Title: Ground Simulation-Last but Not Least Problem in Wind Tunnel Testing of Automobiles
Abstract: As far as an actual automobile is put into the test section of a fairly large wind tunnel, there are little problems in the wind tunnel testing of the automobile. That is because three major problems in the wind tunnel, that is, the Reynolds number effect, the wall interference and the balance support interference are easily overcome. The biggest remaining problem is the ground simulation, which simulates the relative motion between the vehicle body, the rotating wheels and the ground. The moving belt technique, one of the ground simulation methods, is briefly described in this paper. The experimental results show that the ground simulation of some kind is necessary even in case of usual passenger cars.