I can't believe i'm saying this as i've been a background lurker reading your posts about your hill climb exploits for years.

But i have to pull you up about the cosworths.

Small turbo escort cossies were available without the obligatory whale tail, and some just had the boot lip spoiler fitted as well as different rear springs

Hence if someone was pedantic they might be able to bend the rules.

i suppose now would be a bad time to ask about scottish hill climbs and whether 1.9 pugs are worth while

 

IMHO every mod on that car adds up and makes the car look horrid. Also, the other cars with spoilers off, including AndyF "fastest Impreza" also look pretty bad without a spoiler. I've owned and then modded an old WRX with a std pancake to an sti5 spoiler, the top speed drops 5 mph with the bigger spoiler but this is more than made up with the better looks of it. 99% of the big spoilers is about looks not performance, so if you want to go faster lose the spoiler, if you want the looks go for the spoiler. BTW every Impreza I've owned has had the bigger spoiler, it's not a 'proper Impreza' without one.

 

Going back to the post about the effectiveness of the Evo's spoiler, just a glance tells you it's much more a working device than on a classic Scoob. IIRC on the Evo 6 Maks didn't they have adjustable attack angle as standard? Might be muddling it with something else, but the Evo spoilers have always been much more of a sharp leading edge wing attached by two struts to get it closer to roof height rather than a one piece oversized pram handle.

Luckily it's all academic for me anyway as I have a wagon and my roofline spoiler simply separates the airflow off the roof more cleanly rather than letting it create a low pressure zone over the tailgate. Don't get me started on the midline spoiler - I thought they died with the Fiesta 'Flight'.

 

It's a good job we all think differently, i removed my spoiler to make the car more stealthy..... les boy racer ish..... i was the first to add the bmw lip, people on here mocked me when i said about it.... but people have now copied me.......

 

Of course we all think differently. I left the original spoiler on my MY00 for the 'stealthy look', I got bored with the plain looks after 8 months and got a P1 spoiler. IMHO the Impreza doesn't look right without a high spoiler, I'm not saying this is the correct look or not for everyone.

BTW what's your reason for having a spoiler at all apart from looks?

 

I didn't like the rounded egde on the boot, hence the lip.... it just takes the blandness away..... but keeps it discrete... it also helps me not having holes in my bootlid for water to eet in..... that drove me mad!! no matter what i did i couldn;t stop it....

 

Rob (878) I'm talking of the Sierra Cossie. I'm pretty sure all of them had the huge spoiler.
The huge tailgate and that spoiler adds to quite a tally, but my hillclimbi Sierra Cossie friend who I used to race against in my early years swore it worked, but I'm not so sure.

Wether also you like the look of the spoiler-free Impreza is not the question here; Rob is looking to minimise weight, not win the beauty pagent.

Personally I think the cars can look bland and much depends on the colour of the car. IMHO you can easily get away with it in white.

Beuaty is in the eyes of the beholder.

 

well mine came out the factory like this

and thats the way its staying but i can also understand others who
want the big spoiler look

 

Easy then, minimal weight = no spoiler.... BUT, if you remove it, it'd be worth removing the cable on the interior boot opener, as otherwise the boot lid will want to jump into the back seat of the car when you open it, i bolted lead to the inner skin of mine, but that would defeat the object here..... so, remove the cable, and open with the key only.... Carefully!!!!

 

there was a good article in practical performance car about spoilers, and they used subarus as an example. in theory one of the best designed spoilers was the prodrive one for the subaru iirc. it was not just down to downforce created, but also how cleanly the air broke away from the back of the car. so weight was offset by aerodynamics and air flow.

 

I remember talking to some of the Escort Cosworth guys at a show the other year and they said that the ones that came without the spoiler either ended up written off or quickly had the spoiler fitted because the things were just deadly without the down force over the back end.

Didn't the Gobstopper snap its wing in half on a high-speed run? Which is why it had the strengthening vanes put in it?

I guess the only thing you can do it take it off and do some runs - maybe there are some more open hillclimb courses were the spoiler would be handy, were its just a hindrance on slower, tighter courses?

