1959 Chev Car Areodynamics

[DCM]

I was in conversation with a retired Ford salesman when he started on about how the 59 Chev was a big advantage to Ford since the turbulence from the fins made the Chev unsafe, never seen a rolled 59.Were they really that bad? They still look good at carshows. Dan

 

[Anonymous-0]

A lot of the guys drove them in high school. spent many a mile in them at over 100 miles an hr. They were not unstable at those speeds. You might want to go to the old nascar records and see if anyone drove them at the big races.

 

[rustyfarmall]

Those tail fins were purely cosmetic. Might have been somewhat functional IF a high enough speed could be attained, but it would require a jet engine to achieve those speeds, and those old bias ply tires would have disintegrated first. I owned a '60. I won't say it was 100% stable at speeds over 100 mph, but the tail fins had nothing to do with it.

 

[Nitro]

You should understand who you were talking to. Retired Ford SALESMAN. A Salesman was your source of information. I have one for a brother in law. His own dog doesn't even believe him.

 

[Anonymous-0]

I owned a 60 impala (the same body style) and found it to be no less of a boat over a hundred then around town. And consequently found that Bee eeS to be , welll.....Bee eeS.

 

[fixerupper]

This one comes close to my heart. A 59 chevy Biscayne was my first car and the one I dated my future wife in.

The suspension was pure jello-mushpot in every aspect. I think I probably could have touched the rocker panels to the ground in a sharp turn if I really would have tried, but it was as stable as any other car at 100+ MPH. The scarriest part at that time was the biased ply tires.

I do remember reading something in a car magazine at that time stating a fact that the fins actually raised the rear of the car at high speed but I don't know if the statement was founded on fact or not. These fins were flat so I don't see how they could affect the air stream much.

This car had a six cylinder at first but I could get it up to 97 MPH, which was pretty good for a heavy car. Then I dropped in a fairly hot 283 which got it up into the triple digits, but I always was worried about those tires. Jim

 

[Ron in Nebr]

I've read some about this, and I think that the deal was that the fins DID cause some lift on the rearend of the car at high speeds. But this statement was from the NASCAR boys, and only really applied when they were running them on the super-speedway sized tracks(Daytona, Talledega,etc.)running 160+mph. Under "normal" passenger car driving conditions, they were about as stable as most any other car of the time.

 

[Bruce S IL]

Junior Johnson won the 1960 Daytona 500 in a Chevrolet. I found an article that his car was a year old so it sounds like it was probably a 59.

 

[Anonymous-0]

Since Talledega Speedway opened in 1969, I find it highly unlikely that NASCAR was still running the '59 Chevy body then...or at least not in the Grand National series, as it was known in the days before the Winston Cup. Daytona? Si; Talladega? No.

 

[ldj]

It's been a long time but if my memory serves me correctly the 59 fins were a little higher at the rear than where the front of the fin. The 60 was more level. If so that slope could definitely affect the lift differences between the 59 and 60. You did notice the original post said 59, not 59 and 60.

 

[steveormary]

I will go along with nitro. I have a BIL who was an auctioneer and a cattle buyer. Dont know which one to trust the least.

steveormary

 

[Mark]

Those fins affected the stability of the '59 Chevy about as much as the jet engine tail lights and chrome fighter on the '63 Ford, did.

How about those bumper 'jet intake' nose cones and fins on the late 50's caddy's?!!!!!

You just had to live it to appreciate it.

 

[rbel]

59 Impala Sport coupe (2 door hardtop) 348 tri power (3 duces progressive linkage) Would push the speedo needle past 120 and almost back around to 0.
Did the fins lift the tail end?
I thought so and found a 4 foot piece of 90 lb rail in the trunk made it much more stable

 

[Roy Suomi]

When I was selling truck equipment at Concord Road Equipment in Painesville , Ohio.....My boss said to me...."I have always respected you..But now that you work for me , this applies to you too"......"If a salesmans lips are moving he's probably lying"....

 

[RayP(MI)]

I too had a"60. No problems with stability that I can remember. But then it was a 6 cyl, powerglide, and over 100mph probably wasn"t an acheivable goal.

 

[Mark - IN.]

