The recent discussion of NASA/NACA scoops and those on the LAT hood brings to
mind the following incident of years past:
Back in the early '70s when Tom Ballou lived in San Diego and we were both
much younger (read stupid) we were curious about the effectiveness of the
vents on the LAT hood, so we performed an experiment. We took off down the
road in my car with Tom driving with this right hand. His left hand grasped
my left ankle while I lay face down, spread-eagle on the hood, conducting some
scientific measuring: with my hands, I felt around the various hood vents,
assesing the nature of the airflow at each location!
Having survived the ordeal, I can now report that the results were rather
surprising. The exhaust vents did seem to release a moderate amount of hot
air from the engine compartment, and the intake scoop did also! That's right.
With the car in motion hot air was being forced out of the scoop, vice
allowing cool air for the carburetor to enter! So I guess it does serve a
desireable function of sorts, but not what most people would suppose. If you
want the intake scoop to function as such, you must construct some sort of
sealed box arrangement under the hood, similar that used by the clever Dr.
Palmer.
Caution! The test described above is considered dangerous, and should not be
attempted by an ordinary Sunbeam Tiger owner! The test was considered
experimental only, and was conducted by quasi-professionals under somewhat
controlled conditions. It has since been determined to be irresponsible and
of questionable value.
Belatedly, Dick Barker
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