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A computational study was conducted in order to characterize the heat transfers in a sedan vehicle underbody and the exhaust system. A steady-state analysis with consideration for both the radiation and conjugate heat transfers was undertaken using the High-Reynolds formulation of the k-epsilon turbulence model with standard wall function and the DO model for the radiation heat transfer. All three mechanisms of heat transfer, i.e., convection, conduction, and radiation, were included in the analysis. The convective heat transfer due to turbulent fluid motion was modeled with the assumption of constant turbulent Prandtl number; and heat conduction was solved directly for both fluid and solid.

Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) was used to simulate the flow field over a pickup truck. The simulation was based on a transient state formulation and the focus of the simulation was to assess the capabilities of the current RSM (Reynolds Stresses Model) in CFD tools for vehicle aerodynamic development for pickup trucks. Detailed comparisons were made between the CFD simulations and the existing experiments for a generic pickup truck. It was found that the flow structures obtained from the CFD calculations are very similar to the corresponding measured mean flows. Furthermore, the surface pressure distributions are captured reasonably well by the CFD analysis. Comparison for computational results was carried out for both linear Pressure Strain model (Launder, Reece and Rodi, 1978) and Quadratic Pressure Strain model (Speziale, Sarkar and Gatski, 1991). The CFD results of Linear and Quadratic RSM are very close to the test data.

Effects of the wind tunnel blockage in a closed-wall wind tunnel were investigated using computational fluid dynamics (CFD). Flow over three generic vehicle models representing a passenger sedan, a sports utility vehicle (SUV), and a pickup truck was solved. The models were placed in a baseline virtual wind tunnel as well as four additional virtual wind tunnels, each with different size cross-sections, providing different levels of wind tunnel blockage. For each vehicle model, the CFD analysis produced an aerodynamic drag coefficient for the vehicle at the blockage free condition as well as the blockage effect increment for the baseline wind tunnel. A CFD based blockage correction method is proposed. Comparisons of this method to some existing blockage correction methods for closed-wall wind tunnel are also presented.

Effects of the pressure gradient in the wind tunnel test section on vehicle aerodynamic drag were investigated using computational fluid dynamics (CFD). The numerical study was used to obtain the aerodynamic drag of several vehicles in two virtual wind tunnels, one with a zero pressure gradient and another with a nonzero (but small) pressure gradient. A comparison of the vehicle aerodynamic drags in these two virtual wind tunnels, and investigation of the physical mechanisms causing these differences, have led to two correction formulas. These formulas can be used to correct for the pressure gradient effect on vehicle aerodynamic drag measurement in a wind tunnel that has a nonzero pressure gradient. In the first formula, the correction is given explicitly in terms of known variables. The correction is 80% accurate for passenger car, sports car, sports utility vehicle (SUV), and is 70% accurate for pickup truck.

The computational fluid dynamics (CFD) based wind tunnel blockage correction method proposed in [1] was extended in the present study to production vehicles with detailed underhood and underbody components, fascia and grills. Three different types of vehicles (sedan, SUV, and pickup truck) were considered in the study. While the previous CFD based wind tunnel blockage correction method was for vehicle aerodynamic drag, the blockage effect on vehicle cooling airflow is also included in the present study, and a CFD based blockage correction method for vehicle cooling airflow is proposed. Comparisons were made between the blockage effects for the production vehicles and the blockage effects for the generic vehicles.

Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) was used to simulate the flow field over a pickup truck. The simulation was based on a steady state formulation and the focus of the simulation was to assess the capabilities of the currently used CFD tools for vehicle aerodynamic development for pickup trucks. Detailed comparisons were made between the CFD simulations and the existing experiments for a generic pickup truck. It was found that the flow structures obtained from the CFD calculations are very similar to the corresponding measured mean flows. Furthermore, the surface pressure distributions are captured reasonably well by the CFD analysis. Comparison for aerodynamic drags was carried out for both the generic pickup truck and a production pickup truck. Both the simulations and the measurements show the same trends for the drag as the vehicle geometry changes, This suggests that the steady state CFD simulation can be used to aid the aerodynamic development of pickup trucks.

The effect of jet geometry on flow, heat transfer and defrosting characteristics was numerically investigated for elliptic and rectangular impinging jets on an automobile windshield. Initially, various turbulence models within the commercial computational fluid dynamics (CFD) package FLUENT were employed and validated for a single jet, and the results indicated that the impinging jet heat transfer was more accurately predicted by the SST k -ω turbulence model, which was then utilized for this study. The aspect ratios (AR) of elliptic and rectangular jets were respectively 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0, with jet-to-target spacing h/d=2, 4 and jet-to-jet spacing c/d=4, and all those situations were numerically analyzed with the same air mass flow and jet open area. It was observed that the heat transfer coefficient and defrosting performance of the inclined windshield were significantly affected by the shape of the jet, and the best results were obtained with the elliptic jet arrangements.

External rear view mirror is attached at the side of the vehicle which is to permit clear vision for the driver to the rear of the vehicle. When the vehicle is running, the flow field around external rear view mirror is highly three-dimensional, unsteady, separated and turbulent which is known to be a significant source of aerodynamic noise and a contributor to the total drag force on the vehicle. While among all the researches on the flow field around external rear view mirror, different installation environment were employed. The external rear view mirror is mounted on a production car in most researches which presents the real condition and it can also be mounted on the ground of a wind tunnel, a specially designed table, or a generic vehicle model based on the SAE model. While, the relationship between the flow field around external rear view mirror and the installation environment is not very clear.