Seminar report on

Advancements in Aerodynamic devices of Cars

Submitted by
Rama Shankar Sharma
(University Roll No.: 2017051084)

DEPARTMENT OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING

Madan Mohan Malaviya University of Technology,

Gorakhpur(U.P.)

INDIA

January 2020

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 ABSTRACT

When objects move through air, forces are generated by the relative
motion between the air and surfaces of the object. Aerodynamics is the study of these
forces, generated by the motion of air, usually aerodynamics are categorized according to
the type of flow as subsonic, hypersonic, supersonic etc.

It is essential that aerodynamics be taken in to account during the

design of cars as an improved aerodynamics in car would attain higher speeds and more
fuel efficiency. For attaining this aerodynamic design the cars are designed lower to the
ground and are usually sleek in design and almost all corners are rounded off, to ensure
smooth passage of air through the body, in addition to it a number of enhancements like
spoilers, wings are also attached to the cars for improving aerodynamics. Wind tunnels are
used for analyzing the aerodynamics of cars, besides this a number of software’s are also
available now days to ensure the optimal aerodynamic design.

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 CONTENTS

Abstract
Contents

1. Introduction
2. History and evolution of aerodynamics
3. Aerodynamic forces on a body
a) Lift
b) Weight
c) Drag
d) Thrust
4. Study of Aerodynamic forces on cars
e) Drag
f) Lift or Downforce
5. Aerodynamic devices
6. Drag Coefficient
7. Methods for evaluating Aerodynamics in cars
g) Wind tunnels
h) Software
8. Aerodynamic Design tips
9. Conclusions
10. References

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 INTRODUCTION
When objects move through air, forces are generated by the relative motion
between air and surfaces of the body, study of these forces generated by air is called
aerodynamics. Based on the flow environment it can be classified in to external
aerodynamics and internal aerodynamics; external aerodynamics is the flow around solid
objects of various shapes, where as internal aerodynamics is the flow through passages in
solid objects, for e.g. the flow through jet engine air conditioning pipe etc. The behavior of
air flow changes depends on the ratio of the flow to the speed of sound. This ratio is called
Mach number, based on this mach number the aerodynamic problems can be classified as
subsonic if the speed of flow is less than that of sound, transonic if speeds both below and
above speed of sound are present, supersonic if characteristics of flow is greater than that
of sound and hypersonic if flow is very much greater than that of sound. Aerodynamics
have wide range of applications mainly in aerospace engineering ,then in the design of
automobiles, prediction of forces and moments in ships and sails, in the field of civil
engineering as in the design of bridges and other buildings, where they help to calculate
wind loads in design of large buildings.

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 HISTORY & EVOLUTION OF AERODYNAMICS

Ever since the first car was manufactured in early 20 th century the
attempt has been to travel at faster speeds, in the earlier times aerodynamics was not a
factor as the cars where traveling at very slow speeds there were not any aerodynamic
problems but with increase of speeds the necessity for cars to become more streamlined
resulted in structural invention such as the introduction of the windscreen, incorporation of
wheels into the body and the insetting of the headlamps into the front of the car. This was
probably the fastest developing time in automobiles history as the majority of the work
was to try and reduce the aerodynamic drag. This happened up to the early 1950’s, where
by this time the aerodynamic dray had been cut by about 45% from the early cars such as
the Silver Ghost. However, after this the levels of drag found on cars began to slowly
increase. This was due to the way that the designing was thought about. Before1950,
designers were trying to make cars as streamlined as possible to make it easier for the
engine, yet they were restricting the layout of the interior for the car. After 1950, the levels
of aerodynamic drag went up because cars were becoming more family friendly and so as a
consequence the shapes available to choose were more limited and so it was not possible to
keep the low level of aerodynamic drag. The rectangular shape made cars more purposeful
for the family and so it is fair to say that after 1950 the designing of cars was to aid the
lifestyle of larger families.
Although this was a good thing for families, it didn’t take long before
the issue of aerodynamics came back into the picture in the form of fuel economy. During
the 1970’s there was a fuel crisis and so the demand for more economical cars became
greater, which led to changes in car aerodynamics. During the 1970’s there was a fuel crisis
and so the demand for more economical cars became greater, which led to changes in car
aerodynamics. If a car has poor aerodynamics then the engine has to do more work to go
the same distance as a car with better aerodynamics, so if the engine is working harder it is
going to need more fuel to allow the engine to do the work, and therefore the car with the
better aerodynamics uses less fuel than the other car. This quickly led to a public demand
for cars with a lower aerodynamic drag in order to be more economical for the family.

