Journal of Wind Engineering

and Industrial Aerodynamics 7476 (1998) 511519

Experimental investigation of the ground effect

on the flow around some two-dimensional bluff bodies
with moving-belt technique
M.S. Kim*, D. Geropp
Institut fu( r Fluid- und Thermodynamik, Fachbereich Maschinentechnik, Universita( t-GH-Siegen,
D-57068 Siegen, Germany

Abstract
This study investigates the effects of various ground clearances (h/D"0.14, 0.2, 0.5, 1.0), as
well as the type of ground (stationary or moving ground plane), on the flow around a variety of
two-dimensional bluff bodies. The measured base pressures with or without a moving ground
were almost identical, suggesting that the drag remains almost constant. However, significant
changes in the lift forces were observed when the ground plane was moving. The difference in
pressure distribution between the top and bottom of the model increases as the ground
clearance is reduced. This phenomenon is exaggerated with the introduction of a moving
ground which concludes that larger lift forces and longer wakes are apparent with decreasing
clearance. The measurement of Strouhal number show that the low ground clearance dampens
the periodic flow behind the models, the effect is intensified with a moving ground plane.
A comparison of the results with those of the flow around a two-dimensional car model
(h/D"0.14, 0.2) underline the dependence of the results on the model geometry. ( 1998
Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Ground effect; Moving-belt technique; Bluff body flow; Aerodynamic forces; Pressure measurement; Wake

1. Introduction
When a bluff body moves in close proximity to the ground, the ground will have an
influence on the flow close to the body. A similar case occurs when a bluff body moves
close to a fixed boundary. When the fluid on the body separates and a large

* Corresponding author. E-mail: kim@iftnet.ift.mb.uni-siegen.de.

0167-6105/98/$19.00 ( 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PII: S 0 1 6 7 - 6 1 0 5 ( 9 8 ) 0 0 0 4 6 - 4

512

M.S. Kim, D. Geropp/J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 7476 (1998) 511519

wake region develops, the separated flow also changes due to the ground effects.
A typical example is the flow around a motor car. In this case the road is the moving
ground.
The calculation of such flows is very complex because of the large separated regions
and the additional ground effect. The results of the calculation with commercial
CFD-programs show no satisfactory agreement with the experimental result, especially the forces such as drag and lift and the pressure distribution on the underbody.
For a better understanding and modeling of such flows, more systematic experimental
information is needed.
The relative motion of the body to the ground is usually neglected in experimental
investigations. The boundary layer development on the wind tunnel and the working
section will change the flow behaviour. This results in a sometimes considerable
deviation between the simulated flow and the real flow, which occurs especially
beneath the body and in the wake.
This study investigates the influence of the ground effect on the flow around some
two-dimensional bluff bodies. For the systematic investigation of ground effects, the
ground distance as well as the type of ground (stationary, moving ground plane) are
varied. Some different measurement techniques such as balance, LDV, hot-wire
anemometer are used in order to get detail information about the flow near to the
ground.
The experimental results contribute to a better understanding of the flow and can
be used as a basis for modeling the influence of ground effects on the flow behaviour.

2. Experimental apparatus and techniques

The experiments were carried out, at our institute, in a wind tunnel with an open
test section and a nozzle of 1 m]1 m cross-section. Some two-dimensional models
(circular cylinder, half-ellipse and egg-formed model) with a height of 65 mm and
a length of 670 mm (/D"10.3) were used as test models. In order to guarantee
a two-dimensional flow, two plates were placed at both ends of the model without
touching it. The model was fixed to a six-component balance, which was used to
measure all aerodynamic forces and torques. Fig. 1 shows the schematic of the
working section with a six-component balance and a moving belt plane.
The relative motion of the body to ground was simulated by a moving belt. The
self-contained moving belt rig measures 1.73 m]1 m and is installed through the
floor of the working section. Fig. 2 is a schematic layout of the moving belt plane. At
the front of the rig, the gap between the wind tunnel floor and the plane allows the
wind tunnel boundary layer to be expelled under the moving belt. Boundary layer
suction equipment is installed at the beginning of the front side of the belt. The suction
equipment ensures that no new boundary layer develops. The belt is driven by an
internally mounted rear motor at speeds which are synchronous with the wind tunnel
wind velocity.
The ground distance was adjusted to h/D"0.2, 0.5, 1.0. The velocity at the nozzle
was varied from 5 to 30 m/s. This corresponds to a Reynolds number Re "2.2]104
D

