I understand the aerodynamic principles that make spoilers important for performance cars (at least in broad strokes), but I have always wondered if they actually make a big difference in cars that are not so performance oriented, especially fwd commuter cars. I know that aero is less effective at slow speeds, so I would also like to know at what speeds spoilers really give an advantage?
Thanks in advance for sharing your knowledge!
In: Engineering
On regular cars, the spoilers are mostly a cosmetic visual thing. They must have a specific shape to create aerodynamic forces, and lot’s of them don’t. But I’m sure there are some that actually do the job.
Other than that, many regular cars with spoilers are front wheel drive, where a spoiler on the rear end is less useful (they are most useful for RWD cars to prevent the tires slipping during aggressive cornering, and on FWD, the rear wheels are less likely to slip since they are not driven and can spin freely as they need)
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