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It aims to study the unsteady flow characteristic of the side-view mirror wake field, and reduce the wind noise by means of unsteady flow control. In this paper, the PIV test in a wind tunnel is used to capture the unsteady flow in the wake field of the side-view mirror, which is used to verify the accuracy of the steady simulation method with RANS after being averaged. Then LES turbulence model is used to obtain the wind noise, and the unsteady flow characteristic like vortex shedding of the side-view mirror is studied. The results show that, in the wake of the side-view mirror, there is a vortex pair similar to Karman Vortex Street. In both horizontal and vertical sections, these two vortexes are respectively separated from the upper and lower edges of the side-view mirror. Accompanied by a significantly uncertain periodic shedding, they continue to extend back until dissipating.

Formula One (F1) racing cars are often running at high-speed with the pitching angle changing frequently due to road conditions. These pitching angle changes result in changes to the car’s aerodynamic characteristics that will directly affect handling stability and other performance factors including safety. This paper takes a F1 racing car as the model; the influence of the change of pitching angle on aerodynamic drag force and lift force are investigated. CFD code-PowerFLOW based LBM is used to simulate the aerodynamic characteristics with different pitching angles. The distribution of aerodynamic coefficients, velocity and pressure in the flow field are obtained; and the differences between different pitching angles were analyzed. The results show that as the pitching angle increases, the drag force increases and the lift force decreases. The down-force of the car is mainly supplied by the front wing and the rear wing.

The underbody diffusers are used widely in race cars to improve the flow field structure at the bottom of the car and provide enough downforce. In recent years, passenger cars have begun to use bottom diffuser to improve aerodynamic characteristics, so as to reduce drag and increase downforce. In this paper, the aerodynamic characteristics of the bus with different underbody diffuser angles and channel numbers are studied by numerical simulation analysis. Firstly, the aerodynamics of the bus under different diffuser inlet and outlet angles are studied, and then an optimal inlet and outlet angle is determined based on the simulation results. Then, using this angle as a constant, the 2, 3, and 4 channel numbers were chosen as the diffuser channel variables to study the influence of the multiple-channel diffusers on the aerodynamic drag of the vehicle.

Numerical simulations on the fluid-structure interaction were conducted using commercial software STAR-CCM+ and ABAQUS. The aeroelastic responses of a deflector under several different working conditions were simulated utilizing finite volume and finite element methods to investigate the aeroelastic problem of automotive deflectors. Results showed that the structural response of a top deflector is minimal under the influence of aerodynamics given its large structural stiffness. The size of the top deflector was optimised by using thickness as a variable. The volume and quality of the top deflector were significantly reduced, and its lightweight performance was improved to satisfy the stiffness performance requirement. The vibration of a side deflector structure was mainly induced by the turbulence on the structure surface. The amplitude of vibration was small and the vibration gradually converged in a few seconds without obvious regularity.

The concept of “bionic design” has driven the developments of automotive design. In this paper, a novel beak-shaped automotive tail fin with honeycomb cellular structure is proposed based on the idea of “bionic design”. Beak-shaped appearance is utilized to meet the requirement of aerodynamics performance, inner honeycomb cellular structure is filled to achieve more lightweight space. This paper starts from the establishment of three dimensional (3D) model based on the real characteristics of sparrow’s beak. On this basis, aerodynamic performances of novel beak-shaped tail fin and conventional shark tail fin are analyzed by experiment. Finally, the stiffness and modal analyses of solid beak-shaped tail fin and honeycomb beak-shaped tail fin are carried out respectively. The results indicate that the deformation of solid beak-shaped tail fin and honeycomb beak-shaped tail fin satisfy the basic requirements.