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Energies
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New Developments and Researches in Several Aspects of Ground Vehicle...
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New Developments and Researches in Several Aspects of Ground Vehicle Aerodynamics: Aerodynamic Optimization, Wind Noise and Thermal Management

A special issue of Energies (ISSN 1996-1073). This special issue belongs to the section "E: Electric Vehicles".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (25 November 2021) | Viewed by 6608

Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. Joseph Katz

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Aerospace Engineering, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA 92182, USA
Interests: fluid mechanics; cars aerodynamics; propulsion

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The effects of airflow over objects has fascinated scientist for many generations, leading to numerous mathematical models and to a large variety of experimental investigations. With the increased volume of ground transportation, the study of vehicle aerodynamics gained momentum to improve the vehicle performance, comfort, and environmental signature of the related industry. The first and most logical focus was on reducing the air resistance (drag) of ground vehicles, such as passenger cars, trucks, or even trains, which lead to improved fuel economy and reduced air pollution. However, passenger comfort, due to wind noise, buffeting or flow separation (as in convertible cars) also received increased notice, mainly from the vehicle manufacturer perspective. Improvement in these areas lead to increased vehicle speeds, and performance considerations, such as handling and stability, drove the focus on investigating aerodynamic downforce and its balance on the vehicle wheels. The need to quantify and understand the effects of the airflow on the various vehicle shapes led to the development of experimental methods in the form of road testing and wind tunnel testing, and to the development of supporting instrumentation. In recent years, developments in computer-aided design (CAD) and in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) provided an additional tool for estimating and understanding the sources of aerodynamic loads on a large variety of vehicles. One of the most intriguing developments in recent years is the combination of CAD and CFD with optimization methods, to automate the process of vehicle shape development. In this special issue of Energies, the focus is on all the vehicle-aerodynamics-related topics mentioned so far and on the many elementary fluid dynamic problems shared with the airplane or ship design disciplines. As such, the importance of large laminar flow regions, or the control of transition into turbulent flow regions, and the active or passive control of the resulting flow separation or vortex flow, should be included as well.

Topics include, but are not limited to, the following research topics:

  • Vehicle aerodynamics from a historical point of view;
  • Vehicle-shape-related studies: passenger cars, trucks, motorcycles/scooters, trains, etc.;
  • Competition vehicles (race cars) and study of downforce;
  • Vortex flow management (to increase downforce or reduce acoustic effects);
  • Vehicle interactions (overtaking, following, platoons);
  • Heat transfer and cooling: surface heat exchangers, cooling system optimizations (inlets, diffusers fans, etc.);
  • Wind tunnels, moving ground, blockage, sensors and measurement techniques;
  • Vehicle related CFD (grid, shape optimization, aero/CAD interaction, etc.);
  • Flow control over vehicle components: flow-separation, laminar/turbulent transition, active control, vortices etc.;
  • Acoustics: buffeting, mirror noise, convertible noise/flow, etc.

Prof. Dr. Joseph Katz
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Energies is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • vehicle aerodynamics
  • fluid dynamic modeling and testing
  • computational fluid Mechanics
  • wind tunnel testing
  • flow separation
  • aero acoustics
  • heat transfer and cooling

