CE 321 – Highway Engineering

Lecture 2: Vehicle performance and resistance

Dr. S. Ilgin Guler

Penn State
08.23.17

Lecture 2, Fall 2017 CE 321 – Highway Engineering 1

Announcements

• Problem set 1 posted on CANVAS

– Due Wednesday, September 6 (beginning of class)

Lecture 2, Fall 2017 CE 321 – Highway Engineering 2

Outline and objectives

• Vehicle performance and resistance

– Identify how road vehicle performance influences
highway engineering and design
– Describe and calculate the three major resistance
forces that act upon vehicles in motion
• Aerodynamic
• Rolling
• Grade

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Readings covered today

• Chapter 2: Road vehicle performance

– Sections 2.1 – 2.5

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Why is vehicle performance important?

• Determines all highway design and traffic

operations
• Defines how transportation engineers must
react to advancing vehicle technologies
• The single most important factor in defining
the tradeoff between mobility (speed) and
safety

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Vehicle performance

• Acceleration
– Passing maneuvers
– Entrance ramps
• Deceleration
– Stopping sight distance
– Exit ramps

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Vehicle performance

• Ascending and descending grades

– Truck climbing lanes
– Runaway truck ramps

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Vehicle performance

• Traffic analysis
– Speed limits
– Signal timing
– Progression timing (acceleration)

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Vehicle performance – Autonomous vehicles

• No signals (?)
• No signage (?)
•

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Vehicle performance

• Highway Design
– Stopping sight distance
– Passing sight distance
– Safety
– Ramps (acceleration and deceleration lengths)
– Maximum grades

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Sight distance

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Vehicle performance – Autonomous vehicles

• Stopping sight distance calculations might change to

consider what the car can sense as opposed to what
the eye can see
• Smaller reaction times – less stopping distance
required

Glowing lane markers QR codes as signage

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Forces acting upon a vehicle
• Tractive effort: force available at the roadway surface to
perform work (move the vehicle)
– Depends on available horsepower of vehicle
– Expressed in lbs of force
• Resistance: all forces acting on a vehicle which impede
its movement
– Depends upon vehicle shape, roadway surface, grade and other
factors
– Expressed in lbs of force
– Major resistance terms:
• Rolling friction
• Air resistance
• Grade

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Forces acting upon a vehicle

Aerodynamic resistance, 𝑅𝑅𝑎𝑎

Rolling resistance, 𝑅𝑅𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟, on front and

back tires

Tractive effort of the vehicle, 𝐹𝐹𝑓𝑓 and 𝐹𝐹𝑟𝑟 (front

and rear tire) Grade resistance, 𝑅𝑅𝑔𝑔

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Forces acting upon a vehicle

𝐹𝐹 = 𝐹𝐹𝑓𝑓 + 𝐹𝐹𝑟𝑟
Available tractive effort delivered by the front
and rear tires

𝐹𝐹 = 𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 + 𝑅𝑅𝑎𝑎 + 𝑅𝑅𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 + 𝑅𝑅𝑔𝑔 Resistance

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Aerodynamic resistance

• Turbulent flow of air over

the body of a vehicle
(85% of aero resistance)
• Remainder:
– Friction of air over
vehicle (12%)
– Air flow through vehicle
(3%)
• Negligible at low speeds
• Overwhelming at high
speeds (Maglev)

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 Aerodynamic resistance

𝜌𝜌 2
𝑅𝑅𝑎𝑎 = 𝐶𝐶𝐷𝐷 𝐴𝐴𝑓𝑓 𝑉𝑉
2

𝜌𝜌 = air density (slugs/ft3)

𝐶𝐶𝐷𝐷 = coefficient of drag (unitless)
𝐴𝐴𝑓𝑓 = frontal area of vehicle (ft2)
𝑉𝑉 = velocity of vehicle (ft/s)

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Aerodynamic resistance

• Typical values
– 𝜌𝜌 = air density Table 2.1

– 𝐶𝐶𝐷𝐷 = Drag coefficient

Table 2.2

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 Aerodynamic resistance

• Impacted by size, shape and characteristics of

vehicle
– Open windows
– Convertible
– Overhead cargo

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 Which car has larger aerodynamic resistance?

1987 Ford Taurus 1967 Volkswagen Beetle

Drag coefficient:0.32 Drag coefficient: 0.46

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 Which car has larger aerodynamic resistance?

