Technical Paper
Effect Of Cooling Airflow Intake Positioning On The Aerodynamics Of A Simplified Battery Electric Road Vehicle
2024-04-09
2024-01-2521
The transition towards battery electric vehicles (BEVs) has increased the focus on energy efficiency. Ensuring adequate airflow through the underhood is necessary to climatize the vehicle, despite the increase in aerodynamic drag. However, with lower cooling requirements in BEVs, the front air intakes can be placed with greater freedom. This paper explores the effects on exterior aerodynamics caused by securing a constant cooling airflow through intakes at various positions across the front of the vehicle. High fidelity simulations were performed on a variation of the opensource AeroSUV model that is more representative of a BEV configuration. To focus on the exterior aerodynamic changes, and under the assumption that the cooling requirements would not change, a constant mass flow boundary was defined at the cooling airflow inlets and outlets.