Experimental Investigation of Underbody Thermal and Aerodynamic Flow-Field Features

Underbody vehicle flows are poorly understood given the comparatively small field of research to draw upon; even more so in the case of crosswinds. With the advent of electric and hybrid electric vehicles and their increased cooling demands, there is a need for a link between the aerodynamic flow field and the thermodynamic response. Thus underbody research considering a yawing vehicle was conducted on a Chevrolet Aveo5 hatchback. The vehicle was outfitted with a heat source to provide a baseline analysis along thermocouples, pressure probes and flow visualization tufts. The climatic wind tunnel at the University Of Ontario Institute Of Technology's Automotive Centre of Excellence provided video data of the tufts and thermal imaging data of the heat source. This study has demonstrated that there is a strong link between underbody aerodynamics and the thermal field; however the underbody aerodynamics are more dominated by the geometric turbulent effects due to the rough underbody as opposed to the yawing direction of the vehicle.