[MVRC] Mantium Virtual Racecar Challenge 2022 (Grand Prix Cars)

[jjn9128]

That is EPIC!!!!

That is Legendary!!!!

Gotta love the ingenuity combined with proper modeling.

I just fear those gills might upwash the hell over that rear wing.
And, having no sidepods, it might be harder to control front wing upwash (check out how Mercedes is dealing with that).

IMO Mercs main issue is weight and flexing, plus being a bit greedy with ride heights.

[jjn9128]

Holy $h!t That is EPIC!!!!

You might benefit floor load and tyre displacement by pressurising around the top of the floor LE though!

Thanks! I think with the MVRC rules theres a lot space to do whatever you want above the floor there, but I'm going to wait and see what the general flow direction is around there before adding anything.

That is Legendary!!!!

Gotta love the ingenuity combined with proper modeling.

I just fear those gills might upwash the hell over that rear wing.
And, having no sidepods, it might be harder to control front wing upwash (check out how Mercedes is dealing with that).

My idea with this cooling position was to be able to exhaust the cooling air in a good position, in between the rear wing and beam wing. Hopefully there should be a good amount of downwash there. If the loss from the gills interacts with the rear wing I'll have to change things.

I think in general there's a philosopical question about how important outwashing the front wheel wake is for MVRC compared to Formula 1. With a real car there will always be some corner condition where the car is yawing and the wheels are steered which will result in the wheel wake going under the floor - so pushing it further out will give benefits in this condition. But my understanding is MVRC is just looking at straight ahead, 0 degrees yaw, so we are optimising for a very different condition to a Formula 1 car.

This is a good point, F1 is an optimization over a ride height, roll, steer, yaw map problem whereas MVRC is single attitude. Maybe in future you should all be optimizing around like 4-5deg yaw with appropriate steer?!

[Koldskaal]

I've registered under the name Tolo Racing, hopefully I'll get a download link to the CFD package soon. I'll have to wait and see till then if the cooling design is too optimistic.

I was kind of disappointed to see no one trying this for the first race. Can’t wait to see how well this works.
Also: You don't need a link to download Mflow, simply download it from the website.

[variante]

And, having no sidepods, it might be harder to control front wing upwash (check out how Mercedes is dealing with that).

IMO Mercs main issue is weight and flexing, plus being a bit greedy with ride heights.

I was referring to the big aggressive downwashing wing in front of Merc's sidepod, doubling as casing for the side impact structure.
The front wing and the high pressure in the coke bottle region force air to go up, meeting the rear wing at an unfavorable angle. Most sidepods are shaped to counter that. RedBull's pods are especially good at that job. But Mercedes had to find a different solution.

[CAEdevice]

I wasn't able to to make the deadline as I was really busy last month, but I've had some free time recently to make my car for the next round. https://i.imgur.com/nYRDUYa.png

I've registered under the name Tolo Racing, hopefully I'll get a download link to the CFD package soon. I'll have to wait and see till then if the cooling design is too optimistic.

Isn't the center of mass a little too high? Is there room for the exhaust ducts on the side of the cylinder banks?

Anyway (and seriousl): I appreciate the quality of the CAD model, clean and without cuspides or discontinuities.

[Joe7218]

Hey guys, been a bit too busy with uni life to join in on the first race, but have started modelling my car and keen to join the season now that finals are over!

Side note, does anyone use catia for their vehicle modelling?

[LegendaryM]

This is a good point, F1 is an optimization over a ride height, roll, steer, yaw map problem whereas MVRC is single attitude. Maybe in future you should all be optimizing around like 4-5deg yaw with appropriate steer?!

Good idea! I'd go a step further and have different yaw angles for different tracks/rounds: for tracks with more high-speed corners a yaw angle of 3 degrees may be most appropriate, for more tight twisty tracks with a lot of low speed corners a yaw angle of around 6 degrees would be better. We could even use a curved domain.

[LegendaryM]

Isn't the center of mass a little too high? Is there room for the exhaust ducts on the side of the cylinder banks?

Well exactly, none of these things exist in MVRC. You'd never design something like a formula 1 car if you had no specific regulations, all the design choices are specific responses to the regulations and requirements. So, how would a f1 car be different if COG didn't matter (I don't think it would be too different tbh, downforce is usually king)? I did the cooling like that because of the MVRC regulations, the MISC systems is so bulbous that you have to have a fat airbox anyway.

Hey guys, been a bit too busy with uni life to join in on the first race, but have started modelling my car and keen to join the season now that finals are over!

