Prediction Snow Ingress into Air Intake System

The following two objectives were set for the development of predictions for snow ingress into the air intake system.

• To enable snow ingress predictions in the design stage so that vehicles can be developed in a short period of time.
• To guarantee performance in very cold regions such as Canada.

To achieve these objectives, it was decided to develop snow ingress prediction tools that use computational fluid dynamics (CFD). First, research was conducted in Canada to collect the snow information that was required for the simulation. In this research, snow particle measurement equipment was used to measure in detail the number of snow particles and their diameters. The research results that were obtained were reflected in the simulation, and a correlation was found between the calculations and test results obtained in Canada. Finally, tools were developed to facilitate results analysis from the snow ingress simulation. These analysis tools will be useful when formulating countermeasures against snow ingress or for deepening designer understanding of the phenomenon.