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 AERODYNAMIC FORCES ON A BODY

Fig 2

LIFT

It is the sum of all fluid dynamic forces on a body normal to the

direction of external flow around the body. Lift is caused by Bernoulli’s effect which states
that air must flow over a long path in order to cover the same displacement in the same
amount of time. This creates a low pressure area over the long edge of object as a result a
low pressure region is formed over the aerofoil and a high pressure region is formed below
the aerofoil, it is this difference in pressure that creates the object to rise

F=(1/2)CLdV2A

Where :
CL= Coefficient of Lift, dependent on the specific geometry of the object,
determined experimentally
d= Density of air
V=Velocity of object relative to air, A=Cross-sectional area of object, parallel to wind

DRAG

It is the sum of all external forces in the direction of fluid flow, so it acts opposite to the
direction of the object. In other words drag can be explained as the force caused by
turbulent airflow around an object that opposes the forward motion of the object through a
gas or fluid.

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 STUDY OF AERODYNAMICS OF CARS

In order to improve the aerodynamics we must first know how the flow of air past
a car, if we visualize a car moving through the air. As we all know, it takes some energy to
move the car through the air, and this energy is used to overcome a force called Drag.

DRAG

A simple definition of aerodynamics is the study of the flow of air around and
through a vehicle, primarily if it is in motion. To understand this flow, you can visualize a
car moving through the air. As we all know, it takes some energy to move the car through
the air, and this energy is used to overcome a force called Drag.

Drag, in vehicle aerodynamics, is comprised primarily of two forces. Frontal pressure and
rear vacuum.

DRAG FORCE AT LOW SPEEDS

The total drag force decreases, meaning that a car with a low drag force will be
able to accelerate and travel faster than one with a high drag force. This means a smaller
engine is required to drive such a car, which means less consumption of fuel.

CAR WEIGHT

As with the parts inside the engine, when the entire car is made lighter, through
the use of lighter materials or better designs, less force is required to move the car. This is
based on F=MA or more accurately, A=F/M, so as mass of the car decreases, the
acceleration increases, or less force is required to accelerate the lighter car.

FRONT END

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This graph clearly shows that drag force is directly proportional to frontal area.(results of
wind tunnel tests)

Fig 4
REAR END

Rear vacuum (a non-technical term, but very descriptive) is caused by the "hole"
left in the air as the car passes through it. To visualize this, imagine a bus driving down a
road. The blocky shape of the bus punches a big hole in the air, with the air rushing around
the body, as mentioned above. At speeds above a crawl, the space directly behind the bus is
"empty" or like a vacuum. This empty area is a result of the air molecules not being able to
fill the hole as quickly as the bus can make it. The air molecules attempt to fill in to this
area, but the bus is always one step ahead, and as a result, a continuous vacuum sucks in
the opposite direction of the bus. This inability to fill the hole left by the bus is technically
called Flow detachment .At the rear of vehicles, the ideal format is a long and gradual
slope. As this is not practical, it has been found that ‘raising and/or lengthening the boot
generally reduces the drag”.
In plan view, rounding corners and ‘all Forward facing elements’ will reduce drag.
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 WINGS & SPOILERS

What this wings or spoilers does is it prevents the separation of flow and there by
preventing the formation of vortices or helps to fill the vacuum in the rear end more
effectively thus reducing drag. So what actually this wings does is that, The wing works by
differentiating pressure on the top and bottom surface of the wing. As mentioned
previously, the higher the speed of a given volume of air, the lower the pressure of that air,
and vice-versa. What a wing does is make the air passing under it travel a larger distance
than the air passing over it (in race car applications). Because air molecules approaching
the leading edge of the wing are forced to separate, some going over the top of the wing,
and some going under the bottom, they are forced to travel differing distances in order to
"Meet up" again at the trailing edge of the wing. This is part of Bernoulli's theory. What
happens is that the lower pressure area under the wing allows the higher pressure area
above the wing to "push" down on the wing, and hence the car it’s mounted to.

