An investigation of the sensitivity of rear wing orientation for saloon race cars

There is very little published data available to enable the potential aerodynamic impact of the addition of a rear mounted wing on a racing salon car to be predicted with any confidence. A series of wind tunnel tests using a generic scale model of a typical racing saloon are reported in which the aerodynamic load changes as the result of introducing a simple rectangular planform untwisted wing into the region above the boot deck were measured for a range of wing positions and angle of incidence. The wing is seen to modify the flow structure in the near wake separation region behind the vehicle rear window. There is limited correlation between the aerodynamic lift experienced by the wing itself and the change in lift on the complete vehicle, but there is no apparent correlation for corresponding changes in drag coefficient.