Speaking on Junior Johnson, if I'm not mistaken he also dominated a couple of years later with a 427 that NASCAR made him stop running because it wasn't a production engine at the time. Maybe was '62 or '63? I don't recall. Looked almost exactly like the Mark IV big block 396 that first appeared in the '65 Vette and grew into a 427 in '66, even had heat risers at the intake manifold which was supposed to indicate that Chevy had it planned for production, which they eventually did. Johnson's was known as the Mark II and I had a photo of that engine somewhere, but...who knows where now. The 348 and 409 were known as the Mark I. I think Johnson might've been testing that 427 for Chevy's Vette project so it could have big cubes to run against 406 Fords and 413 Mopars. Was said that Vette owners wanted those big cubes to compete, but Chevy said no to the 409 because was too heavy. Back then the Vettes had a 55:45 front to rear weight ratio and as I understood it, Chevy said the Mark I would throw its handling off too much, and developed the Mark IV which gave it a 60:40 front to rear weight ratio and still maintained good overall handling plus them much demanded big cubes.

By the way, Bill Jenkins also raced a I believe a '60 Impala that had "348 C.I." painted on the hood, but to hear Bill tell it, "I was a cheatin son of a gun, it was a 409". HaHaHaHa. Gotta love it. I think it was a '60 just the same.

Mark

 

[ericlb]

as mentioned the huge fins on the '59 body had no effect on the handling on the car it simply wasnt fast enough for arodynamics to come into play, any handling problems with them was more than likley due to roughly 3 tons of detroit iron riding on soft springs and bias ply tires, if you look at all the cars of the late 50's they all had some styling play on aircraft, this was the early days of jet powered planes and the big 3 all got in the act to some degree , the only thing i can remember about stock car racing and fins back in the day[ and that was 69-70] was the fuss over the plymouth superbirds and dodge daytonas with the big wings on the rear and long pointy noses, they did make a difference, so much so that they were banned from competition due to unfair advantage

 

[Jerry/MT]

I don't have any data but they may have caused a reduction in down force( i.e. Lift) on the rear wheels and affected stability. Somebody that drove one really fast might be able to share some real life experience.

 

[deadeye012]

1959 was the year that I graduated from high school. I don't recall of anyone having a way to measure anything on the open market at that time. That was about the time that radar guns for the cops was being introduced, let alone measuring how high the fins would lift a car. The only thing I could say to the retired salesman if "That if god loved a liar, he would hug him to death".

 

[1936]

Urban wifies tails or what ever you wish to call it!

 

[RAW in IA]

Heck, I had a 58 Chevy 4 door sedan, 6 cyl. Three speed that would do 112 with s people in it. Also had a 49 plymouth would do about 105.

 

[Bob S.]

Howdy
I don't know about the 59 Chevy, but I worked at a Buick dealership in 59, Buicks had as big or bigger fin as Chev. The early production Buicks did indeed have a problem on the freeway, Buick called it " Freeway Hop ". The fins were not the problem, Buick tried to save a buck and eliminated the front sway bars on early production cars, when the problem was diagnosed, sway bars were added to early production cars at Buicks expense. The same may have applied to Chev, but I never heard anything about it.
Bob S.

 

[Ron in Nebr]

Oops, ya got me there Buzz! Shoulda checked my facts! I know Darlington was going then, seemed like I remember reading about another superspeedway track running at the time? I might be wrong though, I never was too interested in that kinda thing, being from the school of thought that believes "Dirt's for racin, asphalt is just for gettin' there".

 

[dhermesc]

Bob S. nailed it. A few years back I did some work on a 1959 Cadillac series 62 two door and it had a **** of a lot bigger fins than a Chevy and it had massive stability problems. The issue was the huge amount of weight hanging out behind the rear axle combined with soft springs that had gotten even softer over 45 years. When you got it up past 75 it just plain didn't feel stable and scared the crap out of you.

After I replaced the springs, shocks and got a four wheel lazer alignment it drove pretty good. Then I took off the 225/75/15 super cheap montgomery wards radials from 1975 put on a set of Michelin 245/65/15s and it handled ****ed good.

I couldn't imagine what it was like driving that big heavy beast on bias ply tires back in the day.

 

[George T. Potter]

I bought a new 59 Impala Convertible in March of 59. Got it today. NEVER had any areo or other problems. Drove it in Texas in mid 60s where there was no speed limit in some areas. NEVER left the ground or any of that BS. It is low in the rear and that helps, I think.