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

27 pages, 57681 KiB  
Article
Experimental and Numerical Analyses of a Novel Wing-In-Ground Vehicle
by Martijn van Sluis, Sina Nasrollahi, Arvind Gangoli Rao and Georg Eitelberg
Energies 2022, 15(4), 1497; https://doi.org/10.3390/en15041497 - 17 Feb 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2026
Abstract
The AeroCity is a new form of transportation concept that has been developed to provide high-speed ground transportation at a much lower cost than the existing high-speed railway. Utilizing the Wing-in-Ground (WIG) effect, the AeroCity vehicle does not require complex infrastructures like other [...] Read more.
The AeroCity is a new form of transportation concept that has been developed to provide high-speed ground transportation at a much lower cost than the existing high-speed railway. Utilizing the Wing-in-Ground (WIG) effect, the AeroCity vehicle does not require complex infrastructures like other contemporary concepts, such as the Hyperloop or Maglev trains. In the current work, the aerodynamic characteristics of the AeroCity vehicle are examined through a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis. The results from the CFD analysis qualitatively match with the findings of wind tunnel experiments. Surface streamlines and boundary layer measurements correspond well with the numerical data. However, the force measurements show a discrepancy. It is found that the separation bubble over the side plates is not captured by the CFD, and this is responsible for an under-prediction of the drag at higher free-stream velocities. The Transition SST model improved the matching between the experiments and numerical simulations. The influence of the moving ground is numerically investigated, and the effect of non-moving ground on the vehicle aerodynamics was found not to be significant. Finally, the inclusion of the track wall is examined. It is found that the merging of the wingtip vortices is responsible for a significant drag increase and, therefore, an alternative track geometry should be investigated. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue New Developments and Researches in Several Aspects of Ground Vehicle Aerodynamics: Aerodynamic Optimization, Wind Noise and Thermal Management)
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12 pages, 4062 KiB  
Article
The Effect of Afterbody Geometry on Passenger Vehicles in Platoon
by Hesham Ebrahim and Robert Dominy
Energies 2021, 14(22), 7553; https://doi.org/10.3390/en14227553 - 12 Nov 2021
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1649
Abstract
It is well known that platoons of closely spaced passenger cars can reduce their aerodynamic drag yielding substantial savings in energy consumption and reduced emissions as a system. Most published research has focused on platoons of identical vehicles which can arguably be justified [...] Read more.
It is well known that platoons of closely spaced passenger cars can reduce their aerodynamic drag yielding substantial savings in energy consumption and reduced emissions as a system. Most published research has focused on platoons of identical vehicles which can arguably be justified by some evidence that geometric variety has little to no effect on the overall flow characteristics in platoons of three vehicles or more. It is known that much of the aerodynamic benefit from platooning is gained by the leading two cars, so operating as vehicle pairs could potentially achieve similar environmental benefits whilst addressing many of the practical challenges associated with the safe operation of long platoons on public roads. However, it has been reported that unlike long platoons, the effect of geometry and arrangement is critical if the drag reduction of a pair is to be optimised. This paper describes a parametric study based on three geometric variants of the popular DrivAer model with different combinations and spacings. It is confirmed that vehicle geometry crucially affects the results with the best combinations matching those of long platoons and others creating a net drag increase. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue New Developments and Researches in Several Aspects of Ground Vehicle Aerodynamics: Aerodynamic Optimization, Wind Noise and Thermal Management)
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21 pages, 76975 KiB  
Article
Wake Flow Investigation on Notchback MIRA Model by PIV Experiments
by Yingchao Zhang, Jinji Li, Zijie Wang, Qiliang Wang, Hongyu Gong and Zhe Zhang
Energies 2021, 14(15), 4568; https://doi.org/10.3390/en14154568 - 28 Jul 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2168
Abstract
To deepen our understanding of the flow field and flow mechanism of a car-like model, in this paper, an experimental investigation of the flow field of MIRA notchback 1/8 scale model is carried out using Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) method. The tests are [...] Read more.
To deepen our understanding of the flow field and flow mechanism of a car-like model, in this paper, an experimental investigation of the flow field of MIRA notchback 1/8 scale model is carried out using Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) method. The tests are conducted in an open circuit wind tunnel at a Reynolds number of 9.16×105. In order to obtain the detailed flow field structure of the notchback model, the PIV method was used to capture the flow field images from three orthogonal directions. By studying the vorticity and velocity vector figures of both the time-averaged and instantaneous states, a three-dimensional flow field schematic of the notchback model is summarized, and the formation mechanism and development process of the vortices are analyzed. This study not only provides an intuitive display of the three-dimensional flow field structure of the MIRA notchback model but, more importantly, it provides a reference for the development of automobile aerodynamic drag reduction by analyzing the flow mechanism, which is beneficial to energy conservation. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue New Developments and Researches in Several Aspects of Ground Vehicle Aerodynamics: Aerodynamic Optimization, Wind Noise and Thermal Management)
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