Talk:Spoiler (car)

Unhelpful distinction between wings
"A spoiler['s] intended design function [...] leads to increased drag." "[...]As such, rather than decreasing drag, automotive wings actually increase drag."

This explains nothing, and only confuses me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.239.191.4 (talk) 09:20, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

Lack of variety in photos
There's two F1 pictures now and all three picrures show rear spoilers. Would there be lid/lip, roof or front spoilers? Ferrari F40 pictures show something but the nice front of Ferrari F50 or Ferrari Enzo Ferrari isn't shown very well in the article photos. Formula cars might have most clear front spoilers, though, despite being somewhat different than those on more normal cars. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.216.199.14 (talk) 15:31, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Mileage effects
What are the published mileage effects

are their any slipstream modifiers that generate lift to give higher mileage while a vehicles computer reduces the risk of a tippier vehicle —Preceding unsigned comment added by 140.211.138.126 (talk) 03:56, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Roof spoilers?
I know there is a class of car racing that usually has a giant spoiler on the roof with vertical fins on both sides of the spoiler (I think the fins are asymmetrical for some reason). I picture these cars as being off-road or at least being fairly bulkey-looking. What kinds of cars are these? Why this particular spoiler design? Are the vertical fins really asymmetric? —BenFrantzDale 13:35, 22 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Certain types of sprint car (US) and F1 stock cars (UK) feature large asymmetrical roof-mounted spoilers. The asymmetry is coz they only ever turn left. Mr Larrington (talk) 14:08, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

There is a difference between a wing and a spoiler. A wing (aerofoil) is designed to increase downforce and in doing so increases the drag coefficient of the car. A spoiler has no effect on the downforce; most are constructed too flimsily to transmit the necessary force. It instead changes the separation point of the airflow across the car and so improves the aerodynamic properties by reducing pressure drag.

Anyone else notice that the Diffuser article link doesn't lead anywhere? -Psycadelc 3 May 2006
 * Because the article hasn't been created and written yet Sparky132 13:37, 15 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Somebody went and wrote a Wing (automotive) article, with no sources at all. It took me a few seconds to find 20+ books that say a rear spoiler is the same thing as a wing. So I redirectedd it back here and added mention that the terms can be interchangeable, with a citation. I can add many more if needed. If there is any expert who says a wing is different in some way than a spoiler, it will need a citation to go with it. But even then, most car experts disagree. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 21:22, 3 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Of course wings aren't spoilers, and neither are air dams (or for that matter, diffusers). However the motoring press has thoroughly mixed them all by now, so we might as well have one single article that tries to answer the questions for all of them, in one place.
 * Within this article though, we really do need to distinguish between creating downforce and Kamm tails for reducing drag. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:14, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

spoiler spoils...
Spoilers simply spoil unfavorable airflow. Spoilers aren't intended to actually generate any kind of lift/downforce. Thats what wings do. Just re-affirming the other guy.RCHM 18:50, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

this is quite true. and sadly, the misconception is vast. i just did a short internet research stint and found only ONE person, a jet pilot in some car forum, that knew what spoilers actually did, and i quote "prevent slip stream from wrapping onto the rear quarters". unfortunately, i'm in the middle of procrastinating from writing a journal paper right now and haven't the time to correct this. perhaps i will someday. but being that this whole article is wrong, it's gonna take some doin'. in short: spoilers detach the airflow at the rear of the car to decrease drag. have nothing to do with lift. that's what wings are for. camaros had spoilers. if there's space between it and the car, it's a wing. can't trip a boundary layer if you're above it.

i also find humor in the fact that the beginning of this article ALMOST states that... and then we go on to see numerous pictures of wings. being called spoilers. this is why people make fun of wiki... -Heterodoxus 20:18, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
 * you can even see this in the picture on Spoiler (aeronautics). of course, those spoilers are on wings. cars aren't wings. 'cept maybe the superbird. but that was a long time ago. and they don't make cars like that anymore...
 * -Heterodoxus 20:28, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Six years later and this article is still wrong in so many ways. The problem is coming from the manufacturer's sales talk, I think. As others have said here, a wing is not a spoiler, an air dam isn't a spoiler, and those stupid decorative whatzis on the trunk lids of so many cars today aren't spoilers, except in name. XyKyWyKy (talk) 19:02, 15 March 2013 (UTC)
 * recent cites offered by Dennis_Bratland are show where publishing material from a car manufacturer is using wing and spoiler interchangeably, despite the two applications having a different, and even contradictory function. it seems like he finds the terms to be different in semantics only, such as a 'motor' vs an 'engine'. I disagree with this comparison; even if motor and engine are considered separately, their described functions are related and not contradictory. A spoiler and a wing can have completely opposing functions, so I find it difficult to consider their difference merely semantic. Clearly, this article needs some engineering citations above and beyond the publishing materials from a car manufacturer, which is overwhelmingly what the citations currently consist of. --RCHM (talk) 22:40, 3 June 2014 (UTC)
 * In the vernacular, engine and motor are the same. According to some more technical definitions, they're different. It's not an "error" to use the terms in the vernacular. That's simply how language works. Specialists sometimes have more finely-grained terminology than non-specialists.As far as wings and spoilers, the same situation may be the case, although I would still wait to be shown reliable sources which actually tell us that -- technically -- they are different. I especially wonder about this because the books I saw that use the terms interchangeable were moderately technical in nature. Once we have appropriate sources, we can say that this group of experts use the terms interchangeably, while these other experts define them differently. It's not a problem; you simply report whatever the sources say. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 03:34, 4 June 2014 (UTC)
 * its not a question of how language works in the vernacular, but I struggle to come up with an example of an engine and a motor describing completely mutually exclusive things such that using them interchangeably is wrong. I can come up with such an example with wing vs spoiler; generating lift and spoiling undesired airflow are not mutually inclusive things.
 * also, the issue i see is that the cites used to assert their interchangeability is sales promotional material, and changes seem to not take into account the discussion here, especially when below here user DF7 gave a much better cite of what a wing is/does in an automotive context and that a spoiler is not a wing. . RCHM (talk) 19:38, 11 June 2014 (UTC)
 * If you have the sources now, then there's no problem. Wing (automotive) sat there, for some reason, for 6 years without a single source. If you've got the sources now, then use them. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 21:29, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

