Influence of floor motions in wind tunnels on the aerodynamics of road vehicles

Journal article, 2005

The effect of a moving floor on the flow around a simplified car with a typical fastback geometry is investigated. Two large-eddy simulations of the flows with stationary and moving floors are made and both instantaneous and time-averaged results are compared. It is found that the floor motion reduces drag by 8% and lift by 16%. Changes in the flow are found to be global but are largest close to the floor and on the rear slanted surface of the vehicle. The wake flow is found to be relatively insensitive to the floor movement, in agreement with previous experimental observations. The periodicity of the flow events is found to be dependent on whether the floor is moving. Power spectral density of both the lift and the drag contain only one dominant frequency peak when the moving floor is adopted as compared to scattered spectra in the stationary floor case. Changes in the qualitative picture of the flow are limited to the flow near the floor and on the slanted surface of the body. However, changes in the surface pressure on the body and the history of the flow show the need of a moving floor in experimental and numerical simulations.