The Unsteady Wind Environment of Road Vehicles, Part One: A Review of the On-road Turbulent Wind Environment 2007-01-1236
This paper is the first of two papers that address the simulation and effects of turbulence on surface vehicle aerodynamics. This, the first paper, focuses on the characteristics of the turbulent flow field encountered by a road vehicle. The natural wind environment is usually unsteady but is almost universally replaced by a smooth flow in both wind tunnel and computational domains. In this paper, the characteristics of turbulence in the relative-velocity co-ordinate system of a moving ground vehicle are reviewed, drawing on work from Wind Engineering experience. Data are provided on typical turbulence levels, probability density functions and velocity spectra to which vehicles are exposed. The focus is on atmospheric turbulence, however the transient flow field from the wakes of other road vehicles and roadside objects are also considered. The effects of turbulence on vehicle aerodynamics and methods of experimental simulation are reviewed in a companion paper, Part 2 (Watkins and Cooper, 2007).
Citation: Cooper, K. and Watkins, S., "The Unsteady Wind Environment of Road Vehicles, Part One: A Review of the On-road Turbulent Wind Environment," SAE Technical Paper 2007-01-1236, 2007, https://doi.org/10.4271/2007-01-1236. Download Citation
Author(s):
Kevin R. Cooper, Simon Watkins
Affiliated:
CooperAero Ltd., RMIT University
Pages: 20
Event:
SAE World Congress & Exhibition
ISSN:
0148-7191
e-ISSN:
2688-3627
Also in:
Vehicle Aerodynamics 2007-SP-2066, SAE 2007 Transactions Journal of Passenger Cars: Mechanical Systems-V116-6
Related Topics:
Turbulence
Wind tunnel tests
Aerodynamics
Technical review
Simulation and modeling
Roads and highways
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