I did a rough rewrite of the sections explaining what spoilers are and how they work. It's incredible how much misinformation there is online about aerodynamics which is why it's generally not a good idea to put too much faith in random websites. Just a quick glance through a book on race car aerodynamics will show that the old article had a lot of misinformation. Right now all I had time for was to try to fix the blatant errors from memory and I by no means did a good or complete overhaul of the article, which I think will need to be done at some point. Also, most the pictures show wings not spoilers, but I just corrected the descriptions for now. I didn't add any references since I don't have the books with me now, but "Race Car Aerodynamics" by Joseph Katz and "Competition Car Aerodynamics" by Simon McBeath are where I got most of what I wrote. DF7 (talk) 11:04, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I just looked up this article to cite as a reference on the difference between a wing and a spoiler. However, the three first pictures in this spoiler article are of wings, and 11 of the 12 reference pictures on the bottom of the page are of wings. I could go on a binge replacing those pictures, but I suspect it might meet some resistance - i.e. there must be a reason for all the wing pictures having persisted for years(?)


 * Aleistad (talk) 12:40, 12 January 2012 (UTC)


 * The pictures have been in this article because nobody has corrected them! There are still many issues with many articles! OK - so this is an example of a spoiler, not a "wing" - CZmarlin (talk) 15:19, 12 January 2012 (UTC) 1971 AMC Javelin AMX red MD reartail.jpg

This article badly needs most of its pictures either removed or relabled. It makes a point of drawing a distinction between spoilers and wings early on but the only spoilers pictured are the Porsche ducktail and whaletail -- and both of those are large enough that they might create downforce. The article needs to have the majority of those photos removed and have a couple of photos of trunk lip spoilers inserted. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.182.6.198 (talk) 15:03, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

Passenger Vehicles
This section was edited on 3.18.2007. The previous content did not make a clear distiction between commercially decorative spoilers and actual spoilers. A pictoral example should be provided of what common passeger vehicle spoilers are. A pictoral diagram should be provided to show how spoilers work and a more detailed description should compliment that. J.A.T.

Massive deletion
This article has picked up a lot of misinformation due to confusion between spoilers and wings as discussed above. I've decided to be bold and tear it all out. I also think the article could benefit from the help of an expert in industry or physics. — NRen2k5 (TALK), 21:21, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Missing section on Kamm tail
Given that the application of spoilers to road cars is a German invention (unless anyone can go even earlier), there's an important note missing on the granddaddy of them all, the Kamm tail.

Another few minor, but significant, examples would be the early '70s Renault 17 and Avenger Tiger, both of which were very early examples of the mass-market bootlid spoiler. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:09, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

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history?
there is no proper "history" section, detailing the development of the device? (the brief history of its use "on porsches" is not sufficient; in that it only deals with porsches ...:P

Lx 121 (talk) 15:30, 22 October 2017 (UTC)


 * As far as wings for racing and similar go, there were the stubby little ones mounted either side of the cockpit of one of the Opel RAK rocket cars of the 1920s (though whether they were effective is another question entirely) and round about the same time a letter was published in a British motorsport magazine suggesting the use of inverted wings to create downforce, which I may have read in Alan Henry's history of the British GP or the first volume of William Court's “Power And Glory”. Or somewhere else entirely.  The first proper attempt of which I'm aware was by Swiss brothers Pierre and Michael May who mounted a large wing on struts above the cockpit of their Porsche Spyder circa 1955, but the scrutineers of the event in which they were hoping to compete – IIRC it was a hillclimb – made them remove it and the idea wasn’t followed up.  The Michael May in question was the same bloke who subsequently designed the “Fireball” cylinder heads for the Jaguar V12 engine. Mr Larrington (talk) 02:05, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

Would someone add photos of actual spoilers? All photos show spoiler mounted on cars.
. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.4.109.15 (talk) 23:30, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

Air dams as method of increased cooling is missing.
What immediately comes to mind are Corvettes, Firebirds and Camaros. The air dam at the front is at the same plane as the cooler an directs additional air to it. At least that's what I've heard and makes sense to me.--Tobias ToMar Maier (talk) 19:36, 28 August 2022 (UTC)