Tailfins on your tires?

[Taro Toporific]

Yokohama wants to put spoilers on your tires for aero
autoblog.com | 2015/10/16
...Yokohama Rubber is developing ways to bring that concept to an entirely new place -- your tires. The Japanese brand's rubber features fins all the way around, and they reportedly help improve fuel economy by cleaning up the aero along the side of the body and underneath.
Yokohama first started experimenting with fins on the inner sidewall in late 2012 and found that they decreased drag in the wheel well. The latest design had the help of a supercomputer at a Japanese university. Now, the company is placing the angled airfoils around the outer shoulder to find more improvements. In motion, the stabilizers help reduce drag when at the top of the rotation, "while suppressing vehicle aerodynamic lift when on the lower part of the tire," according to the company...more...

fins-on-rubber-tire-1.jpg

[wuchan]

F1 don't have it, we don't need it. Gimmick.

[Coligny]

F1 don't have it, we don't need it. Gimmick.

F1 have open wheels... Once you have fenders and mudguards rules change...

But anything that increase unsuspended mass might sux... And rim design might be more important. Most speed records cars have flat faceplate on their rim to deal with turbulences. Notably the Audi TT bimoto and the Maybach Fulda Excelero.
Now of course if you are like Renault for the Alpine V6 GTA you shape your rims like turbine to suck air out to help with cooling the brakes (might have helped with ground effect too... But the brakes not catching fire anymore was definatuly the first goal...)

Now if they could bring back fender skirts...

[yanpa]

What application(s) does this have for the humble mamachari?

[wuchan]

F1 don't have it, we don't need it. Gimmick.

F1 have open wheels... Once you have fenders and mudguards rules change...

But anything that increase unsuspended mass might sux... And rim design might be more important. Most speed records cars have flat faceplate on their rim to deal with turbulences. Notably the Audi TT bimoto and the Maybach Fulda Excelero.
Now of course if you are like Renault for the Alpine V6 GTA you shape your rims like turbine to suck air out to help with cooling the brakes (might have helped with ground effect too... But the brakes not catching fire anymore was definatuly the first goal...)

Now if they could bring back fender skirts...

Nascar don' got it either......


All jokes aside, NASCAR cars are the most advanced real cars in racing today. No lap tops. No engine mods during the race. Five lug wheels. If they needed tyre fins, they would have had them years ago.


To me it seems like the typical Japanese company straw grab when they figure out that they are behind by ten or so years.

[Coligny]

Nascar are not road legal and tubular chassis...


I'd watch more toward S1600, S2000 and WRC spec cars for the most advanced vehicles....
Road legal and gave us the Ur Quattro... (Ok, it was Group B back then)