Design and Optimization of Automotive Air Conditioning Duct Based on CFD Algorithm

Nowadays, the air conditioner (AC), as an important guarantee for driving comfort and endurance, has attracted more and more attention. The pipe connecting the air conditioner refrigerator and the air outlet of the cockpit instrument panel is known as the air duct. Its structural characteristics and fluid flow characteristics are related to the refrigeration efficiency of the whole air conditioning system. The air supply performance of the air duct directly affects the uniformity of the temperature field and speed field in the car, thus affecting the comfort performance of the car [2]. Limited by the layout space, the design of air conditioning duct is the most difficult part of the design of automobile air conditioning system [1]. Therefore, how to optimize the air duct of automotive air-conditioning to meet the size design of the car while being more energy-efficient is an important research direction. This paper focuses on the simulation design and further optimization of the model of the air duct of automotive air conditioning through CFD algorithm. The author uses the Soildworks software for preliminary modeling, meshes the established model with Meshing, and applies the Fluent software to simulate the fluid flow characteristics in the pipe. By inputting a given flow to the inlets, the air volume of each outlet can be simulated. Based on the initial air-conditioning duct model of a vehicle model, the pipe turbulence problem and the uneven distribution of air volume at each outlet in the simulation process are improved under the condition of ensuring the existing size, and finally the rationality of the improvement is verified.