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For an efficient automotive AC system it is very essential to ensure uninterrupted and consistent airflow and temperature at the vent exit to help achieve the comfortable cabin space. This certainly requires temperature sensor to position at lowest possible temperature on heat exchanger and uniform flow distribution over it. However the uneven distribution of airflow on evaporator entry face leads to lowest temperature and sometimes goes undetected. This causes the condensate to get freezed and then frosting occurs at the core surface. Eventually a substantial portion of evaporator face gets choked and gradually airflow reduces and evaporator exit air temperature shoots up. Hence it is very important to prevent the frosting on evaporator core so to have uninterrupted airflow and adequate cooling in the passenger compartment. The present paper investigates the reasons for frosting occurring in one of the hatchback vehicle in bench test.

Radiators are types of heat exchangers, which are used to transfer the heat from one fluid to another fluid. It is mainly used in automobile engine cooling systems and the radiators are the major source of heat rejection from the system by cooling the working fluid (generally water or glycol mixture). The application of radiators in the two-wheeler vehicle segment plays a vital role in increasing engine efficiency by maintaining the optimum temperature inside the engine assembly. As the technology advances with higher power requirements for the two-wheeler vehicle segment, thermal management of combustion engine becomes a critical part of it, resulting in the advancement of radiator technology in terms of compactness and thermal performance. In order to cater to the increasing demand for high-powered engines, performance optimization of two-wheeler radiators becomes an important aspect of design.

Transport sector comes under largest energy consuming category, after mining and other industries, a significant fuel economy improvement are required to reduce green house emission. Till now the most promising technologies in this attempt are electric vehicle. Electric vehicles use large batteries to store energy, most common battery used in electric vehicles are lithium ion and lithium polymer preferred due to their high energy density compared to weight. The flow of current causes heating in the battery cells, performance of Lithium-Ion battery cells is greatly impacted by their temperature. For optimum performance it should operate in desired temperature range (15°C-35°C). Battery cooling system is the system which maintain optimum temperature of battery by cooling/heating to increases the thermal efficiency of vehicle. Most common Battery Thermal Management methods used today are, Air Cooled, Indirect liquid Cooled and Direct Cooled.

High vehicle emission resulting in increasing the air pollution day by day has challenged and forced the automotive industry to look for alternate and more environment friendly technologies. The transformation of the automotive industry in near future towards green energy solutions has also fuelled the technological advancement in this industry. In order to fulfil this requirement, Electrical Vehicles (EVs) have emerged as the best solution available till now. It has become very popular because of the zero emission and higher wheel-drive efficiency. The vehicle has some limitations in terms of performance, cost, lifespan & battery safety. The EVs have lithium ion batteries incorporated to cater the drive power requirement. In order to maximize the vehicle performance, thermal management of the batteries becomes very critical. The battery thermal management system (BTMS) has crucial role in controlling the thermal behaviour of the batteries.

The thermal heat load requirement for the cabin and the cockpit of aerial vehicle varies with various conditions comprises of altitudes and different weather conditions. The mapping of the heat load w.r.t. the above conditions is a complex phenomenon, which involves difficult mathematical modeling. The aerodynamic design of the aerial vehicle allows the flow of ambient air to contribute in the cabin and cockpit heat load along with passengers, pilots & co-pilots heat load at various weather conditions. The current study considers the mathematical modeling of the cabin and cockpit of aerial vehicle w.r.t. various weather conditions and altitudes and simulate the heat load requirements. The estimation of the heat load plays a key role in thermal management systems of the aerial vehicle for both the cabin and cockpit. The objective of this study is to highlight the importance of heat load requirement of the aerial vehicle and methods to simulate it.

