I was making some coffee just now and some words came into my head, The Gurney Flap.
You have to be of a certain age to remember the American F1 driver Dan Gurney but was it actually that man who invented it? seems it was.
Roy
Dan Gurney, France 1964.
Please open the link above for a heck of a read!
Gurney Flap was named after Dan Gurney who invented it. He was the driver and constructor of the Eagle F1 cars (the one in banner of my site) and Eagle Indy cars.
You have to be of a certain age to remember the American F1 driver Dan Gurney but was it actually that man who invented it? seems it was.
Roy
Gurney Flap on the Eagle
Dan Gurney Was One of the Genuine All-Time Great Drivers, But Perhaps His Biggest Contribution to Motorsport was the Provision of Extra Rear-End Down Force With Minimal Aerodynamic Disturbance.
By Keith Howard, Motorsport Magazine, England, September 2000
Few people, even the greats of motorsport, get to have their moniker attached to something they invented. Colin Chapman, perhaps the greatest innovator of them all, had only the Chapman strut named after him, and that was hardly his finest creation. For a driver-turned-team owner to enjoy the privilege is virtually unknown. There's no Brabham caliper or Surtees inlet, for instance, or Prost linkage come to that. But there is a Gurney Flap, named after Dan Gurney - a device, moreover, which has retained its currency in a way that Chapman's minimalist rear suspension never did.
If you understand anything of aerodynamics you'll know what a flap is: a (generally) hinged device at the trailing edge of a wing which can be lowered to increase lift when an aircraft is taking off or landing. The prolonged whirring you often hear a few minutes before a commercial airliner touches down is the flaps being deployed: large, hydraulically-actuated auxiliary surfaces which sprout from the rear of the wing and curl down like a crooked finger.
- See more at: http://allamericanracers.com/the-gurney-flap/#sthash.b3guqZgo.dpufPlease open the link above for a heck of a read!
Gurney Flap was named after Dan Gurney who invented it. He was the driver and constructor of the Eagle F1 cars (the one in banner of my site) and Eagle Indy cars.
If you adopt this device on a single element wing, its effect is phenomenal.
This device has retained its value in a way that Chapman's minimalist rear suspension never did.
Now why did I think of a Gurney Flap?
Winning ways and back in 1968, today such flaps are on all race cars, plus air planes of course.
This has nothing to do with boats, or does it, what about those crazy Americas Cup racing boats today, flying on foils and at 40 knots!
http://www.formula1-dictionary.net/gurney_flap.html
Winning ways and back in 1968, today such flaps are on all race cars, plus air planes of course.
This has nothing to do with boats, or does it, what about those crazy Americas Cup racing boats today, flying on foils and at 40 knots!
I well remember these cars, great days for F1 motorsport in many ways.
American F1 cars and drivers just do not exist now, why I wonder, even F1 Mercedes have their cars built in England!
Roy
A Micheal Turner painting, the Eagle F1 at Spa, Belgium.
Click on the pictures, they should enlarge, the painting will become full screen size, its magnificent!
