Yesterday we had the awesome opportunity to do some aerodynamics testing at the abandoned naval airstrip in Alameda, thanks to Makani Power. For those of you who don’t know, this is the same location that Myth Busters uses, though unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately), we were alone on this stormy day.
CalSol used the chance of having a flat, deserted, 1.5 mile long runway to get some data on the aerodynamic performance and rolling resistance of Impulse. For tuft testing, we attached small pieces of brightly-colored yarn to critical areas of the car (such as the leading and trailing edges, and around the canopy) and videoed the performance of these tufts while driving at high speeds. This allowed us to confirm CFD results generated by software and to see where the flow separated from the car. We also performed coast-down testing from high speeds to determine both aerodynamic drag and rolling resistance.
We plan to use this information to update our CFD environment to reflect more real-life conditions and to pinpoint improvements to make for our next car, Zephyr.
We had a lot of fun during testing and would like to thank Makani Power again for this great opportunity.
