PRODUCTS & SERVICES
SIROCO
Using simulation tools in
HVAC development
WHEN IT COMES TO DESIGNING AND TAILORING HVAC UNITS
TO CUSTOMERS’ NEEDS, AIRFLOW AND SIMULATION TOOLS
REMAIN AN ESSENTIAL STEP FOR VALIDATING AN EFFICIENT
AND RELIABLE SOLUTION
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For more than 40 years, Siroco has
designed and developed standard, tailormade
heating, ventilation and air conditioning
(HVAC) systems for electrical and thermal
vehicles. To support its strong development
capacity, Siroco Engineering uses modern
components on a daily basis: design tools, air flow
and thermal simulations, and testing in real-life
conditions thanks to its climatic chamber.
Siroco Engineering brings competent advice to
each customer application. Sébastien Perraud,
research and development engineer at Siroco,
explains how simulation contributes to customer
technical constraints. “There are two types of
customer demand,” he says. “On one hand, the
customer already has a fixed 3D environment and
they want to know the efficiency of the cab’s
thermal comfort. In this case, simulation enables a
diagnosis to be formed, as well as the evaluation
of the 3D model in order to improve it. On the
other hand, the customer has a flexible
environment. In this case, Siroco Engineering,
based on its expertise and experience, is able to
find out the best thermal solution to meet the
customer’s specifications.”
During the simulation, various difficulties were
experienced. “The download of the 3D models
provided by the customer was the first difficulty,”
says Perraud. “We rarely receive 3D environments
designed with SolidWorks. Therefore, 3D
TOP RIGHT: A simulated
visualization of air flow
optimization that Siroco’s
engineers work with to create
optimum thermal comfort
RIGHT: A geometry impact
simulation of Sensyo air
diffuser flaps on air flow,
ensuring effective air
distribution and reduced
pressure loss
geometries can’t be imported as they should. So, I
rebuilt the cab using SolidWorks.
“The same applies to correct part shapes. When
starting simulation, flow simulation software can
spot more than 400-part shape errors. In these
cases, I quickly designed and modified part
meshing, so it became compatible with the fluid
dynamics software.”
Optimizing defrosting
Air flow and thermal simulation are perfectly
adapted to defrosting optimization and to air
diffusion quality. “After having created the forklift
external environment – thermal conditions,
radiation, inertia – with data inputs, we observed
the increase in air temperature in order to study
the heated areas of each panel of glass. The air
flow optimization required choices to be made: the
increasing or decreasing of the air flow, which
would increase or decrease the heating
temperature. We also anticipated cab air flows
and balanced the air distribution to find out what
airflow flowed to which place.”
Often, the customer does not know all of the
parameters that have an influence on the power
calculation. “They often stop at the value of the
product power, forgetting its environment.
Customer needs to be guided to be aware of the
thermodynamics. The same product can have
different powers, depending on the environment
(temperature and moisture) that it is integrated
into.” So the way that results are reported is
crucial to them being comprehendable.
Performance and compactness ratio
Thermal simulation is significant to the
performance/compactness ratio of Siroco’s
standard and tailored products. “As well
as customer demands, we optimize the
electrical consumption, dimensions, general
performances and load losses of our product
catalog,” says Perraud.
Simulation remains a development assistance
tool. Tests carried out in the same conditions in
Siroco’s climatic chamber enable physical values
to be checked and appropriate adjustments of the
model to be made. The correlation work allows the
number of tests and prototypes to be decreased,
in order to reduce delays and development costs.
The correlation work is combined with a
collaborative and efficient approach between
Siroco Engineering and its customers. iVT
Author: Sylvain Reydellet, MD, Siroco Engineering
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iVTInternational.com June 2019
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