Side note, does anyone use catia for their vehicle modelling?

I thought about using catia but I didn't want to pay for the student version. But its used by the vast majority of F1 teams I think, and it's great for designing complex surfaces in a robust way

I was kind of disappointed to see no one trying this for the first race. Can’t wait to see how well this works.
Also: You don't need a link to download Mflow, simply download it from the website.

Thanks a lot! I've found it now

[LegendaryM]

Also (sorry for posting three times in a row), I'm having trouble in Onshape with the helmet being imported in the wrong position, did anyone else have this problem and know the correct offset for it?

[spacehead3]

Also (sorry for posting three times in a row), I'm having trouble in Onshape with the helmet being imported in the wrong position, did anyone else have this problem and know the correct offset for it?

I thought everything was fixed in the latest geometry release, but if in doubt try importing the STL instead.

[variante]

This is a good point, F1 is an optimization over a ride height, roll, steer, yaw map problem whereas MVRC is single attitude. Maybe in future you should all be optimizing around like 4-5deg yaw with appropriate steer?!

Good idea! I'd go a step further and have different yaw angles for different tracks/rounds: for tracks with more high-speed corners a yaw angle of 3 degrees may be most appropriate, for more tight twisty tracks with a lot of low speed corners a yaw angle of around 6 degrees would be better. We could even use a curved domain.

Wait a minute...

Aerodynamics also plays a big role under braking, acceleration and for top speed, all of which happen at nearly 0° of yaw.
Aero is also more more important the faster the corner is (=smaller yaw angle), so it's a bit useless to tune aero for 4-5° yaw corners.
For reference, most F1 corners aren't tighter than 50m in radius (translating maybe into 2-3° of yaw), with the faster corners requiring something like 1° of yaw (essentially negligible).

Plus, there would be computational challenges. Yaw would require the full car simulation rather than the half car one. And a proper simulation would actually require the fluid bending together with the corner (which is doable but not easy) rather than simple yaw.

By the way, yaw was actually computed during the first season of this challenge. The next season we figured we could as well simplify everything into the current state of things.

[spacehead3]

It's not available to you all right now, but I do have full ride height maps built into the lap sim. I'd love to be able to include that in the future, but I'm sure Andre wouldn't want to run 10 ride height points for every car.

[jjn9128]

This is a good point, F1 is an optimization over a ride height, roll, steer, yaw map problem whereas MVRC is single attitude. Maybe in future you should all be optimizing around like 4-5deg yaw with appropriate steer?!

Good idea! I'd go a step further and have different yaw angles for different tracks/rounds: for tracks with more high-speed corners a yaw angle of 3 degrees may be most appropriate, for more tight twisty tracks with a lot of low speed corners a yaw angle of around 6 degrees would be better. We could even use a curved domain.

Wait a minute...

Aerodynamics also plays a big role under braking, acceleration and for top speed, all of which happen at nearly 0° of yaw.
Aero is also more more important the faster the corner is (=smaller yaw angle), so it's a bit useless to tune aero for 4-5° yaw corners.
For reference, most F1 corners aren't tighter than 50m in radius (translating maybe into 2-3° of yaw), with the faster corners requiring something like 1° of yaw (essentially negligible).

Plus, there would be computational challenges. Yaw would require the full car simulation rather than the half car one. And a proper simulation would actually require the fluid bending together with the corner (which is doable but not easy) rather than simple yaw.

By the way, yaw was actually computed during the first season of this challenge. The next season we figured we could as well simplify everything into the current state of things.

I disagree - 4deg is pretty standard for optimizing more toward non-straight line conditions. But hey I don't run the challenge.

[variante]

I disagree - 4deg is pretty standard for optimizing more toward non-straight line conditions. But hey I don't run the challenge.

I measured.
Supposing most corners aren't tighter than 50m in radius and the actual trajectory has a radius of 75m, then:
- without slip angle, airflow has a yaw angle of 2.7° at the front axle, 1.4° mid car, and 0° at the rear axle.
- with slip angle, the above numbers are even smaller or negative.
A 4° angle can only be seen at the front axle on a 50m radius trajectory, without any slip. And that starts being a tight corner, where aero isn't that crucial. So, i'm really not sure about optimizing around that.
And then we have all the straight line conditions.

[vorticism]

Are crosswinds part of the consideration? They could increase the effective approach angle of the airflow without altering yaw. Forcing excessive yaw on the computer might account for this.