The way a real, shaped wing works is essentially the same as an airplane wing, but it's
inverted. An airplane wing produces lift, a car wing produces negative lift or in other
words what we call us, downforce. That lift is generated by a difference in pressure on both
sides of the wing. .

But how is the difference in pressure generated? Well, if you look closely at the drawings,
you'll see that the upper side of the wing is relatively straight, but the bottom side is
curved. This means that the air that goes above the wing travels a relatively straight path,
which is short. The air under the wing has to follow the curve, and hence travel a greater
distance. Now there's Bernoulli's law, which basically states that the total amount of energy
in a volume of fluid has to remain constant. (Unless you heat it or expose an enclosed
volume of it to some form of mechanical work) If you assume the air doesn't move up and
down too much, it boils down to this: if air (or any fluid, for that matter) speeds up, its
pressure drops. From an energetic point of view, this makes sense:

If more energy is needed to maintain the speed of the particles, there's less energy left do
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 Now a day the aerodynamic studies are not constrained to the flow of air past cars
but also a number of other factors like new methods are developed to provide a greater
level of detailed information. Special pressure sensitive paint is now used in the wind
tunnel to graphically show levels of air pressure on a vehicle how it is done is that ,Two
different images are obtained, one at normal room air pressure (wind-off) and a second in
which the wind tunnel is running (wind-on) at a desired test speed. These differences in
color, from wind-off to wind-on, are used to calculate surface pressure.
A bank of blue lights illuminates the car to be tested that has pressure-sensitive
paint applied on the driver's side window. The car and lights are in a wind tunnel at Ford
Motor Company's Dearborn Proving Ground. Ford researchers have developed a
computerized, pressure-sensitive paint technique that measures airflow over cars, shaving
weeks off current testing methods. A digital camera near the blue lights captures this
information and feeds it into a computer, which displays the varying pressure as
dramatically different colors on a monitor.
The images obtained from tests in the wind tunnel are captured on computer. They
can then be used to study air flow patterns across a vehicle, highlighting areas of possible
refinement or improvement. Additionally, actual data from a production ready model can
be compared with pre-production computer predictions which can in turn help improve the
accuracy of the early design stages.

SOFTWARES

Now a day a large number of software’s are developed for the analysis and
optimization of aerodynamics in automobiles. Earlier times the cars were worked directly
on wind tunnels where they prepared different shapes or cross sections and tested upon the
cars, during those times it was not possible to test the for small areas that is for a small part
of front area etc there testing were made for the entire cross sections, But with the
introduction of computational fluid dynamics i.e. the use of computers to analyze fluid
flows where the entire area is divided in to grids and each grid is analyzed and suitable
algorithms are developed to solve the equations of motion. Based on CFD large number of
software’s are developed for the design and analyzing aerodynamics the most commonly
used software’s are ANSYS, CATIA.
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 CONCLUSION

Earlier cars were poorly designed with heavy engines, protruding parts and
rectangular Shapes due to which they consumed large quantities of fuel and became
unaffordable all theses factors lead to the development and need of aerodynamics in the
design of cars now it would be fair to say that all most all cars are tested for getting the
optimum aerodynamic configuration.

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 REFERENCES

BOOKS
1) Road Vehicle Aerodynamic Design, Barnard R.H.
2) Introduction to Aerodynamics by Anderson.
3) Methods of Reducing Vehicle Aerodynamic Drag Upendra S. Rohatgi
4) The importance of unsteady aerodynamics to road vehicle dynamics – Joshua
Fuller n, Matt Best, Nikhil Garret, Martin Passmore.
5) M. L. Poulton. "Aerodynamics," in Fuel Efficient Car Technology. Boston,
MA: Computational Mechanics Publications, 1997, pp. 89-97
6) Review of Research on Vehicles Aerodynamic Drag Reduction Methods
Mohd Nizam Sudin1 , Mohd Azman Abdullah1 , Shamsul Anuar
Shamsuddin1 , Faiz Redza Ramli1 , Musthafah Mohd Tahir1
7) J. Katz. Race Car Aerodynamics: Designing for Speed. Cambridge, MA: R.
Bentley, 2006.
8) W. Beauchamp. (2009, May). "Passenger Car Aerodynamics." Car
Aerodynamics
WEBSITES
1) www.wikipedia.com
2) www.cardesignonline.com
3) www.buildyourownracecar.com

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