[BigMat]

Can you tell the difference with a a G wing spoiler or similar on the road?
I've seen the Challenge Minis with them on and I can see them adding something on the track, but I'd prefer to keep my car looking standard-ish as a kind of street sleeper if there's no performance/handling gains to be had.

 

[Maccmike]

Zero. Zilch.

 

[big jim]

Can’t tell any difference at all with mine, I only got it for the looks!

I suppose if you put the additional adjustable bracket on it would/could give a bit of downforce but would it really be noticeable!

 

[BigMat]

Thanks if that's the case I'll stick with my standard spoiler and spend the cash on something else

 

[KeithyCoop]

Downforce on the rear of a front wheel drive car.....can anyone else see a drawback with that?

 

[BigMat]

Less grip for the front, but why do the challenge guys use them?

 

[big jim]

They will most likely have some sort of splitter/diffuser up front as well to balance it out/counteract it

 

[Maccmike]

Very few cars have actual down force. If they arent for aesthetics then they are there to reduce lift - a bit. So yes a FWD car with are rear spoiler makes complete sense as you dont want the rear to go light the faster you go. Granted on the street itll make no difference though.

People argue a FWD doesnt need a rear spoiler as their argument is only about traction. Off the line the spoiler wont make any difference and once up to speed traction is less of an issue anyway. On a car with correct suspension set ups, decent tyres and a diff even less so. IE British Touring Cars.

 

[lordf]

They will most likely have some sort of splitter/diffuser up front as well to balance it out/counteract it

Looks, we tried every combination of things on the MT Time Attack car. It went a lot faster when we removed the lot and fitted the normal S spoiler back and removed all the splitters etc.

For a diffuser to work it needs to link up the whole floor. The only thing the rear one will do is possibly reduce some rear lift at high speed on the straights, however the mini probably isn't going fast enough for this to be an issue. A few tactical holes in the top of the rear bumper will probably achieve the same.

Simple fact is the mini is never going to go fast enough to make any areo work.

You're better off looking at mechanical grip and set up. To give you an indication most race teams will have an extensive data set of tyre temps, track temps, tyre pressures, suspension changes (spring rates, damper settings, arb settings). All of these will be looked at, checked and changed throughout race and test meetings.

To give you an idea even for some amateur racing where changes are allowed teams will turn up with three of four different tyres, different springs for the dampers, remove arb's for the wet etc.

People wonder why their car doesn't feel great on some track days or some days, well if it was all set up on a nice warm summer day and you have a 10c variance in road / track temp the car is going to show you it when you have opted for a suspension system that can communicate that.

 

[JKo]

The flat floor of the GP1 was made to reduce aerodynamic lift at the rear (which all cars usually have), to make it more stable at high speed corners and braking. It certainly wasn't there for the looks. Some say that the GP wing also played a part in it, and that the Aero spoiler also has some effect to that direction, but is it noticeable is another thing...

 

[lordf]

The flat floor of the GP1 was made to reduce aerodynamic lift at the rear (which all cars usually have), to make it more stable at high speed corners and braking.

Theres no chance it actually does that, its too high to have any ground effect and the mini too slow. I ran all the mini parts past one of my uni chums who is currently an areo lead at Ferrari F1 and spent a couple of years at RJN on their World Touring Car program. His conclusion was your better off learning to drive and spending the money on decent tyres and suspension than bothering to faff with aero.

 

[Maccmike]

Yeah definitely, quickest way around a track are lessons.

 

[Alski]

The gp under trays do make a difference
based on many leptons and side winds, and still looks stock

 

[JKo]

Theres no chance it actually does that, its too high to have any ground effect and the mini too slow. I ran all the mini parts past one of my uni chums who is currently an areo lead at Ferrari F1 and spent a couple of years at RJN on their World Touring Car program. His conclusion was your better off learning to drive and spending the money on decent tyres and suspension than bothering to faff with aero.

No doubt you'll get bigger gains from tyres and suspension and driver training than from aero fine tuning on these cars. But that doesn't mean aero is useless on other than supercars. My mate did his final thesis on aero design, using his 190hp track day Miata, which by no means was faster than any track going R53 that I know of (in a straight line that is)... he found that he could turn the stock form's 600N lift in to 1300N downforce with a splitter and a wing. Took a second off of his laptime. Of course that was many months worth of faffing on nothing but aero, so probably not feasible for an amateur racing team, let alone for us forum warriors in our sheds. 😁

 

[CarsOrBikes]

looking like going from one extreme to the other took a second off his time, maybe had he just settled between the two he'd have done better as well as spending far less time on it, accept the compromise.