Finite Element Study of Rotating Elements of a Ventilator

Abstract

The ergonomy and comfort in modern cars make more and more demands and requirements concerning heating, air conditioning, ventilation as well as noise reduction. The reduction of noises needs the better balancing of rotating elements, therefore during the design of car ventilators more and more rigorous balancing constraints must be fulfilled. This paper would like to help the improvement of the balancing process of a car ventilator, by showing the importance of the effects of the deformation state of the ventilator blade, caused by the centrifugal loads, and by cheap and simple approximate calculations of the additional loads caused by the air pressure around the blade during the operation and testing. During the balancing process small masses (metal clips) are placed on the blade, which can cause more deformations because of their mass and centrifugal forces during the rotation. These deformations can cause significant asymmetry of the blade shape, therefore they are not negligible during the balancing process. Higher accuracy of the balancing needs smaller and smaller masses (clips) to be placed on the blade. Smaller clips can be easily removed from the blade, therefore the finite element results can help also during the design of new, smaller and lighter clips, too.