SAE TECHNICAL

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2006-01-1976

CFD Analysis of Non-Symmetrical Intake

Manifold for Formula SAE Car
J. Ling and L. T. Y. Tun
School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering

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2006-01-1976

CFD Analysis of Non-Symmetrical Intake

Manifold for Formula SAE Car
J. Ling and L. T. Y. Tun
School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering

Copyright 2006 SAE International

ABSTRACT
CFD simulations were first performed on the inlet
manifold of the 2004 University of Sydney (USYD) FSAE
competition car. For years prior to 2004, the FSAE team
used classical techniques such as Helmholtz method to
tune the intake manifold for their competition car. This
traditional method can only predict the engine speed and
tuned peaks. In 2004, one dimensional simulation
package was used to analyse the dynamics of pressure
waves, the flow characteristics and energies in the
intake and exhaust manifolds.
With three dimensional CFD simulations, unsteady flows
were visualised, allowed the explorations of the flow
characteristics in the manifold in such a way that
geometrical designs can be improved.
Due to the absence of a plane or axis of symmetry in the
entire manifold design, partial or 2D simulations were
not possible. The non-symmetrical inlet manifold design
is not common due to more complicated flows and
unpredictable effects compared to the symmetrical
manifolds.
Besides examining the flow in the manifold, the
simulation also aimed to test the response to the
pressure fluctuation due to the reciprocating pistons.
Also to the constraint of the venturi attached near the
inlet, the simulations were made in the interest of
evaluation of the current venturi design.

need of optimisation is important to maximise the

performance while ensuring the design requirements are
met.
In early years, the design and analysis of engine intake
and exhaust manifolds were dependent upon being able
to calculate the unsteady flow of compressible gasses
using the Method of Characteristics [1]. The field of
engine design and analysis has been changed
dramatically over the past few yeas with the fast growing
computational
technology.
Computational
Fluid
Dynamics (CFD) has become the most popular design
technique for the engine designers. CFD provides
illustration of flows, where in the past, requiring massive
investments on instrumentation and prototyping to obtain
the equivalent results.
The simulations were made to illustrate the flow in the
manifold when the engine operates at high rpm, where
the engine is not optimised to operate. Under this
critical condition, the manifold's response may be
unpredictable.
At 6000 rpm, pressure ratio as low as 0.5 was observed
in the induction system, and many suggested that the
20mm venturi flow restrictor (Figure 2) developed critical
flow downstream of the nozzle.
The Helmholtz
resonator model also suggested the induction system
could not operate efficiently at this speed.
This
simulations work was performed to prove these
statements and provide illustrations.

1. INTRODUCTION
In a competition car such as Formula SAE, performance
demand is critical as small improvements may give great
advantages over competitors. Modern engines achieved
their desired characteristics through optimised design of
manifold systems, based on the design constraints. The
component geometries in the intake systems such as
the size and the length determine the air flow into the
engine cylinders.
Due to the rules and restrictions, which can greatly
reduce the performance of the available engines, the

2. MANIFOLD GEOMETRY
The inlet manifold of the USYD 2004 competition car is
designed to run at low rpm at most of the times. As can
be seen in Figure 5, it has a long intake duct with a 90
bend, and four long runners to induce air into the engine,
designed in accordance to Helmholtz model. However,
it is necessary for the car to perform well at its maximum
throttle whenever required. The intake manifold design

of the USYD 2004 FSAE car, which is subject to the 3D

simulation, is briefly described as followed.
To plenum

2.1 RUNNERS
The runner diameter for the intake manifold is
constrained by the inlet port diameter on the Honda CBR
600 F4, measured to be 35mm. The runner with the
inner diameter of 34.9mm with 1.6mm wall thickness
was used. The runner was mandrel bent to secure the
injector as seen in the Figure 1 below. To the other end,
the runner was welded to the trumpet outlets from the
plenum.

Fuel Injector
Bend on
Runner

Figure 1: Interface between Runner and Engine Inlet

showing the runner clearance for the injectors

20mm restrictor
throat

Gradual
contraction
Figure 2: Venturi restrictor placed between the throttle
body and plenum having the gradual contraction and
expansion

2.3 PLENUM
Since 2001, USYD team had been using the
symmetrical plenum as shown in Figure 3 (top). This
design complied with the design parameters stated
above for having the symmetrical geometry. Hence, the
pressure distribution between the cylinder ports was
symmetrically balanced. However, for 2004 team, the
new frame was designed and the height of the roll hoop
was reduced. Hence, it would be conflicting with second
height restriction regulation if the previous intake
manifold design is used.
.

2.2 VENTURI RESTRICTOR

According to the FSAE competition rules, a single
circular restrictor must be placed in the intake system
between the throttle and the engine, and all engine
airflow must pass through the restrictor. Any device that
has the ability to throttle the engine downstream of the
restrictor is prohibited. The maximum restrictor diameter
is set to be 20mm.
Therefore, USYD team uses a venturi for the restrictor
design. The effects of the restrictor were minimized by
having the gradual converging and diverging as shown
in Figure 2. The venturi was contracted from 46mm inlet
to 20mm diameter and then expanded into 50mm outlet
to the 90 bend.

