foot well cooling

[Lumpyguy]

I have a 818C and I am finding after long drives I get little to no air flow down in the foot well other than hot air from the rad, I am going to work on sealing things up.

I am wondering what people have done for tubing and vents you can close off or open to let cooler front air into the floor of the drivers and passanger area?

I was thinking 2 fresh air tubes from the front bumper to the driver and passanger footwell and have a damper valve in line I can close off to stop or control the air flow when its needed or not needed?

[Hojo]

Anyone who has an idea about what lumpyguy should do should be aware that he is an amazing fabricator. Look at his car and think of a wild idea. I bet he can make it happen.

[Ajzride]

I have a restomod-air unit above the passengers footwell with ducts to the driver-side. Probably not the solution you were looking for, but works great.

[aquillen]

I setup a cool air inlet on the right front of the grille, through a cabin air filter in the right side wall by the radiator. Into the bottom of the passenger side of the aluminum block off plate, in front of my glove compartment. This went into a "diverter box" with some servo motors and a custom control I made for those. The air can go to either or both of a Vintage Air blower or just air ducts to the right and left corners over the footwells. The duct was McMasterCarr 3" ID (# 5488K61).. Some pix below.

Performance: so-so. I removed the air filter to get better flow as I was not getting as much as I hoped for. Some air restriction is in the duct size and rather long stretch, and probably 1/2 of the restriction is in the perforated aluminum front inlet in the nose. On the highway I can feel moderate air at both footwells with the blower off. I also think my diverter box restricts some flow.

If you'd do like mine, but just put an air split instead of the fancy servo box, and open up the inlet with less restriction, I'd say you'd be happy with the flow. It works, the foot area does not get hot, but it does get a litte warmer than ambient on a hot day in my coupe. One inlet on each side of the nose to its own foot outlet would really get you plenty of air, I'm sure.

Step down through a couple posts starting with these, the pictures show most of it. I'd do the same thing again - it works for me. I did about 125 miles in July and didn't jump and run when I stopped...

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/show...ht=air+control

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/show...esh#post403535

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/show...esh#post424817

[cob427sc]

In FFR roadster builds, some of us ran tubes (either flex, fixed aluminum or a combination) from the front small grill openings. I used small inline fans for added boost and then a shut/open valve that was available through marine supply. This could be a simple solution on the 818.

[Lumpyguy]

thanks all, that is exaclty what I was thinking tubes from the front into a simple open and close valve

anyone have a like to a marine place with shut and open valves

[cob427sc]

I found mine on ebay along with the fans. They were setup for use to ventilate a small boat bilge. They were relatively inexpensive but move a lot of air.

[sgarrett]

I'm a little late to the game on this one, but I was able to incorporate the fan unit from the donor. I mounted it (along with the filter) in the front compartment and just used some PVC pipes to connect it to the foot wells (they are white in the photos but I later changed them to black). I punched a couple of holes throught the front firewall and will eventually 3D print some grills to cover them up....and I will also use some more appropriate fasteners to attach the PVC mount to the front side of the firewall. I used the donor's four position rotary switch to control the fan. It blows like crazy in the foot wells at the highest level so I am pretty confident that I will be able to get enough air flow into the compartment to keep from sweltering, but it won't be as good as AC for sure.

Cabin Air Fan.jpgCabin Air Ducting.jpgCabin Air Foot Well Opening.jpgCabin Air Switch.jpg

[AC Bill]

I used what is commonly called a blast gate. They are available in plastic or aluminum. They can be controlled (open/close) with a simple push-pill cable or a stronger solenoid. I used the cable to keep it simple, and the aluminum for longevity. They are three times as expensive though.

https://www.leevalley.com/en-ca/shop...CABEgKK4_D_BwE

Rather disappointed with the marine blower's air flow, so I installed a squirrel cage fan. It has four speeds so I control the flow rate.

[Jetfuel]

We have to remove the source of hot air coming into the car and in my case while driving around and using a digital point and read thermometer I found out the biggest source of hot air was coming from the door hinges openings, every pass through in the firewall was sealed and I was still sweating.
I fabricated block off plates for the hinge opening and never looked back.
If the C model is like the S for the hinge arrangement then you should consider something like that.

Jet