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Can't remember the source on this, but I read that when a car is traveling down the road, noise is generated by the tires pushing air out of the way. Some tires make more or less noise than others while pushing air out of the way. The left and right air dams push air out of the way of the tires thus reducing the noise effect. So while they don't look like they're doing a lot of work down there, the air dams increase fuel efficiency and reduce interior noise.
Some people are going to tell you that it's OK to pull them off. Some people are going to tell you that they intentionally took them off on day one or whatever. Just know that they do have an engineered purpose.
Center air dam is found only on "Base" models, used to limit air flowing under the car, (think of race cars and air flow). Bottom line it lessens the drag and ups the MPG by a tick. Center air dam not found on other models because they have air scoops in the front and rear to cool brakes.
The car will not miss it, and your mileage isn't either....enjoy the ride.
Can't remember the source on this, but I read that when a car is traveling down the road, noise is generated by the tires pushing air out of the way. Some tires make more or less noise than others while pushing air out of the way. The left and right air dams push air out of the way of the tires thus reducing the noise effect. So while they don't look like they're doing a lot of work down there, the air dams increase fuel efficiency and reduce interior noise.
Some people are going to tell you that it's OK to pull them off. Some people are going to tell you that they intentionally took them off on day one or whatever. Just know that they do have an engineered purpose.
Mostly correct in your statement. The key item is the speed at which the airdams are meant to function. Keeping it simple, to get those to be functional and actually doing something, you need to have triple digits on the speedo. I rarely, if ever, get to triple digits while driving in Jacksonville on city streets or even on the highway for that matter. Yes, I took off all of the airdams on the front of the car. My 2014 Z51, doesn't even come with that center air dam. I only have (had) the two dams in front of the wheels. Mine are gone and I don't make the scrape coming up on the driveway.
A road gator removed the one on the driver side of my 2014 Z51 in North Dakota last year. The attachment points were damaged and I decided it was not worth the investment to replace the plastic parts under my bumper so that I could install a new dam so I just removed the other one and called it a day. Besides, I didn’t care for the look and the scraping most every time on driveways.
Center air dam is found only on "Base" models, used to limit air flowing under the car, (think of race cars and air flow). Bottom line it lessens the drag and ups the MPG by a tick. Center air dam not found on other models because they have air scoops in the front and rear to cool brakes.
The car will not miss it, and your mileage isn't either....enjoy the ride.
All models have them, not just base. Limited need for only typical highway driving, however I would replace them if mine because I like to keep my stuff 'right'.
Sorta, the base model has the center piece, the Z51 only has the two side pieces and No center piece.
Mine tore not shortly after I bought my 2019 brand new. Believe it is from my driveway entry angle. I try to go slow and at an angle. Anyway, I acquired a rivet gun to install my sideskirts and a few other broken items around the house. New toy tool so had to put it to use. I removed the dam, removed the remaining attached piece then moved it up (overlapped) on the lip from which it tore and used some plastic rivets to attach it back to the piece that screws into the car. Took all of 10 minutes. Seems to be working.
Buuttt, as others have said, you can probably just take it off and not worry about it unless you are doing some triple digit driving.
The one on my 2017 Grand Sport tore halfway like yours from going into and out of my driveway (would love if C7 had the same raising feature as the C8). I also removed mine. Haven't noticed any negative MPGs/noise so far, but I don't drive it a ton.
Replacement is a twenty minute job and not too co$tly. At Spring Mountain we learned the lower center dam is installed to stabilize the car above 140mph, so isn't necessary for most driving...
Replaced all three of them once each, they kept getting damaged. Two of the three of them got damaged this last time so I’m leaving them off now for good. I’ll try to remember to be extra careful at over 140!
Last edited by The Successful Plumber; 06-20-2020 at 07:08 PM.
Replace all three of them once each, they kept getting damaged. Two of the three of them got damaged this last time so I’m leaving them off now for good. I’ll try to remember to be extra careful at over 140!
I did say triple digits to get ANY use out of those parts.
If only it were this easy to avoid scrapping the splitters and aero bits on these cars. Steep transitions of driveways, entry ways - all sorts of things can create significant problems - and not everyone has the choice to avoid them entirely if they want to drive their cars.
What I'd like to know it what the hell you guys are doing to rip and tear them! Either you are blind, or careless.
The corner pieces would tear on the corners from going up and down driveways and this last time I was going down a very dark section of freeway in a construction zone and ran over a piece of tire or something black. It busted one of the mounting tabs right off the bottom of the car.
06-20-2020, 07:00 AM
So do I need to replace this
