Efficiency Enhancement Design Approach in the Side Wing of a FSAE Car Utilizing a Shutter-Like Fairing Structure

Abstract

Aerodynamical design is one of the critical technologies in race car engineering, and favorable race car aerodynamics is supposed to provide sufficient negative lift force and keep the center of pressure in the vicinity of center of mass. Taking the Formula Society of Automotive Engineers (FSAE) cars as an example, side wing structure is frequently adopted for better grip in the mid-back of short wheelbase, open wheel race cars. This research designs a shutter-like fairing structure and utilizes it to weaken the vorticity and reinforce the pressure of side wing flow field. The sensitivity of side wing aerodynamic efficiency to shutters’ key parameters is analyzed, and optimized shutters’ key parameters for a prototype FSAE race car are obtained through computational fluid dynamics simulations. Results indicate that over 10% enhancement in side wing aerodynamic efficiency can be achieved by applying optimized shutters.

Keywords

• race car aerodynamics
• shutter
• fairing
• side wing
• FSAE
• CFD