Computational Fluid Dynamics Applicable to Cloth Design

Increasingly, different concepts such as safety, hygiene and comfort interact in the characterization of the workplaces. Being comfortable during periods of low activity, seems to be a requirement for most people and, secondly, in other sectors where performance is critical, the priorities are different. In both cases, the intellectual and physical performance is strongly affected by the sensation of thermal comfort. Thus, various approaches can be applied to provide comfort, for example, in the design of buildings and the selection of appropriate clothing. Comfortable clothing is a complex and interdisciplinary concept, consisting of a balance of the sensorial, psychological and physiological aspects [1, 2]. In objective terms, the behavior of the human body depends on several factors: temperature, air velocity and humidity, production of metabolic heat and clothing insulation. All these factors determine the heat and mass transfer processes between the human body and the environment. The Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) numerical simulation has been a powerful tool in this investigation field. A combined simulation of a room and a thermal manikin has been developed in the FLUENT code. Using a manikin with real dimensions, divided into parts with different temperatures, seems important to give accurate fluid flow and moisture distributions.Copyright © 2009 by ASME