Passenger door 'blowing in' at the back at extended motorway speed

[Blacken]

I visited PGM today and on the return journey on the M25 the passenger door blew in like Revilla's.

I was doing a healthy speed in a crosswind. The driver's side was ok because l was in the way (driver's elbow resistance)!

Does anybody manufacture a carbon fibre sidescreen for an SV?

[Blacken]

Mine measures 880mm too but it does not give the same performance as Ian's.

[revilla]

A bit more info ...

Yesterday I finally got fed up with my doors blowing in and replaced the doors on my 2003 SV with doors taken from a 2013 SV to cure this problem. There is a significant difference between the doors, which I can only assume explains why some people have this problem and some don't. Comparing them, I guess the earlier doors were modified specifically to address this issue. I can now understand why those who didn't get the problem might find it hard to understand why others of us did, because with the "New Style" doors I can't see any way they could blow in.

The main difference is in the shape of the internal rigid metal frame / plate around the window, specifically the shape of the rear corner.

The first picture below is taken from the Caterhamparts website and shows the "New Style" SV door now sold:

You can actually see the outline of the internal metal frame in the picture, but I have highlighted the part that I mean in the second picture below. The metal frame extends backwards from the lower corner of the window to sit against the chassis hoop in front of the wheel arch to make sure that the door cannot move inwards.

On my original doors the rear edge of the metal frame was approximately the profile show in the third picture below. It did not have the extension. The entire area behind the red line was just flexible vinyl and did not prevent the door from moving inwards over the chassis rail; it simply just bent out of the way.

So there are clearly (at least) two different designs of SV doors out there, one of which is prone to "blowing in" at speed and one of which has been modified to address this issue.

My car was registered in 2003 but was built from a 2001 starter kit, making it one of the earlier SVs. I have no idea at what point the doors were modified but my guess would be that those people experiencing the problem probably have earlier cars like mine?

Andrew 

[sjmmarsh]

Mine (on a 2007 CSR) are the old style doors. It wasn't a problem until I had the rear wing replaced.. Odd, as the door doesn't foul the wing, so something else must have changed...

Steve

[NeilCSR]

The turnbuckle mod (see p3 of this thread) is working fine, no problems since.

I've done quite a bit of quick solo mileage since fitting the catch and the door has been fine at all speeds.

Revilla is right about the different frames but rather than switch doors this mod is quick, cheap and it works.  

Neil