Two-dimensional numerical tests, of drag compensation device for on-road freight vehicles, based on CFD methods

Technical University - Sofia, FPEPM, Department:“ Hydroaerodynamics and Hydraulic Machines”, Sofia 1000, Bulgaria

^* Corresponding author: m_ivanov@tu-sofia.bg

Abstract

In today’s demanding reality, making the on-road freight vehicles more fuel-efficient and lower emissive, is becoming more and more important design issue. During the past years the light car industry has managed to reduce significantly the aerodynamic losses, whereas the freight transport did not have much development in this aspect. For heavy vehicles such as tractor-trailers, drag is one of the dominant reasons for energy loss due to poor aerodynamic shape and large surfaces facing the flow direction. That is why, the presented study focuses on the development of technological solution for aerodynamic loss compensation, devoted to the freight transport vehicles. An innovative approach for drag compensation, based on airfoil device located in the tractor-trailer gap, is tested by the methods of the Computational fluid dynamics (CFD), in 2D simulation study. The lift and drag force distribution over the airfoil are analyzed in the restricted area, in relation to the airfoil size. The results show that, the values increase with the increase of the size of the profile. However, important model limitations are described as well, which will assist the further development of the proposed device.