That wing is a HPI molded wing and it's been legal at the USGT races I raced in. 3/4 of the field has that wing or the other HPI wing on there cars.

It's the moulded HPI wing. A lot of the racers here run them as they are more sturdy than the lexan wings. I'm not convinced they make a massive difference though. I suspect some chassis tuning would make either perform similarly.

Yeah, if you read the rules closely, 10mm is for the lexan wings only. You pay a large wt penalty for the hard plastic HPI wings, but I did find that it helped with rear end stability for my PFM10 (depending on which hpi wing I used).

Tuning is key as stated previously in the above posts. Wings have a minor effect in comparison.

Why would you need a plastic wing for durability? We are racing on road here. Not 1/8 off road buggy. Hell even 1/10 off road uses lexan.

That wing provides absolutely no advantage over a lexan wing at 10mm.

It puts excess weight at the farthest point from center of balance and center of gravity. The amount of aerodynamic drag created most likely far exceeds the advantage of any additional down force. Any additional downforce created over the 10mm lexan wing most likley unbalanced the front downforce causing instability on high speed straights and corners.

And you have done the FDM to back that up?

Cheers,
Jim

Do you any data to disprove?

Any affect it may have is purely placebo. If you think it is going to give an advantage and you gain .1 in lap times then was it actually wing or you believing it was. The placebo effect is a very real and tangable thing.

Having confidence that you car will do what you want when you want makes a bigger difference than almost any hop up we can add to our cars.

I don't but your reply was so definitive I thought maybe you had some data to back that up.

Cheers,
Jim

when I used the HPI wing (from the 350Z) vs back to back testing with the lexan one (both mounted on my PFM10), the back would step out on sharp 180s with lexan, wouldn't with the hpi 350Z hard plastic wing. No other changes.

I tried to lose the rear, wouldn't do it with that wing, always on the verge with the lexan.

Good enough?

My Guess is that it is the weight difference, I bet if you weighed those wings the plastic is at least 3 times heavier

Love the paint! Very appropriate for the class. The rear wing, not so much. Let Kevin or Rob weigh in on this, but the original intent of the Lexan wing rule was based on the vast majority of molded wings that came with the popular Tamiya and HPI bodies back ten years ago. I have an entire box of them squirreled away from the NSX and Ebbro kits. All of these measured at or very close to the 10 mm maximum wing height they have mandated for the Lexan wings to measure. They were all pretty flat.

If the interpretation of the molded wing rules are vague enough to allow for the wing that you are running and you feel is legal, then the rules need to be made clearer to eliminate any confusion, one way or the other. The rules state "Any "SCALE" molded wings can be used. Lexan wings 10mm maximum height / side dam height." The operative word here is "SCALE". I think if you reproduced the wing on your car in real life, it would probably be 15"-18" tall. LOL

Always remember that the local track has last say on whether or not they want to enforce the wing rule. I know the CTS Series in California this year was very lax on wing height in . They did not want to turn anyone away from participating.

The last two USGT purpose built bodies to hit the market from Exotek (P Zero) and Protoform (Corvette) have their Lexan wing molded with a 10 mm cut line on them to comply with USGT rules. Honestly at the speeds these cars are traveling with 25.5T motors, 10 mm is all that is really needed. That and a chassis tuned to run a lower down force wing. You have to retune your car to accommodate the Gravity USGT tires to get maximum performance. Big difference in grip level/performance between the Gravity tire and let's say the Solaris spoked tire. It's no difference with the rear wing... you just can't throw a low d/f wing on a car tuned to run with a very large wing height and expect it to perform to it's maximum.

Good Guess!!!!

An HPI plastic wing approx. 17 grams
A lexan wing (cut to 10mm) approx. 6 grams.

Thanks Mooby, It was a Visual Estimation
( my other hobby is guessing the weight of Hogs at Dupage co. fair! )

it is 3 times heavier. The real difference is how much lip the 350Z wing has, like a TC wing. Just like the one in the Vette post pic 2 messages after mine.

10 grams heavier. 2 faster so who cares about weight. On carpet down force no big deal on big fast asphalt marginal grip race track it's a bigger deal.

That much weight that high up can induce more traction rolling.