Studies of air-flow and temperature fields inside a passenger compartment for improving thermal comfort and saving energy. Part II: Simulation results and discussion

In the first paper the simulation model, numerical methods and experimental measurement validation for a vehicle compartment with two chairs and one long bench have been provided. In this paper, the simulated results are presented. Simulation results with a variety of conditions reveal that: (1) a good choice for decreasing the cooling load in the summer time is increasing the inlet air temperature, not reducing the volume flow rate of the inlet air; (2) the thermal comfort in a compartment with given conditions depends on the number of persons in it. For the compartment studied, when there are two passengers in the compartment both of them should sit in the backside; (3) the outside temperature has appreciable effect on the cooling load. While change of the vehicle speed hardly affects the cooling load of air conditioner when good seal of the compartment is assumed; (4) to decrease the cooling load one can change the material of the window (reducing its transmissivity), and improve thermal insulation on the vehicle body; (5) a better flow circulation near the compartment bottom is favorable to improve the uniformity of temperature field around the driver’s foot zone. The inlet air direction should be kept horizontal.