Tell me how fast have you gone? I ran it up to 135 but not sure the spoiler helped at all. I am going to remove the fuse, I would rather it just stay down. The car looks more stylish that way. Just my 2 cents. :-)

 

The thing works or it wouldn't be there. You think the bean counters would allow such a thing if it weren't in their financial best interests? :|

 

well i know for the Audi TT.
the first cars didn't have the rear spoiler.
and they had many accidents in europe with the rear being loose at higher speeds.
and by higher i mean over 60 mph.
till Audi eventually acknowledged the design flaw and fitted the rear spoiler that is now on all TTs.
at least with the crossfire when you are parked you don't have this huge wing up.
also the boxster has it,
so does the 911, SLR etc
i am sure the porsche designers knew what they were doing.
i wish ours was like the SLR.
if you brake hard the rear wind deploys at 90 digress to the bodywork and acts as an air brake.

 

I believe the rear end was not an issue being loose until over 100 mph on the TT. Andrew is spot on that it was designed for the 150 mph autobahn driver and they just kept it for aesthetics in US, rather than additional expense to delete it.
I love this car but it is not a 911.

 

Ian,
Good idea! looks over safety. ...just make sure your no where around my area when you decide to try to cheat Physics 101 at 135+ mph...
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Typhoon,

Since you seem to want a detailed answer your going to have to get a hold of a tech/designer etc. to get this info. I think there's a general understanding from these posts that. :

1) Being the Crossfire price is middle of the road for a small sporty coupe = R+D costs must equal function.

2) Given the facts of a deployment speed, general shape of car, other like shaped cars (i.e. Audi TT) that w/o the spoiler had handling issues; the Crossfire spoiler must add some increase in downforce pressure which is enough to operate the car at higher speeds.

Again, yes these answers are general but to my knowledge no one here helped design or build the Crossfire so educated possible guesses are the best your going to get...

 

actually there were 2 accidents of the TT in England of drivers who were driving well below the speed limit. The audi TT and the crossfire share similarities in the rear end which produces lift, because of their rounded shape.

and you need the spoiler to create downforce.

it is not a coincidence that all cars which have an electronic rear spoiler activate it around 60 mph (crossfire, SLR) 75 for the boxtser.

so if you pull the fuse and go around 90 mph, you are asking for trouble, and good luck explaining to the insurance agent that you preferred the looks without the spoiler.

 

my unwanted two cents i'm sure...but at 125+, the spoiler is VERY noticeable.

i've gotten up to speeds of 140 mph, and chickened out. that's a visit to jail i would like to avoid. =P

xf_newskool
04' coupe
white/6 speed
20' dub trump's w/p245/30zr20 bf goodrich kdw g-force t/a's
what?

 

Kmarei,
I understand the argument of wanting to counter act the rear end lift.
but...
What speed limit in europe?... the accidents you speak of were driver error not directly attributed to rear end lift?
Last time I checked, if you go around 90 mph in the US, you are asking for trouble but not from a retracted spoiler.
Hey, does anyone have statistics on what speed that you should be concerned when rear end lift occurs? If it is 100+/- then I guess I don't have to worry to much.

 

But again...looking at the big picture

If major rear end lift does not occur till around 100 or so mph then why the automatic deployment at the lower speeds?

Also as I think more about this, do a search on the fixed vs. retractable spoiler threads in the forum which talks about the most likely theory of why they put a fixed wing on mine and a retractable one on yours for some answers...

Also, just in the fact my coupe runs at least $10k or so more in cost then yours, one would think that the more complex and $$ spoiler setup (yours) would be on mine and my fixed run-of-the-mill wing would be on yours if downforce pressure did not play a major role.

 

Respdoc,
I believe that the automatic deployment is set at an ultra conservative speed. If set at speeds which would actually be functional, most US drivers would never see it.
What is the theory behind fixed vs. retractable? I would assume that the SRT is fixed as the speeds on average are faster than the base model. You are right in that one would assume that the more expensive model would have the more elaborate spoiler.

 

It's probably true about the deployment being set on the conservative but would see where the proper downforce pressure would play a role in highway type speeds (~75-80 mph or so).

The theory says basically if you gun the SRT the wing would not have enough time to deploy before the problems without having that downforce pressure in the rear would occur.

