AUTOMOBILE UNDERHOOD THERMAL AND AIR FLOW SIMULATION USING CFD

Automobile underhood thermal and airflow simulation h α s been performed by using a commercial CFD program, FLUENT. To implement the radiation heat transfer effect to the underhood thermal and flow field, Discrete Ordinates Method(DOM) was used. The cooling fan was modeled by using the Multiple Reference Frame(MRF) technique. For the implementation of the heat exchangers, such as radiator and condenser, which are located in the front side of vehicle, the effectiveness-NTU model was used. The pressure drop throughout the heat exchangers was modeled as Porous media. For the validation of the current computational method, the coolant temperature at the inlet port of the radiator was compared with experimental data, and less than 3% error was observed. Finally, the composed model was used for the cooling fan spec determination process in the development of a new vehicle, and the results showed that the current CFD method could be successfully applied to the vehicle development process.