Computational Simulation of Heavy Truck Model with Corner Nozzle Drag Reduction Device

Abstract

Heavy truck fuel consumption represents a high percentage in overall energy consumption Its matchbox-like configuration makes its aerodynamic drag exceed the frictional drag due to its weight A large portion of the aerodynamic drag is attributed to the drag in the rear end of the truck The purpose of this research is to study numerically the design of corner nozzles installed vertically at two corners of the truck’s rear end for the aerodynamic drag reduction to save fuel consumption The model of heavy truck in the present study was an 1/8-scale Ground Transportation System (GTS) which was studied experimentally in the 7-by 10-foot NASA Ames wind tunnel facility Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) method was used to do the numerical simulation The computational model was created using CATIA CAD file The numerical method adopted was CFX software for numerical simulation and ICEM-CFD for mesh generation The simulations were performed on a baseline GTS truck model with and without the add-on corner nozzles Comparisons were made to see the effectiveness of the corner nozzles The nozzles in design considerations were made of two curved sheet metals The performances were determined based on two configuration parameters: the effusive angles from 20 degrees to 70 degrees and the nozzle outlet to inlet area ratios (AR) from 1 0 to 2 0 at 0 2 intervals Calculations showed good aerodynamic drag reductions at different percentages The results indicated that the larger AR has better drag reduction effect The optimal effective angle for a given AR is proportional to the value of AR The larger AR has the larger optimal effusive angle The best design in the present study was found to be 7 609% in drag reduction when AR equals 2 0 and effusive angle is 60 degrees

Date of Award	2017 Feb 15
Original language	English
Supervisor	Shih-Hsiung Chen (Supervisor)