Dam-it

"Jesse Shaffer" (7esse) 11/11/2014 at 21:06 • Filed to: None

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Even with the bumper off and the bug-eye turned up to 11, personally, I think this is one of the sexiest Chrysler products on the road. I don’t think I’m going to get too many people to agree with me, even if they dig my wheels. It’s not hard to build such hubris in your own whip. Anything that draws blood tends to get respect, and this car has pierced me more times than I care to recant.

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When I would look the car over after the build was running, any photos from similar angles used to make me cringe. It took me about a month and a half before I realized that I needed an air dam. At first, it was just the charge pipe awkwardly dangling in front of me that I found distracting. Then, I started high-speed trials.

Before:

After:

That’s when I realized that, on my car, this thing actually had a function! I didn’t understand jack-squat about aero back then. This was real-world Black Magic 101. Bolting on this hand-made beauty gave me benefits on two fronts.

First, IAT (intake air temperature) dropped immediately upon installation. I mean, it was a decent percentage and noticeable even on the butt-dyno. What I had actually done by clearing out some of the air in and around the engine bay at-speed was to create a low-pressure zone behind the inter-cooler. This allowed a larger over-all volume of air to work over the fins and further cool the hot-side air coming through the tubes and in to the heat-exchanger.

Second, the car was much more stable with speed. As I breached what were probably factory-tested MPH, the car would start walking all over the road.

The tires don’t even get !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! traction until around 100 mph, in any gear. By about 135 you basically needed an air-strip, this beast moved around so much. Getting some of the airflow out from under the car was immediately noticeable here, as well. Having 35 mph of usable power is not ideal.

Crafting this thing was simple. I made a quick cardboard mock-up/template to get the bolt holes where they needed to be.

Road-tested it for clearance

Bought a strip of steel from True Value. Cut the metal, bent it at the bottom for some style and painted it for some stealth. That was it.

In the beginning, I was trying for a sleeper look. Yeah, that didn’t work out. You can hear the car coming from over a country-mile (miles with hills and other sound deafening stuff) away. The look on people’s faces when this teensy-weensy crap can comes around the corner, instead of the lifted diesel pickup that they expected to see... well, it’s just worth it. So, I wasn’t too disappointed when all of the paint started chipping off the air dam (because that’s what paint does this close to the road,) and just stripped the stainless back to its former glory.

I also thought ahead and used long bolts with washers and springs to save my lower-lip from getting bent on parking stops and other mis-calculations. I gave myself about ten degrees of aft movement, which has proven more than plenty. You can see this set-up in the after pic if you look closely.

All-in-all, I’d call this simple little side-project a success. Got forced induction and a front-mount? Dam-it!

Boxer_4 > Jesse Shaffer 11/11/2014 at 21:24

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The first gen Neon can look good. They need to be in bright colors.

Jesse Shaffer > Boxer_4 11/11/2014 at 21:30

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NYG ACR cars are most neonites' holy grail.

All Hail Spaceball > Jesse Shaffer 11/18/2014 at 14:03

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Where do I go for resources on simple modifications like this for my forced-induction car (S60 R)? I don't wanna sift through loads of fake science to get to real tips. Also how do I get out of the grey?

Jesse Shaffer > All Hail Spaceball 11/18/2014 at 17:33

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Man, I wish I could tell you. I have a selective focusing issue and no legal or affordable way to deal with it, so I pretty much read about transportation 90% of the time I'm awake. I don't mean to sound pompous, but if you'd like I can set up a forced induction or advanced propulsion blog on Kinja and just start pouring some of this shit back out over there. It'd help if I knew what areas you're curious about..

I'm not trying to say I know it all, but I do have a bit of real world knowledge to back me up.

All Hail Spaceball > Jesse Shaffer 11/18/2014 at 18:13

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That would be fantastic! I'll follow you and patiently await the resulting articles. You don't sound pompous at all.

Richtofen, Baron von Pickup > Jesse Shaffer 11/20/2014 at 10:57

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You've caused me to start shopping for a cheap Neon that will double as my DD and homebound hooning device. I'll be watching for your next installment on the engine work you've done to get it running at its peak.

Jesse Shaffer > Richtofen, Baron von Pickup 11/21/2014 at 06:59

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YES. This was my only goal, gladly achieved! It's not as a shitty as people claim, and will bring you happiness so long as you're good enough to not crash it head-on!