So I’m driving south on I-95 the other day on my way back from Pawtucket (sadly I wasn’t there to see a PawSox game), when I notice that my car seems a bit on the noisy side. Not a mechanical noise like an engine knock or a flat tire; no, it was more like a wind noise, as if a door wasn’t properly shut or a window was open slightly, but without any directional clues. After determining that it wasn’t any of the doors or windows, I tried listening more closely (and without any music blaring). I still couldn’t tell where it was coming from, but with my concentration heightened I could “feel” an aerodynamic change to the car. The front was clearly generating a bit of lift, or at the very least a substantial amount of drag that isn’t normally present. Now, you don’t have to be Adrian Newey to know that there aren’t a lot of ways that can happen on a production car. But since the hood of the car was quite clearly closed I was at odds to determine the source. So I took the next exit and pulled off into an empty parking lot. I opened the hood and saw that there was something amiss at the bottom of the car. I had to look underneath the car to get a better look, so it figures that I was wearing a nice shirt and tie at the time. Fortunately I had a blanket in the trunk to help me keep clean. This (photo) is what I found. It’s half of a plastic shield that covers the bottom of the engine bay (ironically enough it’s purpose is probably to reduce noise), and by the time I stopped it was dangling below the car and barely attached. With a yank I removed the “barely” and was on my way again.