My Honda Fit-- which currently needs an oil change-- has an interesting design flaw: if you're alone in the car, barreling down the freeway at 80 miles per hour, and you open the two rear windows, you create an air turbulence pattern that quickly becomes a horrendous harmonic vibration: the ceiling of the car shakes visibly while the air hammers your eardrums. I find this both hilarious and scary, which means I like rolling my rear windows down on occasion just to experience that vibration.
Is this design flaw common in other cars? I can't say that I've ever encountered it before, and I've driven quite a few different types of vehicles in my lifetime.
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Friday, August 12, 2011
interesting design flaw
11 comments:
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we have a 1985 mercedes 500sel. its a big, gas-guzzling boat in the likely case you dont know that that is. it also creates eardrum hammering turbulence if you open nothing but the two rear windows. the ceiling doesnt shake visibly though. i didnt realize this was a design flaw...
ReplyDeleteH,
ReplyDeleteIt might not be a design flaw, but I'm assuming it is just because of what happens to my car. Serious shaking. I wonder what would happen if I had passengers.
Kevin
My ex gave our daughter a Ford Festiva. When we got caught in the backwash of an 18 wheeler it would actually lift up the car and move it. Scariest shit I ever experienced. On the plus side, it got GREAT gas mileage. (My sis called the car a pregnant roller skate, which was pretty much true.) I'll take a vibrating hum.
ReplyDeleteI get something similar in my Mazda 3; it's only a year old or so. I think you don't need to worry too much, and I would agree that it is a design flaw.
ReplyDeleteDesign flaw, hell! That's a joy ride!
ReplyDeleteJeffery Hodges
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Brat,
ReplyDeleteI'd love a vibrating hum, too, as opposed to shake, rattle and roll.
All,
Interesting to read that my car isn't the only one with this "problem." I really need to get a passenger in there with me.
80 miles per hour! I didn't know you'd moved out of the nation's capitol and out to Montana. I think I hit 100 mph out there a few years back traveling to Canada and back.
ReplyDeleteJohn,
ReplyDeleteI've done 100 on the freeway near my home, but the cars going toward and away from DC routinely do 80, despite the 70mph limit. I'm pretty aware of most of the speed traps, but I've also been lucky: there have been times when a cop had me dead to rights, but he did nothing.
(For what it's worth, I never drive like this when I've got passengers.)
Not to pile on, but the same thing happens in my car and my wife's car. Respectively, that's a 2007 Caliber and a 2003 Grand Prix.
ReplyDeleteSteve,
ReplyDeleteThis puts us in aeronautical engineer territory: if enough different cars exhibit the same behavior, can we say the behavior is the result of a design flaw? If yes, then is this flaw irreparable? If it's not a flaw, then why does it feel like a flaw? That's a hell of a lot of turbulence, after all.
Maybe the flaw/not-flaw dualism is the problem here. Heh.
I've noticed something similar, tho probably not as intense, with my 2007 Honda CRV.
ReplyDelete