Flow field analysis of trucks and a design of an additional drag reduction device

Authors

  • Jianmin Xu School of Mechanical and Automotive Engineering, Xiamen University of Technology, Xiamen, Fujian province, China
  • Shuiting Zhou School of Mechanical and Automotive Engineering, Xiamen University of Technology, Xiamen, Fujian province, China

Keywords:

truck, aerodynamic characteristics, drag reduction devices, flow field

Abstract

Numerical simulation of the outflow field of a truck is carried out by using aerodynamic analysis software based on a computational fluid dynamics model. The velocity and pressure distribution of the outflow field around the truck are obtained and the cause of generating aerodynamic drag is analyzed. The flow separation in the front and at the tail of the truck is the main cause of air resistance generation. Three kinds of truck fairing are proposed based on the aerodynamic drag reduction mechanism. The influence of a drag reduction device on aerodynamic characteristics is analyzed based on the pressure distribution, velocity distribution and turbulent kinetic energy distribution around the truck. The research shows that three kinds of drag reduction devices for a truck have great effect on drag reduction, with the bottom fairing showing the best drag reduction effect. This study provides a theoretical basis for drag reduction and energy saving for the truck.

Downloads

Published

2018-01-25

Issue

Engineering Review, Vol. 38, No. 1

Section

Articles

License

Engineering review uses the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 International License, which governs the use, publishing and distribution of articles by authors, publishers and the wider general public.

The authors are allowed to post a digital file of the published article, or the link to the published article (Enginering Review web page) may be made publicly available on websites or repositories, such as the Author’s personal website, preprint servers, university networks or primary employer’s institutional websites, third party institutional or subject-based repositories, and conference websites that feature presentations by the Author(s) based on the published article, under the condition that the article is posted in its unaltered Engineering Review form, exclusively for non-commercial purposes.

The journal Engineering Review’s publishing procedure is performed in accordance with the publishing ethics statements, defined within the Publishing Ethics Resource Kit. The Ethics statement is available in the document Ethics Policies.