M.S. Kim, D. Geropp/J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 7476 (1998) 511519

513

Fig. 1. Working section with a six-component-balance and a moving belt plane.

Fig. 2. Schematic layout of the moving belt plane.

to 1.3]105, which is based on the model height D. The pressure distribution was
measured at 60 pressure taps on the model. The velocity and turbulence distributions
in the wake region were measured with LDV. A hot-wire anemometer was used for the
measurement of the separation frequency in the wake behind the model.

514

M.S. Kim, D. Geropp/J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 7476 (1998) 511519

3. Results and discussion

It is impossible to present and discuss all the results. Therefore only select results
from the measured variables will be discussed in this paper. For the comparison of the
results on the flow around simple model geometry, the measurement of the flow
around a two-dimensional car model as an example of a typical industrial application will be considered. All measurements were taken using the same test stand at
our Institute. More detailed information can be acquired from previous publications
[13] about each measurement.
The boundary layer development will be presented, whereby the difference in
boundary layer development between a stationary and moving ground plane is
apparent and also a major source of discrepancy in the results.
3.1. Boundary layer profile on the ground plane
The velocity profiles are measured with a hot-wire anemometer. Fig. 3 shows
the measured boundary layer profiles at three positions, x"450, 850, 1250 mm,

Fig. 3. Boundary layer profile on the ground [3] (a) Re"3.3]105; (b) Re"9.9]105. v stationary
ground plane without boundary layer suction; e moving belt ground plane without boundary layer
suction; + moving belt ground plane with boundary layer suction.

M.S. Kim, D. Geropp/J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 7476 (1998) 511519

515

measured from the nose of the boundary layer cutting plate. Three lines with different
symbols show three different measuring conditions.
Fig. 3a for the case of Re"3.3]105 shows that on the stationary ground plane the
boundary layer grows continually and the displacement thickness d reaches a value
1
of d "3.3 mm at the center of the working section (x"850 mm) and d "3.6 mm at
1
1
x"1250 mm. For a higher Reynolds number Re"9.9]105 the development of
a boundary layer is slow. With the moving belt and boundary layer suction, 8090%
of the displacement thickness d could be reduced. The measurements recorded by
1
Lajos et al. [4] show a similar result.
3.2. Aerodynamic forces
The results of the aerodynamic force measurements are shown in Fig. 4. The drag of
the circular cylinder decreases when the gap between the model and ground is smaller
but the drag is almost constant at all measured Reynolds number. There is also only
a small drag deviation between the case of stationary and moving ground plane.
A similar behaviour can be observed for a car model (see Fig. 4b).
The results from the measured lift, for both cases, show quite different tendencies.
The lift distribution of the circular cylinder shows that the lift with a moving ground
has a higher value than that with a stationary ground and it is independent of
Reynolds number. The lift distribution of the car model shows an opposite results.
The lift with a moving ground has a lower value than that of stationary ground and it
is strongly dependent on Reynolds number. The reason can be explained that the car
model has a long plane underbody and the boundary layer on the underbody
responds more sensitively to a variation in Reynolds number.
3.3. Static pressure distribution on the model
The measured pressure distributions on a circular cylinder and a car model for
h/D"0.2 are presented in Figs. 5 and 6. A comparison of the measured base pressures
with and without moving ground show almost no difference. Therefore, the drag
remains almost constant.
For the circular cylinder the deviation between the pressure distribution at the top
and the bottom of the model is much larger in the case of the moving ground plane.
The lift has a higher value when the ground plane is moving. The pressure distribution
on the car model also changes significantly when the ground plane moves. The
difference in pressure distributions on the top and bottom of the model increase if the
Reynolds number is larger.
3.4. Wake
The wake becomes longer when the wall distance decreases. A moving wall also
increases the wake. The variation of the wake length for a half-ellipse (/D"1.0)
d
and a car model is presented in Figs. 7 and 8.

