Faulty Subaru Wing Causes 148 MPH Crash?

KaMaSuTrA

Resident Sexi Man
Aug 22, 2008
1,485
0
Chicago IL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LnmD7kxHUw&feature=player_embedded

“You get what you pay for,” and when it comes to rear spoilers, disaster can strike if they’re not carefully engineered. Look at the chaos below that was caused by a faulty wing. Was a cheap spoiler responsible for this disaster, or just bad luck?

500x_wingfail-500px.jpg


Going 70 on the highway, will a big-ass wing on your Subaru make a performance difference? Sorry, no. How about if you're heading into the esses at VIR without realizing your ex-big-ass wing has just failed? Uh-oh…

It turns out that you need plenty of downforce on a WRX STI's rear wheels when you're pushing 150 on the race track, and Bad Things happen when your carbon-fiber wing goes AWOL without letting you know. We're happy to report that the STI pilot walked away from the wreck, though we're still shedding a few few tears for the poor car. The tale of Subaru racer Phil Grabow's not-so-happy adventure in Virginia may be read over at the NASIOC forums; here's an excerpt:

" With the new engine tuned we headed off to the second round of the NASA season at Virginia International Raceway. One of the major changes we made to the chassis was to have taller wing supports made so we could get the rear APR wing up into clean air in hopes of gaining down force. We also had added a rear diffuser to the flat panel underneath the car. After running at minimum power for practice and scrubbing in new tires the car felt great and the power delivery was awesome.

As we headed out for time session one disaster struck on the first lap! I was taking it easy to get the tires up to temperature but as I exited turn 6-7 the carbon wing structurally failed between the air foil and the mount. Not knowing this I entered the uphill esses at around 148 mph and this is what happened."
 

Bob Kazamakis

I’m the f-ing lizard king
TCG Premium
Oct 24, 2007
85,575
45,868
Denver
Real Name
Joel
If you watch in the rearview you can see it fly off. Then he proceeds to make a turn at almost 150mph. Full on race cars apparently take that turn not much faster....:dunno:

I'd say at those speeds aerodynamics are huge and when that's interupted bad things happen. Phil is a talented driver for sure and he's lucky it went as well as it did.
 
Old Thread: Hello . There have been no replies in this thread for 90 days.
Content in this thread may no longer be relevant. Consider starting a new thread to get fresh replies.

Thread Info