed Pennon wing for this application, 60" span, 10" cord, at roofline height, and spaced back enough off the trunk to be legal.

When you move into Single seat prototype style cars, the body itself is a wing (look at any of the prototypes from a side profile). So the wings that are now being developed are just increasing the efficiency of the underbody designs, and allowing a decrease in overall drag, while keeping as much usable downforce as possible.

Aero is a VERY technical topic, and again, at this level its all a black art, and trial&error. Unless you have laptimes that show 100% that a specific aero change made a difference, then there is no argument for or against it.

You not only need to have faster lap times, but you have to quantify that the wing change was the cause. And if we're talking tenths of a second gains from these wing changes...thats below the factor of error unless you strap on a Data logger with aero sensors...which if you can afford that, you can afford a custom 3 element wing from pennon thats solid mounted to the rear suspension :)

Often misunderstood != black art. ;) The principles for low speed aero are pretty simple.

Someone needs to scan in the exterior profile of the car. That and a little CPU time on a system with a decent CFD package installed would move things in the right direction fairly quickly. :) There'd still be guessing, but not as much. There doesn't have to be that much guessing anyway. Just tape some bits of string on the car at various points. (or if you are more into smoke trails for your CFD analysis, tuck in behind something British. :stickoutt)

At a club/DE level, aero downforce in any appreciable amount usually isn't terribly helpful anyway. Most drivers don't know what to do with it and have issues giving enough feedback on the aero bits just to keep the car balanced at speed. Hell, most don't give terribly insightful feedback on shocks + springs. This applies to most drivers in their first few years of pro racing too. Finding drivers that give great feedback is extremely rare. Without data and an engineer on hand most won't be able to get something as simple as the suspension truly dialed in, let alone suspension that has to work with random aero package #17. (Yeah, I know basically everyone here is the driver. That was a general statement but chances are it does apply to some/most of you. Know your limitations. ;) Also know that you can bring in a pro for a day or two on a test session to help you get a car sorted.)

Often misunderstood != black art. ;) The principles for low speed aero are pretty simple.



:withstupi

It isn't too hard to pick out a good low speed airfoil, and even on a light rainy day you can have someone drive beside you at 70-80mph and get a general idea of the flow around the car. Just put the wing in a favorable spot wrt incoming airflow and experiment with the angle of attack at about 6-8* +/- ~3 degrees and you should be good to go for this level of competition. It's not like you can really do THAT much aero wise within the rules to a huge "brick" of a door slammer that some guy spending lots of $$$ is going to have much more downforce than a reasonable solution like this one.

I actually found a company (part of a school) that did E36 CFD, pretty in depth from the pictures I saw, so I am trying to get my hands on the data.

I'm probably going to do some oil line tests at the track this week, and having a super smart fluids grad student on hand at the track will help too :)

Incidentally this APR place will custom make stuff...I'm having them make me a simple 60" wing.

Incidentally this APR place will custom make stuff...I'm having them make me a simple 60" wing.

Are they making it from carbon? What dimensions and so forth if you don't mind me asking? I assume you are adhearing to the Prepared rule set for the wing?

Are they making it from carbon? What dimensions and so forth if you don't mind me asking? I assume you are adhearing to the Prepared rule set for the wing?

CF is roughly $200 more and saves about 8lbs...not sure it's worth it. I'm adhering to prepared rules but I'm not really sure why.:dunno

I'm going 61" wide, 11" off the trunk and with a 12" chord I think.

I'm adhering to prepared rules but I'm not really sure why.:dunno

As far as wings go, Prepared and Mod rules are the same anyway.

As far as wings go, Prepared and Mod rules are the same anyway.

I know that...it was a free shot at Olsen and I couldn't help myself. :D

Bryan, where can I get those blanks you have for the headlights? I have the intake, all I need is a pass. side blank and a driver's side cornermarker blank. I'm determined to be in IP next year but for now I might as well run the intake in mod.

www.fiberartz.com or www.turnermotorsport.com has them :D

CF is roughly $200 more and saves about 8lbs...not sure it's worth it. I'm adhering to prepared rules but I'm not really sure why.:dunno

I'm going 61" wide, 11" off the trunk and with a 12" chord I think.

Thats 8lbs less downforce ;)

Does ARP have numbers that they used to give you those dimensions?

www.fiberartz.com or www.turnermotorsport.com has them :D

I have the duct, I need a headlight blank (saw that at fiberartz) and cornermarker blanks.

im pretty sure turner has them as well......i dont think they make cornermarker blanks?? just use the stocks

Make your own dummy corner lights. Just gut the inside and screw the corner lense to the dummy headlights.

Make your own dummy corner lights. Just gut the inside and screw the corner lense to the dummy headlights.

Yup, makes sense.

for a visual, i just have the corner blinker bolted right to it:
http://gallery.underclockers.net/albums/6-28-04-at-Pocono/Front_end_uncovered.sized.jpg