Do you like the original flip up or the non flip up on the FC?

 

non flip up

 

flip up...

 

sleek ftw

 

originals. old-school FTW!

 

flip up

 

im with you all the way. pop ups add that extra amount of differnce to our cars. and when they are poped up the car look's like it has a face looking at you saying HEY!

 

flip up ftw

 

Flip up. I hate when people make them non flip up.

 

East Bear kit is pretty.

 

I'll be toying with a conversion, but if I did it I'd spent many hours making sure the design would be perfect. the flip ups might grow on me, too, so idk yet. for now, I just love driving it.

 

Flip up definitely.

At what point would the aerodynamic difference mean something though and how much does the system weigh versus a non-flip up version?

 

flip up ftw... the ONLY exception would be the RE FC2000 look imo. and i can't afford that so yeah. lol

 

Stock ftw.

 

flip-up

 

I'd bet a stationary system MIGHT only save a couple pounds, however the aerodynamic drag of the flip ups increases exponentially with speed (airspeed, technically. with a tail wind you do better, a head wind worse). I think it's close to this example: you're doing 25mph, the flip ups produce x lbs of drag. you do twice that speed, 50mph, and receive 4x lbs of drag. 100mph: 16x lbs of drag. you can insert whatever unit of force, too, it certainly doesn't have to be pounds.

the '7 is pretty aerodynamic, so I imagine the flip ups play a fairly significant role at speed, and more so gradually the faster you go. if you had flip up lights on a Honda Element, I doubt it would make nearly as much difference. The stupid thing's already a rolling brick.

 

didnt they stop making flip-up lights cause it was hurting the people that got ran over by a car too much??? i mean wtf, i'm running you over with my car, i dont care how much pain your in

 

I have no idea, but I wouldn't be surprised. Honestly, is someone more likely to be more hurt by a 2900lb RX-7, or a 4000lb SUV? Yet there are clearly more SUV's on the road than there have ever been cars with pop up headlights...

 

Maybe the 4000lbs SUVs don't cause as much pain and suffering.

 

stock flip FTW!

 

arguably, that could be false. if you're dead, guess who really suffers regardless of whether or not there's some sort of afterlife?

 

I know that. I meant at what point is it a significant term in the drag equation. If at 10 MPH it's 0.0001% of your drag and at 100 MPH it's 0.01% of your drag it's definitely insignificant. If the numbers are 1% and 30% however, that's a meaningful difference.

More precisely:
What is the total drivetrain drag on the vehicle?
What is the airspeed drag with the lights down at 30 mph? 60 mph? 90 mph? 120 mph?
What is the airspeed drag with the lights up at 30, 60, 90 and 120 mph?
Why do I keep starting to type "dragon" whenever I type "drag"?
Why do I do the same for "ration" and "ratio"?

Funny thing is, the most aerodynamic production vehicle (which was neither the Element nor the FD) looked like a rolling brick.

 

im all for the flip ups, I just like the way they work and look

 

I noticed that my FC only went 120mph with headlights up, and closer to 130mph headlights down.

 

yep drag does wonderful things