Overheating Issues, Perplexed

[mr0077]

Interesting tidbit of trivia on shrouds...during development of the C2 Corvette (the Stingray), the engineers found that the big block cars would overheat at high speeds. On that car, the air came through two openings below the front of the car, went up then back down through the radiator (that was leaned back at the top similar to some Cobras), then straight back toward the motor-driven fan. Because of the long nose and the engine setback, it had a shroud that was about 10" at the top and about 26" at the bottom. The engineers found that at high speeds the fan acted as a plate and would restrict air flow between the radiator and the fan. They came up with two fixes, one was shroud flaps that were pressure operated and the other was shroud flaps that were thermo operated...in either case, the flaps would open up to let air OUT of the shroud when needed for air flow and better cooling. Both ideas were nixed by the bean counters as unnecessarily expensive and complicated...