• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.194-201
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• 2006

Roof-fairing and deflector system have been used on heavy-duty trucks to minimize aerodynamic drag force not only for driving stability of the truck but also for energy saving by reducing the required driving power of the vehicle. In this study, a numerical simulation was carried out to see aerodynamic effect of the drag reducing device on the model vehicle. Drag and lift force generated on the five different models of the drag reducing system were calculated and compared them each other to see which type of device is efficient on the reduction of driving power of the vehicles quantitatively. An experiment has been done to see airflow characteristics on the model vehicles. Airflow patterns around the model vehicles were visualized by smoke generation method to compare the complexity of airflow around drag reducing device. From the results, the deflector systems(Model 5,6) were revealed as a better device for reduction of aerodynamic drag than the roof-fairing systems(Model 2,3,4) on the heavy-duty truck and it can be expected that over 10% of brake power of an engine can be saved on a tractor-trailer by the aerodynamic drag reducing device at normal speed range($80km/h{\sim}$).