516

M.S. Kim, D. Geropp/J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 7476 (1998) 511519

Fig. 4. Aerodynamic forces on two-dimensional bluff bodies close to a ground: (a) circular cylinder; (b) twodimensional car model [3].

The length of the dead water amounts to "2.7D for a clearance between the
d
half-ellipse and the stationary ground h/D"0.2 and a Reynolds number of
Re "5.5]104. In the case of h/D"1.0 the length is "1.2D. The dead water for
D
d
the case of a moving wall is 40% longer than that for the stationary wall and the dead
water is shifted to the ground. The dead water of the car model shows a similar
behaviour in case of h/D"0.14 but there are no significant differences in the case of
h/D"0.2.
The measurement of Strouhal number in Table 1 show that the low ground
clearance dampens the periodic flow behind the models. This effect is intensified with
a moving ground plane.

M.S. Kim, D. Geropp/J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 7476 (1998) 511519

Fig. 5. Pressure distribution on a circular cylinder close to the ground.

Fig. 6. Pressure distribution on a two-dimensional car model close to the ground.

Fig. 7. Wake length for a half-ellipse (/D"1.0) close to the ground.

517

518

M.S. Kim, D. Geropp/J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 7476 (1998) 511519

Fig. 8. Wake length for a two-dimensional car model close to the ground [3].

Table 1
Measured Strouhal number for a half-ellipse model
u (m/s)
=

10 m/s
15 m/s

h/D"0.2

h/D"0.5

h/D"1.0

Stationary

Moving

Stationary

Moving

Stationary

Moving

0.203
0.212

0.178
0.195

0.254
0.254

0.254
0.254

0.267
0.262

0.267
0.262

4. Conclusions
This investigation shows that the ground has a strong influence on the flow around
the body. The pressure distribution on the body as well as the lift and drag are affected
significantly. The comparison of the experimental results for a moving and a stationary ground plane show strong local deviations, especially beneath the body and in the
wake region. Therefore, the relative motion of the body with respect to a ground has
to be simulated by appropriate experimental equipment, for example a moving belt.
The comparison of the results with the measurement of the flow around a twodimensional car model show the strong dependence of the results on the model
geometry.

Acknowledgements
The authors thank the Ministerium fur Wissenschaft und Forschung des Landes
Nordrhein-Westfalen and Daimler-Benz AG for the support provided.

M.S. Kim, D. Geropp/J. Wind Eng. Ind. Aerodyn. 7476 (1998) 511519

519

References
[1] M.S. Kim, D. Geropp, LDA-Untersuchungen des Nachlaufes hinter einem wandnahen Kreiszylinders,
Proc. Lasermethoden in der Stromungsme{technik, 5. GALA-Tagung, Berlin, 1996, pp. 15.115.7.
[2] M.S. Kim, D. Geropp, LDV-measurements in the near wake behind a half ellipse close to a stationary
and a moving wall, Proc. 7th Int. Conf. on Laser Anemometry Advances and Applications,
Karlsruhe, Germany, 811 September 1997.
[3] H.-J. Odenthal, Kfz-Totwasserstromungen mit Fahrbahnwechselwirkung und aktiver Stromungsbeeinflussung zur Widerstandsreduktion, Fortschritt-Berichte VDI Reihe 7, No. 307, 1997.
[4] T. Lajos, L. Preszler, L. Finta, Effect of moving ground simulation on the flow past bus models, 6th
Coll. on Industrial Aerodynamics, Road Vehicle Dynamics, Aachen, Germany, 1921 June 1985.