Figure 3: Symmetrical plenum design providing the

even pressure distribution between cylinders (top), 2004
Intake manifold layout having the log style plenum with
the inlet beside the driver and the 90 horn shaped bend
(bottom).

Consequently, 2004 USYD had to come up with a new

solution. Caldarola [3] designed the new 2.3L log style
plenum to neutralize the effects the restrictor and
unequal pressure distribution between the runners as
shown in Figure 3 (lower). The plenum was such that
the inlet was repositioned to the right hand side the
driver.

2.4 TRUMPETS (BELL MOUTHS)

One of the design considerations of intake manifold is to
have a smooth flow so that the unnecessary turbulence
and friction can be eliminated. When the fluid flows
through any opening, it creates the Vena Contracta as
shown in Figure 4. It can be seen that the crosssectional air flow is significantly less. It could reduce the
flow inlet capacity up to 80% of the full cross-sectional
area equivalent [3].
To overcome this effect, a bell
mouth could be used at the entrance of all runners. A
bell mouth with a ratio of r/D < 0.15 and a roll back
degree ranges from 90 to 270 could be used to reduce
the loss due to the Vena Contracta. In addition, the
taper angle was made to attain a smooth and efficient
flow into the runner.

temperature were 1.71610-5 kg/m-s and 273K

respectively with constant molecular weight 28.966
kg/kg-mol. The discretisation parameters were all set to
second order upwind. The solutions were found to be
stable and converging in each time step.
Both steady-state analysis and time dependence
simulations of the whole intake manifold system were
performed. The 3-D solid model was created with
SolidWorks as shown in Figure 5 (a). Figure 5 (b)
shows the meshed model of the intake manifold with the
grid size of 0.005m. As for the whole system, there were
two planes required to show the results. The two planes
were at the middle of the inlet and the middle plane of
the runner outlets as shown in Figure 5 (c).
T-grid meshing with combination of tetrahedral/hybrid
elements was used. An inlet volume had been made in
front of the main inlet bell mouth. The boundaries of the
inlet volume were all set as inlet vent where all inflows
are perpendicular to the boundary plane.

(a)

Figure 4: Vena Contracta occurrence at the sharp corner

pipe entrance and the bell mouth design for
counteraction the effect [3]

3. MODELLING
Commercial CFD code FLUENT was used in the
simulations. The standard k- model was adopted as
the turbulent model for both steady and unsteady flow
analysis since it is the simplest and having reasonable
accuracy, requiring only the modest computational
resources. Incompressible simulations were performed
initially. The results showed flow velocity in the manifold
reaches well over sonic, which is not reasonable in
many cases. Also it is generally accepted, if the flow
velocity reaches Mach 0.3, the compressibility effects
start to be significant. Therefore, second simulation
attempt was made on the compressible flow.
The air was modelled as compressible fluid such that the
density varies according to ideal gas law and the
Sutherland rule was selected as viscosity modelled. The
specific heat of air was 1006.43 J/kg-K, thermal
conductivity 0.0242W/m-K, the reference viscosity and

(b)

(c)
Figure 5: (a) SolidWorks 3-D Solid Model of 2004 Intake
Manifold System, (b) 3D tetrahedral meshed of the
Intake Manifold with grid size 0.005, (c) Middle Planes at
the Manifold Centre and Outlets Centre
Grid dependency tests were carried out. Solutions of
deferent grid size were tested in steady flow mode. The
result is as shown in Table 1. It can be seen that the
solution did not reach grid independent. Unfortunately,
existing computing power was proven to be insufficient

to make grid independence test with even grid size

distribution. Grid adaptation was then used to enhance
the accuracy by refining the areas with more critical flow.
Reasonable accuracy of less than 5% difference in mass
flow with respect to the previous adaptation was
obtained by a grid model with 486300 cells. The same
grid model was then used in all the following simulations.

In time dependence simulations, time step of 0.0005s

was used. Larger time step was unable to give a
converging and stable solution. 50 iterations in each
time step were set.

Table 1: Intake Manifold Mass Flow Rates Results with

different grid size
Grid Size
(mm)

Number of
iterations

Mass Flow Rates (kg/s)