Vehicles wind shield are designed to provide a clear visibility in winter as its one of the most important requirement for the comfortable and safe journey. In extreme winters, wind shield of vehicle is covered with layer of ice and if frosted happened, results in reduces the visibility distance. To increase the visibility and providing the comfort to driving the vehicle, heater is used in vehicle as an integrated part of vehicle HVAC System. When the blower air passes through heater, air temperature gets increased. When the hot air is injected through grill at designed angle of injection and at selected air velocity on wind shield surface, ice on wind shield melting due to convection heat transfer phenomenon and thus achieved a clear windshield glass and clear visibility at driver and at co-driver area.

Heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems play a crucial role in our day-to-day activities. With rise in global warming, leading to climate change, HVAC unit is the need of the hour. With average temperatures on the rise, it is quite imperative that the unit provides better thermal comfort to the passengers. Off-road vehicles like tractor, is also no exclusion. Tractor drivers have to experience adverse weather conditions out in the open field. Thus it is quite fundamental that sufficient airflow reaches every point inside the driver cabin, ensuring proper cool-down. To ensure proper distribution of airflow inside the cabin, optimization of HVAC unit needs to be properly carried out. The present study shows how an HVAC of an off-road vehicle is properly optimized with the help of Computational Fluid Dynamics. STAR-CCM+ v2021.2.1 is used as solver for the simulation.

The automotive industry is a gigantic industry as millions of vehicles are running on the road and it’s growing at a rapid rate. The emissions are causing various global problems such as global warming, green house effects, air pollutions etc. due to the use of fossil fuels in abundance. This drives to think for alternative solutions, which are eco-friendly and having less or no emissions. The electric vehicles (EVs) are the most reliable solution as it is having high performance and efficiency with zero emissions. The evolution of EVs has fuelled the two-wheeler EVs industry to flourish at a fast pace. Li-ion battery and traction motor are the most important components in two-wheeler EVs and the thermal management for battery is more important for higher efficiency with longer life and better reliability along with the traction motor to have long range and better durability.

In electric vehicles, along with cooling and heating requirement of battery, cabin atmosphere also need to be controlled according to human comfort level. Productivity level of humans decreases when cabin’s environment (including temperature, relative humidity and air velocity) varies too far from comfort range. For cold ambient conditions, waste heat from internal combustion engine is enough for heating passenger cabin in conventional vehicles. In contrast to that, electric vehicles do not have enough waste heat available to warm up cabin atmosphere during winters. Using battery power for heating in winters reduces vehicle mileage drastically. Consequently, many alternative cabin heating technologies and their combinations are proposed and designed to reduce the dependency on battery energy to improve thermal comfort under cold weather conditions.

The rapid evolution of electric vehicles (EVs) has considerably forced the automotive industry to design compact and highly efficient heat exchangers due to low-temperature applications. The plate type heat exchanger (Also known as “Chiller” in automotive industry) is one of the most important components in EVs thermal management systems. It is a type of heat exchanger, which uses metallic plates arranged like a staggered sandwiched structure and brazed together to exchange heat between two working fluids. The heat transfer between the plates occurs due to highly compact structural design as compare to any conventional heat exchangers. The chiller is having very large surface area, which is exposed to the working fluids as the distribution happens all across the plates. The chillers are more suitable design for transferring heat between ranges of working fluids pressure varying from low to high. Various types of welded, semi-welded plate heat exchangers are available in the market.

Electric vehicles (EV) have become very significant and potential way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions on a worldwide scale. EV also provides Energy security, as it reduces the dependency on petroleum producing countries of the world. Similar to the conventional Internal Combustion Engine Cars, in Electrical Vehicles also the efficient air conditioning system is very important for providing thermal comfort and for giving safe driving conditions. In Air Conditioning systems for EV, the heating option is available in the form of Electrical heaters and Heat Pump systems. The Heat pumps have become more popular compared to the electrical Positive Temperature Coefficient (PTC) heaters because of their highly efficient and energy saving designs. However, there are still some issues with using heat pumps. One of such issue is their less Coefficient of performance (COP) at low ambient conditions.