Temperature and Heat Flux Behavior of Complex Flows in Car Underhood Compartment

In this work heat transfer and temperature behavior of complex flows encountered in the vehicle underhood compartment is experimentally studied and described with simple models. Underhood thermal measurements made on a passenger vehicle in a large-scale wind tunnel are reported here. The underhood is instrumented by 80 surface and air thermocouples and 20 fluxmeters. Measurements are carried out at three thermal functioning points, in all of which the engine is in operation and the front wheels are positioned on the test facility with power-absorption-controlled rollers. Models are proposed to predict the maximum temperatures and time constants of the underhood components as functions of the car speed and car engine power. The relative errors of the models are 3.6% and 3.7%, respectively. The maximum temperature and the time constant are crucial in the design and optimization of the underhood aerothermal management system. The results obtained in the present work also provide a large database for validation of numerical codes dealing with underhood cooling management.