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I agree completely that comparisons can only be made within a single tunnel, and for that reason there is some benefit to sticking with the original tunnel.I didn't say that the measurements are meaningless, only that I think it's unwise to assume otherwise unless you have experience with wind tunnel results. (I did find your parallelism to my post cute, though.) I did say that it was borderline absurd to think the measurements would be accurate. There is an important difference between accuracy and comparability, which I imagine you appreciate. While (to my understanding) one wouldn't want to think that results on any wind tunnel are accurate (particularly one with a fixed floor), a tunnel may still provide plenty of ability to compare two different cars. And that's much of the point of the tests above. So far so good; perhaps I shouldn't have bristled at the idea of a fixed-floor tunnel. But comparing cars should be done when you can characterize the differences between them and that is where I see the fixed-floor tunnel as falling short.We know that there are real effects from (1) road moving under the body and (2) spinning wheels. By eliminating both of those factors and drawing conclusions about the relative performance of cars, you are assuming that they affect all cars the same. I doubt that is true; my knowledge, however, is far from what would be required to answer this question.
I agree completely that comparisons can only be made within a single tunnel, and for that reason there is some benefit to sticking with the original tunnel.
I didn't say that the measurements are meaningless, only that I think it's unwise to assume otherwise unless you have experience with wind tunnel results. (I did find your parallelism to my post cute, though.) I did say that it was borderline absurd to think the measurements would be accurate. There is an important difference between accuracy and comparability, which I imagine you appreciate. While (to my understanding) one wouldn't want to think that results on any wind tunnel are accurate (particularly one with a fixed floor), a tunnel may still provide plenty of ability to compare two different cars. And that's much of the point of the tests above. So far so good; perhaps I shouldn't have bristled at the idea of a fixed-floor tunnel. But comparing cars should be done when you can characterize the differences between them and that is where I see the fixed-floor tunnel as falling short.
We know that there are real effects from (1) road moving under the body and (2) spinning wheels. By eliminating both of those factors and drawing conclusions about the relative performance of cars, you are assuming that they affect all cars the same. I doubt that is true; my knowledge, however, is far from what would be required to answer this question.
