The behaviour of road vehicles in unsteady cross winds

Abstract A method is presented to calculate the displacement of road vehicles in high cross winds. This calculation follows methods adopted in the field of building aerodynamics in that the spectrum of the wind is multiplied by a vehicle aerodynamic admittance, and a vehicle transfer function to determine the spectrum of lateral displacement. Actual displacements follow from an integration of this spectrum. The derivation of the vehicle transfer function is given, and results are presented of a parametric investigation to assess the sensitivity of the method.