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Cyclist Aerodynamics: A Comparison Between Wind Tunnel Tests and CFD Simulations for Helmet Design

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Book cover Proceedings of the XV Conference of the Italian Association for Wind Engineering (IN VENTO 2018)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Civil Engineering ((LNCE,volume 27))

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Abstract

During the last decades, a particular attention has been paid to the aerodynamic optimization of professional bike riders and their equipment, with a large use of experimental investigation as well as numerical simulations. Extensive studies have been carried out in wind tunnels all over the world by professional cycling teams to study the best set-up for time trial competitions. The standard approach is to compare different parts of the equipment or different positions and find out the optimized configuration by a trial and error procedure. This paper presents an attempt of helmet design based on CFD calculations and experimental validation of numerical results with a new experimental set-up able to measure the surface pressure on a real helmet.

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Change history

  • 13 June 2019

    In the original version of this chapter, the following belated correction has been incorporated: The author’s name was corrected from “S. Somaschini” to “C. Somaschini”. The correction chapter has been updated with the change.

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Acknowledgements

The activity presented in the paper is part of the research activity developed with MET helmets. We thank the athletes Davide Fumagalli and Emilio Previtali.

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Correspondence to S. Giappino .

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Giappino, S., Omarini, S., Schito, P., Somaschini, C., Belloli, M., Tenni, M. (2019). Cyclist Aerodynamics: A Comparison Between Wind Tunnel Tests and CFD Simulations for Helmet Design. In: Ricciardelli, F., Avossa, A. (eds) Proceedings of the XV Conference of the Italian Association for Wind Engineering. IN VENTO 2018. Lecture Notes in Civil Engineering, vol 27. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-12815-9_27

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-12815-9_27

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-12814-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-12815-9

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