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Crash bar

MagnetiseST

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#41
I did all that stuff too except for CF hood. I rarely street drive my car - most street miles are to/from tracks. It's 17.5lbs roughly and that IS a lot of weight off a 2,700lb car.
Sure, for a car that is rarely driven on the street. We have one of these on our race car and we only drive it to / from the track and the occasional spin around town. Again I would not recommend these crash bars to the vast majority of the forum who use their cars as their daily driver.
 


Magnetic

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#42
You are running a light bar, mounted behind the grille, blocking airflow to the radiator? I'd assume any decrease in airflow utilizing the stock set up would result in higher temps, but it heavily depends on what you are doing with the car. Mountain driving? Autox? Track? Street driving?

I realize front end real estate on the FiST is limited, you can get the Rally Innovations mount, or make your own that mounts the light bar lower, in front of the crash beam and bumper cover.
Not currently but a lot of us on this thread are considering running the light bar behind the grill for stealth purposes. Works when you need it and doesn't show when you don't. So that's all of our concern and why some are considering the aftermarket crash bar.

Also having the bar mounted outside the grill probably would be good for aero.
 


MagnetiseST

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#43
Also having the bar mounted outside the grill probably would be good for aero.
Pick your poison. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

Put the light bar in and get a radiator, if you really want to mount the bar behind the grille. I genuinely do not think that you will see any difference in operating temperatures using a tubular crash bar with the stock radiator. You are only freeing up the space that is covered by the filled in part of the grille. If you shave the grille you gain that area, but negatively affect the aero and air flow through the engine bay.
 


Magnetic

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#44
Pick your poison. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

Put the light bar in and get a radiator, if you really want to mount the bar behind the grille. I genuinely do not think that you will see any difference in operating temperatures using a tubular crash bar with the stock radiator. You are only freeing up the space that is covered by the filled in part of the grille. If you shave the grille you gain that area, but negatively affect the aero and air flow through the engine bay.
Yeah I've already got a solid radiator. I'll be testing this in AZ 120+* summer next year and will provide actual data so we can FINALLY know if it in fact will harm or help.

I agree with a good radiator it may not make much of a difference. But with OEM it's iffy.
 


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#45
in racing you want to block off the radiator as much as possible along with any other holes on the front of the car while still getting the cooling you need. when it comes to crashes. on a track there are no trees or sharp points that you can hit making things like this safe. on the street you can tag a pole and mess up the unibody with something like that. there's always a trade off. I don't want to remove highly engineered and tested part like that for the sake of very little gain. I wouldn't want to get in a street accident in a fiesta as is with how little and unsafe they are, let alone lower my own odds of walking away from a wreck.

beyond radiator, I've always suspected the fiesta suffers from not enough cooling volume. a larger radiator will address this, but so would any other way to increase capacity. It's not always about getting air to the radiator.
 


OP
Old Mike Emerson

Old Mike Emerson

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Thread Starter #50
Aero has been brought up several times. Our cars have a drag coefficient of .33 stock which is not bad. For comparison an F1 car is around .94 it's a brick, but runs 200mph+ which our ST's will never see. The truth is unless your booging around over 100mph, aero is a moot point. Splitters and canards look cool but do little to nothing on a street car. Hood vents would probably let the engine run cooler and a good idea because they will let the hot air out.
 


Magnetic

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#51
Aero has been brought up several times. Our cars have a drag coefficient of .33 stock which is not bad. For comparison an F1 car is around .94 it's a brick, but runs 200mph+ which our ST's will never see. The truth is unless your booging around over 100mph, aero is a moot point. Splitters and canards look cool but do little to nothing on a street car. Hood vents would probably let the engine run cooler and a good idea because they will let the hot air out.
Those are my thoughts exactly on the hood vents and especially at stoplights in the AZ heat.
 


M-Sport fan

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#52
I've been considering getting the Pro-Alloy Comp Spec setup but wasn't sure the Aluminum crash bar would suffice in the event of an impact.
I would triple check with Ron about that Pro Alloy, alloy crash beam, since I believe I read somewhere that it does not work/fit with our USDM/North American front bumper cover ([dunno]), but I could be wrong about that.
 


Magnetic

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#53
I would triple check with Ron about that Pro Alloy, alloy crash beam, since I believe I read somewhere that it does not work/fit with our USDM/North American front bumper cover ([dunno]), but I could be wrong about that.
Oh for sure. Big/complex purchases like that I would def get info from him to confirm 1st.
 


anticon

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#54
Aero has been brought up several times. Our cars have a drag coefficient of .33 stock which is not bad. For comparison an F1 car is around .94 it's a brick, but runs 200mph+ which our ST's will never see. The truth is unless your booging around over 100mph, aero is a moot point. Splitters and canards look cool but do little to nothing on a street car. Hood vents would probably let the engine run cooler and a good idea because they will let the hot air out.
I feel like an undertray and hood vents would be another way to improve aero and cooling.
 


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Old Mike Emerson

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Thread Starter #56
It makes me wonder just what effect on both aero and cooling my alloy skid plate has on all of this, with otherwise all factory aero/ride height on the front end.. [dunno]
Get this book, Modifying Aerodynamics of Your Road Car, by Julian Edgar. A lot of good info.
 


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