Computational Fluid Dynamics Study on the Effect of Using an Under-Tray Addition to Motorsport

Abstract

The aim of this study is to analyze the effect of deploying an under-tray to a Formula Society of Automotive Engineers (FSAE) racecar for the Washington University FSAE racing team (WashU Racing) through Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). The under-tray geometry was developed to cover the bottom of an FSAE racecar by members of the WashU Racing team (a college FSAE team). The under-tray was added to the existing geometry of the Formula racecar; a mesh around it was then generated using the mesh generator ANSYS ICEM and CFD simulations were performed using ANSYS Fluent to determine lift and drag values for the car in the presence of under-tray. Processing of the numerical data was done using ANSYS EnSight. All physical quantities obtained with inclusion of under-tray were compared to those obtained for the model of the car without the under-tray. The center of pressure of the car was determined. It was found that under-tray slightly increased the lift coefficient and significantly decreased the drag coefficient. The study showed that the inclusion of an under-tray could be a worthwhile addition to the FSAE car.