THE DEVELOPMENT OF A MULTI-PURPOSE WIND TUNNEL

This manuscript contains the development stages of a multi-purpose wind tunnel built at the Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia. The fully automated wind tunnel is named Pangkor after an island in Perak, Malaysia. The development of the wind tunnel consists of three stages namely the design, fabrication and testing & commissioning. The computational fluids dynamic (CFD) approach was employed to ascertain the main geometries to optimize space utilization. Calculations are made based on typical wind tunnel design guidelines. Pitot tubes-pressure transducer, hotwire anemometry, temperature, room humidity and barometric sensors were used to verify actual flow of our construction. A traverse installed at the wind tunnel is capable of a two dimensional movements. The 15 kW axial fan used is especially selected because of space limitation. A variable frequency drive (VFD) connected to fan’s motor allows velocity control from a computer. All devices are connected a computer with one single controlling software; Scilab – ensuring ease of operation. The project shows that, with a limited budget, a wind tunnel with full functionalities could be constructed

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