Large Eddy Simulations of flow around two Generic vehicles in a platoon

Abstract

A detailed analysis of the effect of inter-vehicle distance on the flow structure of a two-model platoon is presented. Simulations are made for two Ahmed bodies with a slant angle of 25° and for three inter-vehicle distances, d∕L = 0.3, 0.5 and 1. The Reynolds number based on the body height was 30000. A drag increase was observed for the follower with d∕L = 0.5, compared to the drag value of a single body in isolation. To explain the underlying reasons for the increase in drag, various instantaneous and time-averaged plots are presented and compared for different distances, and a significant change in flow structure was found in flows between the set-ups with d∕L = 0.5 and d∕L = 1.