Brake Ducts - MSA Urethane Air Dam

[Red-Eye]

I recently bought an MSA Urethane Air Dam for my '72 ITS 240-Z to replace the custom spoiler that I cracked last year. Is anyone running ducting from the MSA air dam back to their rotors? If so, what did you attach to the back of the air dam? Thanks...Robert

[gnosez]

Are you racing your Z or using the brakes very often? If yes, then consider ducting.

A hose from the airdam (make a sheetmetal holder and attach to the airdam) to the strut is all that is needed. There are pics of installations on race sites and over on hybridz.org

We run a 240 on the race track and have blocked off the brake ducts since we have never had an issue (larger Toyo 4X4 w/Porterfield R4S pads). We have run through a set of pads in 4 days but have never had a fade issue due to lack of cooling air.

For aero purposes you want no or very little air going under the front of the car and everything that goes into the grill should be directed to the radiator via an enclosed shroud. Our inlet is no bigger than 14X4 and we have no overheating issues.

[preith]

I don't have a good pic readily available, but when I originally used the duct style airdam like this one:

I simply bent up a c-shaped (lengthwise) piece of 6061, hole-sawed and welded a piece of 3" pipe to it, and attached that to the airdam with pop rivets from the back side, thereby leaving the nail side of the rivet exposed from the front. It didn't look too bad.

You can kind of see it here:

http://www.classiczcars.com/photopost/data/500/gingerman2.JPG

@gnosez, ducting is, for all intensive purposes, a requirement on an ITS car.

[gnosez]

Since our's is not an ITS car we are not limited to stock calipers so the larger versions dissipate the heat better. Should we have an issue the sheetmetal frames and hoses will be re-installed.

A street car will not likely need brake ducts IMHO.

We'll see how the race car does on an extended lap time trip to Monticello, NY next week. The track is 4.1 miles with 22 corners and three straights. Pit row straight is an 80mph run to a hard left off-camber turn, the next one is a 100mph run with a set of corners that you can't take at more than 40 and the back straight is more of how fast can you go before a hard 90 uphill. We were hitting over 125mph with our 181rwhp 240Z but the vettes, prepped M-series and a few GTRs were lifting around 170.

Our lap times were just under 3 minutes.

We ran the car for a total of 4.5 hrs (within an 8 hr day) and had no brake fade issues. BTW, we use Porterfield shoes in the rear.

[Red-Eye]

Preith,

I can kinda see it in that pic, mostly I see you dogging a 911... I was hoping that since the MSA air dam was pretty popular, that I wouldn't have to fab something up myself, but it doesn't seem like there's anything readily available. Oh well, wish I wouldn't have crunched my old spoiler last year.

Thanks for your help...Robert

[preith]

Preith,

I was hoping that since the MSA air dam was pretty popular, that I wouldn't have to fab something up myself, but it doesn't seem like there's anything readily available.

I was only trying to keep mine as neat as possible. I've seen guys just lay the ducting in them but IMO it looks real ghetto. You could try adapting an inlet duct like this:

http://www.pegasusautoracing.com/productselection.asp?Product=3624

Preith,

I can kinda see it in that pic, mostly I see you dogging a 911...

It was a hoot battling it out with the 911, piloted by a veteran racer. My first year of racing, '05, only my 3rd event, I dragged past him on a relatively short strait, he later told me he was absolutely stunned at my straight line speed (gt2ish motor), I was on cloud nine. Unfortunately I crashed the car at the next event and tore up the all the front body work, goodbye air dam.

@gnosez, good luck in Monticello, NY.

Edited June 2, 2010 by preith
pic

[Lazeum]

I was thinking about doing it also on my MSA air dam.

Not that I really need it but also to get some projects going and to make those "holes" functional.

I was thinking about doing some ducts with fiberglass. Make a mold out of expandable foam you can shape yourself and then get 2 pieces made. Fixing them with pop rivets as Preith was suggesting.

Next step would be to find out how to fix them in front of the brakes to make them efficient without interfering with wheels