As the automotive industry increasingly shifts toward electrification, reducing vehicle drag becomes crucial for enhancing battery range and meeting consumer expectations. Additionally, recent European regulations require tire and car manufacturers to provide reliable drag data. A significant factor influencing vehicle drag is the highly turbulent wake generated by rotating tires. Accurate correlation between wind tunnel experiments and numerical simulations is essential, yet discrepancies often arise due to the dynamic behavior and technical challenges in measuring tire deformation, leading to inconsistencies between tire deformations observed in wind tunnels and those modelled in simulations.

This Master’s Thesis investigates the aerodynamic impact of realistic tire deformation parameters—specifically, bulge and contact patch deformations—using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations conducted with PowerFLOW. The deformation parameter tests are carried out in a standalone tire setup, which is validated from previous work by Dassault Systèmes and experimental results. To further assess the impact of these deformations on vehicle drag, the tests were repeated using the DrivAer model, an IP free model provided by the Technical University of Munich. Given the complexity of the flow features in a tire wake, the analysis of the results consisted of two different approaches: a statistical approach based on Principal Component Analysis (PCA), and a vortex behaviour and wake development analysis, including a vortex tracking algorithm based on the Gamma 2-Criterion and single-link hierarchical clustering.

The results identify the most influential deformation parameters based on their impact on the drag coefficient and the wake behaviour changes. Two primary wake development behaviours were identified: wake contraction and wake expansion. An analysis of the transient flow showed how these two trends resulted from changes in the unsteady behaviour introduced by certain deformation parameters. The relevance of these wake development changes was portrayed by the impact of certain deformations on the full vehicle drag as a result of
complex wake interactions.

Vortex Generators (VGs) are one of the most commonly used passive flow control devices. Recent studies have shown that it is beneficial to use sub-boundary layer vortex generators (SBVGs). The height of these generators varies between 10% - 50% of the boundary layer thickness. However, the reduced height causes the induced vortices to be substantially weaker. Therefore, using SBVG is beneficial only when the regions of flow separation are well defined. To better understand and comprehensively predict the effectiveness of these devices for flow control over a range of operating conditions, two different SBVG profile: rectangular vortex generators (RVGs) and triangular vortex generators (TVGs) are analysed when subjected to a laminar boundary layer. The topics of interest are instantaneous flow, mean flow, far-field acoustic properties and influence of the angle of attack on the VG vane. The results emphasise the unsteady nature of the induced vortices for both the VG profiles. For RVGs, mean flow visualisation indicates the presence of local re-circulation zones in between the vanes with an increase in angle of attack. Additionally, secondary vortices are noted for both the VGs. These secondary vortices significantly influence the properties of the primary vortices thereby, suggesting that, effectively managing the secondary vortices using suitable design changes to VG profile could be one of the possible ways to accomplish better flow control.

As the suitable locations for large wind farms in the mainland are limited, wind energy generation in the urban environment is gaining interest. The Diffuser Augmented Wind Turbine (DAWT) is a promising concept where the turbine is embedded into an airfoil-shaped diffuser (also named shroud or duct), which has the function of increasing the mass flow across the rotor. Such device is
designed to overcome the low wind speed present in urban locations.
Noise regulations represent a limit to the installation of wind turbines in urban areas. To the author’s knowledge, the far-field noise generated by DAWTs has been investigated only by Hashem et al. [31], who reported noise increase up to 20 dB compared to unaugmented turbines. However, the noise generation mechanisms are not clear yet. Furthermore, only partial data [15] on the
fluid-dynamic behaviour of DAWT when operating in yawed inflow conditions are present, with no information on the noise pattern.
The current study investigates both the fluid-dynamic and acoustic fields for a ducted wind turbine using a computational approach. The commercial DonQi turbine is taken as reference. The fluid-dynamic flow field is computed using the Lattice-Boltzmann Method solver Exa PowerFLOW. The Ffowcs-Williams and Hawkings (FW-H) analogy is employed to compute the far-field noise.
Three cases are investigated: the ducted turbine at 0 deg and 7.5 deg yaw angles and the unducted turbine at 0 deg yaw angle.
The fluid-dynamic analysis reveals that the presence of the diffuser accelerates the flow in the tip region, resulting in a significant increase of the thrust and the power produced by the turbine. In correspondence, the tip vortices present a higher intensity. These vortices interact with the boundary layer of the diffuser and form long vortical structures convected beyond the diffuser trailing
edge. The presence of a yaw angle creates a non-axisymmetrical velocity pattern at the rotor disk, resulting in a power drop of 10.8%. However, no stall on the blades is detected. Contrarily to the observations by Cresswell et al., a separation region is formed on the diffuser suction side.
Regarding the far-field noise, the directivity pattern for the unducted turbine presents a zone of low noise above the rotor. The addition of a diffuser causes a noise increase by approximately 5 dB upwind and downwind and by up to 15 dB in the low noise region, resulting in a more uniform noise distribution. This effect is ascribed to the higher flow speed in the tip region and to the diffraction
of acoustic waves by the diffuser. Increasing the yaw angle to 7.5± is found not to have a relevant impact on the far-field noise.