Wind-Tunnel Study of the Traffic-Wake Impacts for Road-Vehicle Aerodynamics National Research Council Canada

Format:

Book

Conference/Event

Author/Creator:

McAuliffe, Brian, author.

Ghorbanishohrat, Faegheh, author.

Barber, Hali, author.

Conference Name:

WCX SAE World Congress Experience (2026-04-14 : Detroit, Michigan, United States)

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Commercial vehicles.

Wind tunnel tests.

Drag.

Local Subjects:

Commercial vehicles.

Wind tunnel tests.

Drag.

Physical Description:

1 online resource

Place of Publication:

Warrendale, PA SAE International 2026

Summary:

When driving in traffic, the wakes of leading vehicles reduce the wind speed experienced by a following vehicle, lowering its drag relative to isolated driving. These wake effects can persist to large inter-vehicle distances, on the order of hundreds of meters, while lateral convection due to cross winds can influence vehicles in adjacent lanes. Wind tunnel testing was conducted at 30% scale for light- and heavy-duty-vehicle models in a large wind tunnel with a traffic-wake simulation system, expanding upon a previous study that examined only heavy vehicles. Three variants of the DrivAer model, four variants of the AeroSUV model, and three variants of a zero-emission heavy-duty-truck model were tested with a range of simulated wake conditions that varied the type, forward distance, and lane position of the wake-source vehicle(s), for a range of yaw angles up to 11°. Results show drag reductions of up to about 10% for the heavy-duty-truck model, and up to about 20% for the passenger-vehicle models. Surface-pressure measurements provide insights about the sources of drag reduction in wake effects, highlighting the balance between strongly-varying forward-surface pressure differences and mild base-pressure increases

Notes:

Vendor supplied data

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license