Tropic Sheild?!?

[MaximusZTS]

Has any one ever heard of "Tropic Shield"? There was a panflet of it on my desk this morning.

I just did a google search and found the web site. (tropic-shield.com) at the bottom of that page there is a link to the brochure left on my desk. The people I work with seem to be having this done to thier cars despite my best efforts to educate them on proper car care. Can any one help me out with this?

One of the claims is "Conventional sealants & waxes begin to melt when surface temperatures reach 75 F. Your vehicles surface can exceed 150 F in the sun!"

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

Has any one ever heard of "Tropic Shield"?
One of the claims is

"Conventional sealants & waxes begin to melt when surface temperatures reach 75 F. Your vehicles surface can exceed 150 F in the sun!"

the average room temp is around 75 degrees?

Don't pay no nevermind to claims like this, best thing to do is to buy the product and try it yourself.

[BlueZero]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

According to there website... "Reduces your vehicles' drag up to 40%, Increases your top end speed up to 10%, Saves on fuel consumption up to 5%, Eliminates vehicle washing by 50%"

Sounds like some pretty big promises. I would be guessing if it worked, race cars of all types would have it done. I'm not saying it doesn't work, who knows. Not much sticks to my cookware.

[Superior Shine]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

I went down to see them back in 1990. Long story short they are clowns.

They are pushing selling you a franchise more than they are protecting your ride.

[Chex]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

how can a wax or sealant melt at 75? don't they know carnauba wax stands temperatures of such grade? and if polymer sealants last even more and are tougher than waxes, i'd say it's a way to hook newbies into buying super expensive products that will perform as same as a high quality product and not paying the rip off :P

BTW, I checked the site and it says some nonsense things like the hi speed rotary buffing system being obsolete: if they offer heave and extreme oxidation removal, how do they do it without a rotary? wouldn't that be a bad idea not to use it?

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

According to there website... "Reduces your vehicles' drag up to 40%, Increases your top end speed up to 10%, Saves on fuel consumption up to 5%, Eliminates vehicle washing by 50%"

Look, I know we have a rule around here where we aren't supposed to bash other companies, products, etc, but........................come on!!

Resisting the temptation to just slam these guys, let me just say that I have a very strong feeling that if you were to reduce your vehicle's drag by 40% then your fuel economy would likely improve by more than just 5% and your top end speed would likely rise by more than 10%. Trying to remember this from my bicycle racing days where we always tried to be as aerodynamic as possible (and perhaps Paul will refresh my memory with more clarity) but doesn't the power required to overcome wind resistance increase with the square of speed (or something like that - hey, I'm not an engineer!)? Or was it even more than that? A 40% reduction in drag is just HUGE!!! I think these guys are really stretching here.

[pohljm]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

I would guess that a porsche has about 40% less drag than a suburban, so this stuff must be able to really work some magic by just applying a coat of a finish to a fixed aerodynamic shape. And the funny thing is a bumpy finish is actually more aerodynamic than an ultra smooth surface so what are they smokin

[STG]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

I refuse to buy this stuff until it offers a 40% reduction in frontal area!

[the other pc]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

We’ll you guys lucked out. I tried posting a long-winded response about aerodynamics and the forum wouldn’t accept it. I guess it was too boring even for the software.

Anyway, yes Mike, drag goes up with the square of speed.

Maybe when they say "reduces your vehicles’ drag up to 40%" they’re assuming your vehicles are missiles or something else that have a very high surface area to frontal area ratio.

Maybe, as STG suggests, they’re planning on reducing your frontal area by 40%. If you launch a bottle of their product at your car at a high enough velocity it’s bound to tear 40% of your car off. Of course that’s likely to change the shape so it will have a different Cd too.

Maybe they’re not talking about aerodynamic drag. If you flip your car on its back and drag it on a big sheet of rubber the force is all skin friction.


PC.

[pcfxer]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

Generally cars have a Cd around .30 {average of the average speed of the average etc. etc. etc.}, applying Tropic Shield one should (and given no tolerances, so clearly the figure is made up), have a Cd of 0.18. Yikes!

But really, could people stop posting this garbage on the forum? I know I should ignore it, but I see too many people getting ripped off from it just to let it go. Maybe it's a ploy to get me banned?

[STG]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

You got it backwards:

Drag squares with a doubling of speed.

[the other pc]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

I said:

…drag goes up with the square of speed…..

That means when speed goes up by two drag goes up by four. Triple the speed and the drag force goes up nine times.

The equation for aerodynamic drag force is:

Fd= 1/2 x A x p x Cd x v^2

Where:
Fd = drag force
A = frontal area
P = density of air
Cd = coefficient of drag for the object
v = velocity



PC.

[STG]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

I agree with your explanation and formula, but the following sentence has nothing to do with either!

"drag goes up with the square of speed"

if speed = 10mph, then........

drag goes up with (10 squared)

huh???

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

I said:



That means when speed goes up by two drag goes up by four. Triple the speed and the drag force goes up nine times.

The equation for aerodynamic drag force is:

Fd= 1/2 x A x p x Cd x v^2

Where:
Fd = drag force
A = frontal area
P = density of air
Cd = coefficient of drag for the object
v = velocity



PC.

See, and I said it in basically plain English to begin with. I just love when an engineer proves me right. Well, not so much proves, and confirms.

I just remember watching my heart rate monitor while training on the bike and seeing numbers in the mid 170 beats per minute range when taking a pull at the front of the paceline while doing 30mph and then watching it drop to below 140 beats per minute when riding in the draft at the same speed. A nice live, graphic example of the principle.

[pcfxer]

Re: Tropic Sheild?!?

I agree with your explanation and formula, but the following sentence has nothing to do with either!

"drag goes up with the square of speed"

if speed = 10mph, then........

drag goes up with (10 squared)

huh???

Noooo! If your speed is 10mph and you accelerate to 20mph, effectively doubling v then your drag will be four times higher than at 10mph. I'm going to assume you don't have any background in physics eh?