 

I was commenting on the Evo

 

Suppose thats what makes us different as i think they have cleaner lines without and its nice to be able to see whats going on behind on trackdays

 

OP - would you be allowed to fit an adjustable spoiler under the hill climbign rules ? just a thought that if you had something that allowed you to add downforce at lower speeds, it may be more useful, and you could try different settings to see what worked best for different courses.

 

It's a 'spoiler' because it 'spoils' the airflow over the rear of the car which would otherwise try to hug the boot and create lift. In other words, it assists high speed stability but does not produce downforce (unlike some of the adjustable wings fitted to Evos). Don't know about drag, though.

Ditto the tiny wing fitted to the Audi TT and the little pop-up jobbies that Porsches deploy at higher speed. They are spoilers, not wings.

Andy F (lip spoiler) or Paul at Zen (big wing) will have interesting views on this

Richard.

 

Did anyone see that top gear episode when they crashed the koenigsegg, the stig apparently said if it had a rear wing it would be by far the quickest. It came back with a very small version of the spoiler on yours and was 2 seconds quicker. I think in hill climbing though it would be hard to notice dude, like we said cedar straight is the only place it would really help.

 

Which when taken flat out with the rumble strip under the sump on the kink like we do is the most dangerous part of any hill climb so thats where I would want the help. I don't want to find out the hard way that it doesn't work.

But 5 kilos as you know at the stage my car is in is a massive amount (without spending money).

I will beat you either way so it doesn't really matter. W000o00o0o0o0o!

 

i feel a few people in this thread should put down the medicine and try to get back to the point of weather or not this spoiler will help the chap on a hill climb, not what looks "proper waxa" outside mcdonalds

as i said above, i noticed a large difference in the rain drop patterns on my back screen while "testing"

this spoiler pictured here

had the rain drops coming down the back screen and flicking upwards off the back end really well, it was quite impressive, but i sold it and went back to the standard mid level sti4 style one. it also felt a LOT more stable once over 70mph

while sorting the bodywork out i did drive it about a bit while spoiler less but never over 100, it did feel a little bit different to me

 

another point to make is the cars that came without spoilers as standard were never intended to go very fast anyway (jap restrictor)

 

There are 3 objectives being considered here:
1
Remove weight, and removal of (any) spoiler will achieve that.
2
If removed, will stability be impared on a high speed section of a hillclimb competition.(speeds about 90 mph max, but at Shelsley Rob hit 116 mph in the blue Zen car iirc). I too would like to be sure the car is stable...the track is only 12 feet wide.
3
The racing rule Book (The Blue Book) does state that the siloette (sp) above the centre of the car must remain as supplied (or words like that).
That technically prevents you fitting a wing like the Zen TA car or maybe removing the stock wing (sorry, spoiler) as the Sti RA V3's all had spoilers (?)

When McRae rallied the 4 door Impreza, the car had a low level spoiler, as in very low level. Was that because of homologation, marketing reasons or it stabilised the car at speed?

 

I did three hillclimbs in 2006 without the spoiler, some fast corners above 70mph and some straights where you could wring it right out in 4th 130mph plus. Also have driven the car at speed above 150mph and the car never felt unstable compared to having the spoiler.

I will be running without a spoiler again in 2008, but then again the leading car- 800 bhp Lancia Intergrale has a custom wing which sits about three feet above the rear of his roofline-so maybe a proper wing ala ZEN would work rather than the aesthetically pleasing Subaru spoilers.

I still think it looks better without.

 

What was the front bumper off? iirc it was Sti 5??
Also, you were not to low to the ground from pics of the car you posted at the time?

 

I think it was this photo. The front bumper was already on the car. I think it was the standard WRX bumper cut 2/3 way down and an Sti lip added on.

It feels heavy, so maybe this could be something to modify/change for something lighter - if i can do it cheaply!!

 

It does look low - it has the Whiteline superlow suspension, but I only very ocassionally scraped the bumper or the exhaust on speed humps or driveways meant for normal cars Never any problems while hillclimbing even with some rubbish courses, narrow, bumpy and with dips in the road.

It was lower at the rear until I took off the MRT exhaust and replaced it with the Buddy Club system. Amazing what a 20 kilo lighter exhaust system will do.

 

That was the pic I could remember, thanks.

TSL over here make a very light exhaust system, £1000 mind with slip joints etc, sport cat too.

Loosing weight is very expensive

Happy New Year!