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Aeroacoustics is playing an increasing role in the development of new passenger cars. However, most existing wind tunnels, with few recent exceptions, have been designed and built with little or no attention to their aeroacoustic aspects. Building new wind tunnels with excellent low noise levels is technically feasible today, however it is not often justifiable from an economic standpoint. In the case of the Pininfarina wind tunnel, built in 1972 without any specific noise target, a decision was taken in 1984 to progressively upgrade the facility and the acoustic measuring techniques. A target of reaching a background noise level low enough to allow satisfactory acoustic development work on new cars, with the contemporary use of more modern measuring techniques, was established. This decision implicitly assumed that, to do this development work, it is not necessary to reach the very low noise levels of a pure acoustic wind tunnel.