CFD Analysis

During my placement year I was furloughed for a period, and during that time, I decided to use my knowledge from my fluids lectures and teach myself how to use Star CCM+. After many youtube tutorials, and cups of coffee, I decided that the best test of my ability would be to conduct an inverstigation into the bodywork of the Formula Student car that we were designing.

In this investigation, I compared several different types of bodywork construction, from a seemless glass fibre design, to no bodywork at all - and I compared the aerodynamic properties of these to a similar Formula Student team with a full aero package, in terms of performance, mass and cost!

The 'aerodynamic efficiency' was a scaled value for the Cd/Cl and the results of this analysis helped us to determine the final bodywork type on the vehicle - and whilst it was not the prettiest selection, it was the best comprimise between cost and performance for us.