High Level Geometry Restoration for CFD Purposes in ANSA

Paper in proceeding, 2009

In the 1955 Le Mans race, the worst crash in motor racing history occurred. This accident would change the face of motor racing for decades. Numerous investigations has been carried out on this disaster, however still today a number of key questions remain unsolved; and one open area is the influence of aerodynamics on the scenario, since the Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR involved in the crash was equipped with an air-brake and its influence on the accident is basically unknown. In a first attempt to establish CFD as a tool to aid in resolving aerodynamic aspects in motor sport accidents, a research project was started where CFD is used to investigate the aerodynamics of this vehicle and potentially uncover the aerodynamic aspect of this accident. To generate a representative base model of this vehicle, suitable for CFD-simulations, the project borrowed a 1.24 die-cast collector’s item of the Fangio/Moss vehicle. This model was then laser-scanned, however since it had metallic coating the scanner had severe issues with reflections and the resulting geometry was bad. Although looking really bad, with the FE-tools in ANSA this model was salvaged and a clean surface was recreated of the input data. With this data the project carried on, and first step of results was published on SAE Motorsports Engineering Conference in the autumn of 2008, the second step of the project was published on European Automotive Simulation Conference EASC, Munich 2009.