2014 BMW I8 2016 Dodge Charger

Drag coefficient:0.26 Drag coefficient: 0.35

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Aerodynamic resistance

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Power required to overcome aerodynamic
resistance
• Power is equal to product of force and speed
• Power required to overcome aerodynamic
resistance increases with speed traveling
• Since 1 horsepower = 550 ft-lb per second…
𝑅𝑅𝑎𝑎 𝑉𝑉 𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌𝐷𝐷 𝐴𝐴𝑓𝑓 𝑉𝑉 3
ℎ𝑝𝑝𝑅𝑅𝑎𝑎 = =
550 1100

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Rolling resistance

• Resistance resulting from the tire/pavement

interface
– Tire deformation (90%)
• Impacted by:
– Rigidity of tire
– Hardness of roadway surface

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 Rolling resistance

𝑉𝑉
𝑅𝑅𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 = 𝑓𝑓𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 𝑊𝑊 𝑓𝑓𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 = 0.01 1 +
147

𝑅𝑅𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 = rolling resistance (lbs)

𝑊𝑊 = weight of the vehicle acting normal to the
pavement surface (lbs) (actually should be
𝑊𝑊 cos 𝜃𝜃𝑔𝑔 but 𝑊𝑊 cos 𝜃𝜃𝑔𝑔 ≅ 𝑊𝑊 for small 𝜃𝜃𝑔𝑔 )
𝑓𝑓𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 = coefficient of rolling resistance (unitless)
𝑉𝑉 = vehicle speed (ft/s)

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Power required to overcome rolling resistance

• The power required to overcome rolling

resistance is not as dependent on speed
• Since 1 horsepower = 550 ft-lb per second

𝑓𝑓𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑊
ℎ𝑝𝑝𝑅𝑅𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 =
550

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Grade resistance

• Gravitational force resisting a vehicles motion

• Since highway grades are usually small as
discussed before, sin 𝜃𝜃𝑔𝑔 ≈ tan 𝜃𝜃𝑔𝑔 .

𝑅𝑅𝐺𝐺 = 𝑊𝑊 tan 𝜃𝜃𝑔𝑔 ≅ 𝑊𝑊 sin 𝜃𝜃𝑔𝑔 = 𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑊

𝑊𝑊 = Weight of the vehicle acting normal to the
pavement surface (lbs)
𝐺𝐺 = Grade defined as vertical rise per some
specified horizontal distance (ft/ft)

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Percent Grade Illustrated

5 ft
5% grade
𝜃𝜃𝑔𝑔 = 2.86°
100 ft

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Forces acting upon a vehicle
Resistance (lb) Power Required (hp)
Aerodynamic
Resistance, 𝑅𝑅𝑎𝑎 𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌𝐷𝐷 𝐴𝐴𝑓𝑓 𝑉𝑉 3
ℎ𝑝𝑝𝑅𝑅𝑎𝑎 =
1100

Rolling
Resistance, 𝑅𝑅𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟
𝑓𝑓𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑊
ℎ𝑝𝑝𝑅𝑅𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 =
550

Grade
Resistance, 𝑅𝑅𝑔𝑔 𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑊
ℎ𝑝𝑝𝑅𝑅𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 =
550

𝐹𝐹 = 𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 + 𝑅𝑅𝑎𝑎 + 𝑅𝑅𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 + 𝑅𝑅𝑔𝑔

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Example Problem 1

• A 2,000 lb car is traveling at an elevation of

5,000 feet (𝜌𝜌 = 0.002045 slugs/ft) on a
concrete surface. If the car is traveling at 70
mph and has a 𝐶𝐶𝐷𝐷 = 0.4 and 𝐴𝐴𝑓𝑓 = 20 ft2 and
an available tractive effort of 255 lb, what is
the maximum grade that this car could ascend
and maintain the 70 mph speed?

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Example 1 (solution)

• Aerodynamic resistance

• Rolling resistance

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Example 1 (solution)

• Grade resistance

𝐹𝐹 = 𝑅𝑅𝑎𝑎 + 𝑅𝑅𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 + 𝑅𝑅𝑔𝑔

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Recap

• Vehicle performance affects all aspects of highway

engineering
• Vehicle resistances are broken into three major
categories
– Aerodynamic
– Grade
– Rolling
• Tractive effort must overcome these forces

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