When the new Ford GT debuted at the 2015 Detroit Auto Show, we lost our minds over its sheer sexiness. Now Ford has released a clip of the supercar in a wind tunnel, and—once again—we’re having a hard time keeping it together.
Part of the reason why the Ford GT looks so good is those elegant swooping aerodynamic curves and intakes. To see all of those shapes performing their actual, non-aesthetic functions in a wind tunnel is car porn at its finest.
And yes, all of those intakes perform a function according to Ford’s engineer Nick Terzes, who says that every little grille, every little scoop, all of it “has a function.”
Which is great, because we’re not big fans of fake intakes.
Ford’s new video shows the GT in Wind Tunnel 8 in Allen Park, Michigan. As “Job 1" (i.e. when the first car rolls off the assembly line) isn’t until next year, Ford is still making small tweaks to the GT’s aerodynamic profile to get it all dialed in.
It’s a careful balance between downforce and drag. The pre-production model shown in the video sits on scales that can measure horizontal aerodynamic forces (drag) and vertical aero forces (downforce) as 125 mile an hour wind flows over and under the car’s bodywork.
The numbers from those scales help the team validate their computational fluid dynamics models (we showed some examples of CFD visuals a few months back).
How those aerodynamicists actually get any work done instead of just standing there drooling is beyond me. But it sounds like an awesome job.