ADIABATIC FLOW SIMULATION IN AN AIR-CONDITIONED VEHICLE PASSENGER COMPARTMENT

Dispersion and flow of air in passenger compartments of vehicles are important to assure a comfortable environment for passengers, driver concentration and safe driving conditions. The article describes numerical adiabatic flow simulations for the „mute“, an electric car. Air streams in its passenger compartment were simulated; air velocities were compared while using different turbulence models. The turbulence models were selected upon being screened for best-suiting characteristics. The eddy-viscosity standard, RNG k-e and SST k-ω models were used. Near-wall approaches (standard wall functions, scalable wall functions and enhanced wall treatment) were checked against a test case from “European Research Community on Flow, Turbulence and Combustion" to determine the best choice for „mute“ passenger compartment air velocity simulations. (Received in March 2013, accepted in September 2013. This paper was with the authors 3 months for 2 revisions.)

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