Front fender vents

KerbMonster

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Guessing
I saw that video @ThomasDK as well when it first came out but then I also saw may Porsche videos saying that they do nothing for looks alone.
When I peered into the fender vents I saw a honeycomb plastic insert with holes, I assumed to keep animals or debris from getting in when the car is parked. I will try to get a better look next time. But many Taycan owners on the forum.
The insert is there to solve the downside with the vents on road cars - mud and stones get flicked up by the wheels and can damage the door. As an aside, it's why the TVR Sagaris had massive arch vents that on production models were completely filled in... drivers were having the windscreen sprayed with mud and even broken by stones!
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BenJL

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I'm pretty sure that when I was in Frankfurt the front fender vents were closed on Turbo & Turbo S.

However, they were open on the Mission-E.
 

feye

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Having driven the Turbo and 4S models and viewed the Turbo S I noticed that on the 4S model the front fender vents in front of the front doors are blocked. On the Turbo and the Turbo S these vents are open and you can view the front tire through the vents when standing behind the front door.

So, I´m wondering does anyone know why these vents are blocked off on the 4S models?
Different breaks, different vents?
 

ron_b

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MissionC

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I talked to my rep and he said “The powered charge door will not block or hinder aero.” I feel like this was #fakenews. There definitely needs to be a screen and shown in the photos to protect from rocks and debris flying through and damaging the doors, but can’t imagine Porsche would close off that aero pathway.
 

KensingtonPark

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I talked to my rep and he said “The powered charge door will not block or hinder aero.” I feel like this was #fakenews. There definitely needs to be a screen and shown in the photos to protect from rocks and debris flying through and damaging the doors, but can’t imagine Porsche would close off that aero pathway.
Great to hear it, as I was the one who had originally posted the link to the article that suggested that the powered charge door had some kind of effect on it. I was wondering if I would have to delete the powered door!
 

rs38

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old thread, but it just popped up on facebook. Never checked that before but the "vent" in the finder of my turbo with electric charge door is completely closed. that's pretty fooling customers with these nice "air curtain" pics and promise low cw numbers.
so this is not true:
Porsche Taycan Front fender vents 1610988934708
 


ron_b

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old thread, but it just popped up on facebook. Never checked that before but the "vent" in the finder of my turbo with electric charge door is completely closed. that's pretty fooling customers with these nice "air curtain" pics and promise low cw numbers.
so this is not true:
1610988934708.png
That issue has been raised a few times before. it probably goes into the reason that a Turbo S has a CD of 0.25 versus the non-S versions having 0.22.
 

Kingske

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old thread, but it just popped up on facebook. Never checked that before but the "vent" in the finder of my turbo with electric charge door is completely closed. that's pretty fooling customers with these nice "air curtain" pics and promise low cw numbers.
so this is not true:
1610988934708.png
It is true if you have the standard manual charge door covers. Electric covers are an option for which you also pay (a bit) in aerodynamic efficiency.
 

JC Mann

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Hopefully someone with a car or close to a dealer can solve this new question. I ordered a 4s and would hate if the vent is closed :-(
I’ve checked many demos. Fender vent has louvers if the charge port is manual, but is solid with power port.
 

faroutinNM

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I’ve checked many demos. Fender vent has louvers if the charge port is manual, but is solid with power port.

Exactly correct, with respect to the vertical feature behind the wheel. The Taycans with electrically actuated charge ports have the body feature behind the wheel completely blocked. My opinion is that this rear vent likely is much less significant in producing the air curtain effect than are the parts located forward of the wheel. Following is the thought experiment I went through in arriving at this conjecture.

The vent in the vertical feature in the front area, extending downward from the headlight, is open on all Taycans, regardless of model, year, or options. This air intake is designed to form the air curtain that protects the wheel from the ambient air moving rearward past the wheel (that's from the wheel's frame of reference, and is equivalent to saying "the wheel is moving forward past the air", from the stationary, Earth surface frame of reference). This air curtain is applied primarily to the wheel's upper area, which is the part moving forward at twice the car's speed (the contact area at the bottom of the wheel remains stationary from the Earth frame of reference, unless it loses traction). Looking closely at these vents when with a real world Taycan, you can see that the opening is tapered so that going from front to rear, it narrows vertically and perhaps curves a bit. The rear opening is located in the upper part of the wheel well in front of the wheel.

The air curtain should direct the air such that the air moves outboard away from the outboard wheel surfaces (the other wheel surfaces aren't subject to the same drag as the outboard face), thus removing the drag of the oncoming air, mostly on the outboard upper surfaces.

The point of all of this is that the opening behind the wheel may not be significant in this shielding effect because by the time the rear area of the wheel has moved past the curtain air, that curtain air should be away from the car's surface, and thus detached from it.

Naturally (since I don't have a wind tunnel and a properly instrumented Taycan, or all of the engineering skills to use them), this description was formulated without doing the measurements required to determine exactly what happens aerodynamically, but I do speculate that something similar to this might be a factor in the Taycan design.

Tellingly, the illustrations in the article linked below depict a Taycan with powered charge port, and show the air moving past the wheel without tucking inboard as it moves out of that rear vent area, as it does in the illustrations above.

Full disclosure: I have a Taycan Turbo on order, with a powered charge port spec'ed, so it feels like a better choice if it doesn't compromise the aerodynamics. ;>)

https://newsroom.porsche.com/en/products/taycan/aerodynamics-18554.html

Porsche Taycan Front fender vents taycan wind tunnel
 
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Vim Schrotnock

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The car is more aerodynamic when the flaps are closed. I would bet the difference in aero between the Turbo and Turbo S is almost exclusively due to the larger tires.

Porsche Active Aerodynamics (PAA) thus offers several advantages at the front of the Taycan: When the cooling air flaps are closed, the system reduces drag and therefore increases range. When the flaps are open, PAA improves both the performance of the cooling system and the brakes at the same time. Control of the cooling air flaps is always demand-driven and depends on the driving mode, speed and cooling requirement.
 

rs38

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interestingly enough I checked some cars and saw that even with the Panamera there are versions with a closed and open fender (S Hybrid) vent and of course there is no electric front charge door.
Brake cooling could be another feature which isn't of much importance for a Taycan (IMHO).
 

XLR82XS

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Anyone with open fenders have issues with road debris chipping the front door paint? PPF for doors is an option but prefer not too as I might as well wrap the entire car at that point. (I will be doing mirror forward PPF & rockers)

I have a car on order with manual charge port doors.
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