Off topic but where is your location, Sleepy Hollow at? I lived in parts of the Upstate NY area (Rochester, Wayland)...nice area...

 

It's probably true about the deployment being set on the conservative but would see where the proper downforce pressure would play a role in highway type speeds (~75-80 mph or so).

The theory says basically if you gun the SRT the wing would not have enough time to deploy before the problems without having that downforce pressure in the rear would occur.

Off topic but where is your location, Sleepy Hollow at? I lived in parts of the Upstate NY area (Rochester, Wayland)...nice area...
__________________
Sleepy hollow is on the Hudson River about 30 min. outside NYC...

I see you have the H&R spacers... do you have pics? I believe a post stated that the 20mm would be too much - any thoughts?

 

I can't believe you guys have sooo much free time to waste talking about a stupid spoiler, that probably doesn't do any thing in the first place. You guys need to get over it...get a woman their much warmer and built for performance if you find the right model... LOL. No disrespect to the community... Just can't figure it out.

 

Ahhhh, the first dart is thrown. Time to get out the armor.
Ian, I wonder why you are wasting time reading & replying to this post? I believe the community exists for discussions, right?
Anyway, ignorance is bliss - you did confirm my suspicions for starting this post?

 

I think the downforce is not needed at 60-65 mph when it deploys. But the wing needs some time to come up. At full acceleration, it starts to deploy and is ready at high speed where it's needed. That may be the reason why the warning beep comes later.
Driving straight roads is probably no problem. Autobahn with no speed limit still have curves. And I don't want to risk any loss of traction at 140 mph!

The difference between the regular wing and the SRT bar is just to silhouette the SRT against the regular. There's no big difference in vmax ... +5km/h can not be the cause for that ironing board.

 

Since today is my day off I will waste my time as I please...


What are you still posting here for?...I thought you were making plans on how to turn your Crossfire into a tree ornament...

 

While the SRT wing does make the car look more pronounced, I still think there's more of a reason besides just for looks...

BTW...isn't the base/limited wings pretty square and flat without any sort of grooves?...If either spoiler would make a better ironing board it would be yours.

 

it's just for the look, IMO. Both do quite the same vmax. The regular 250km/h and the SRT is blocked at 255km/h. So, where should be reason?

Quote:

Originally Posted by respdoc

BTW...isn't the base/limited wings pretty square and flat without any sort of grooves?...If either spoiler would make a better ironing board it would be yours.

Ha ha ha, I was waiting for that...

 

well, you play with girls, this is what you get. TY why are you so sensitive? no one else is.

 

I think ANDREW gave the definitive answer when he said, Chrysler highly advertised this car as being autobahn tested at 150 mph. It has to have it at that speed. CHXF made a very good point about it coming up at 65 to give it a head start before it reaches a speed where it's really needed. I think we are all in agreement that "down force" is a good thing at any speed. How much down force that is created by the pop up wing at 65 mph? As I said, at the start of this thread, I thought I read somewhere it was 40 lbs. at 65 mph. Because I remember thinking to myself at the time, that's only two bowling *****. I am sure the down force naturally goes up as speed increases. At what point the down force becomes so great as to affect MPG, I don't know. From everything I've read and witnessed over the years it seems that fast back, slope back, turtle back, slant back styling (what ever) generally improves a cars aerodynamics enough to give it an edge over a notch back (flat trunk) car. But along with its advantages, a fast back seems to experience more "lift" at a similar high speed. Chrysler discovered this with their 1966 Hemi powered Chargers on the Super speedways like Daytona. The remedy was to install a very small vertical spoiler. On the other hand, Pony cars used in the Trans Am race series in the 60's & 70's spent a great deal of time going around curves and on the straights at substantially slower speeds, and yet they all used some sort of spoiler or wing to give them an edge. It even works on non-fast backs too. The alternative? A car that looks like a Porsche 917 race car, or Fords mid-engined racer the J-car, in other words, extend the back of the car out so far that it would be impractical for highway use. That's why practically every high performance sports car built since the early 60's has used some sort of spoiler, wing, or duck-tail to finish it off (at least when the cars were raced). Now I'm not an engineer and these are only my opinions, but I don't think you're going to go spinning off the road at any speed higher than 70 mph just because you choose to deactivate your wing. I do think Chrysler thinks it's in your best interest to let the wing operate the way they intended it. But since we still live in a free society, to each his own.