Outlet
1

0.005
0.007
0.008

439
434
360

0.0756
0.0880
0.0749

Outlet
2

Outlet
3

Outlet
4

0.0773
0.0928
0.0784

0.0780
0.0939
0.0797

0.0803
0.0966
0.0815

3.1 UNSTEADY MODEL

To model the 3-dimensional unsteady flow, the timedependence boundary conditions were needed. User
defined function (UDF) was used to simulate the
approximated sinusoidal pressure oscillation due to the
opening of intake valves of each cylinder. Since all the
cylinders complete the 4 strokes in 4 radians, each
cylinder takes turn for its radian of duration of intake
stroke. Hence, during every radian interval, there
must be an intake process happening in one of the 4
runners. The engine speed used in the simulation was
6000rpm, which is more than twice the rpm of the first
tuned peak of the engine (2808rpm). The engine makes
one complete a 2 cycle every 0.01s. Therefore, the
duration of each intake period takes 0.005s
The time dependent boundary conditions were made by
DEFINE_PROFILE macros. In addition, to have a more
realistic flow, the actual flow time could be assigned to
the UDF function by assigning CURRENT_TIME to the
local time variable. The sinusoidal pressure function
was defined to be
P(t) = - pmin sin(2 period t)
where pmin is the pressure amplitude.
Figure 6 shows the output plot of the UDF. It could be
seen that only one output has the pressure drop and the
others were zero at any instance. UDF was developed
using the real flow time.
The pressure at the inlet valve was measure by U-tube
manometer in order to obtain a correct pressure ratio
across the manifold. The mean pressure was found to
be -43200Pa at the runner outlets. Therefore the
pressure amplitude pmin was approximated to be twice
the magnitude, which is -86400Pa.

Figure 6: MATLAB plots for time dependent boundary

conditions showing 4 outlet time dependent pressure
changes (pressure magnitude not to scale).

4. OBSERVATION
The observations were taken starting from the second
4 cycle of the 4 strokes in the simulation, at which
t=0.0225. The first 4 cycle did not give a converged
result as the system took more time to respond.

4.1 THE PLENUM

It was observed at t = 0.0225s, at which the intake valve
for the first cylinder is fully opened, low pressure started
to form at the outlet end of the runner. The sudden
pressure drop at the cylinder inlet forced the pressure
magnitude down to below mean pressure. Air starts to
accelerate from the outlet end of the runner. The
compressible nature of air slowed down the response of
the acceleration process. Therefore the air in the runner
does not accelerate all at once, but accelerates as a
form of wave. Figures 7 shows the cut-out pressure
contour of the plenum/runners plane, at 0.0225s,
0.0245s, 0.0260s and 0.0275s instances. The figures
explained the pressure response in between the time
when the first valve is fully opened to the time when the
second is fully opened.
As time elapses, as shown in the series of Figure 7 (a),
(b), (c) and (d) the expansion magnitude decreased as
the wave moves toward the bellmouth. However, at
6000rpm, it does not wait until the first pressure wave
cleared from the runner before the second inlet valve
starts to open. This caused chaotic flow in the plenum
and in other runners, as shown in Figure 9: when the air
in one of the runners is fully accelerated, the air in other
runners flows in backward direction in order to replace
the volume of lower pressure in the runner.

(a)

(b)

(c)

(a)

(b)

(c)

(d)
(d)
Figure 7: (a) Pressure contour at t=0.0225s, (b)
Pressure contour at t=0.0245s, (c) Pressure contour at
t=0.0260s (d) Pressure contour at t = 0.0275s, pressure
magnitude colourmap unit shown in Pa.

Figure 8: (a) velocity contour at t=0.0225s, (b) velocity

contour at t=0.0245s, (c) velocity contour at t=0.0260s,
(d) Velocity contour at t=0.0275s, shown in velocity
magnitude contour (m/s).

As predicted, the velocity magnitude plots show the

same phenomena. The air in the runners accelerates to
respond to the pressure wave. However, due to the wall
friction, the velocity magnitude near the wall of the
runners is not as high as the magnitude near the centre.
Colourmaps in Figure 8 show the velocity magnitude in
ms-1. The maximum velocity was observed to be close
to sonic.
When the results are compared to those of
incompressible flow simulation (Figure 10), it is clear that
in compressible flow simulations, the pressure waves, in
form of local expansion travelling inside the runners,
which is not the case for incompressible flow. Figures 8
show the corresponding velocity magnitude contours
with respect to Figure 7 of which were plotted to show
the pressure response.
It can be seen the plenum very much behaved like a
buffer volume to moderate the flow fluctuations. Without
a plenum of sufficient volume, the reverse flows will
become more intense, causing insufficient air being fed
into cylinders.
During the operation, where the piston suction occurs
alternatively, driving the chaotic flow inside the intake
manifold. As can be seen in Figure 8 and 9, not only the
air in the adjacent runners could have the back flow, but
even the runner located far away will have reverse flow
due to the suction in one of the runners. When the air is
accelerated in reverse, it is more difficult for it to change
direction of flow later when the local valve is opened.
This very much reduces the mass flow rate during the
intake stroke.

Figure 10: Velocity magnitude

incompressible flow simulation

contour

from

4.2 THE INTAKE MANIFOLD

The critical part of the flow was observed at the venturi
throat. As can be seen in the velocity magnitude plots
(Figure 11), the velocity at immediate downstream of the
venturi throat was seen reaching sonic and the
corresponding static pressure was lowest.
It was
observed there is a delay between the instant when one
of the valves opens and when the flow velocity at the
throat reaches its maximum.

(a)

Figure 9: Vector plot showing reverse flow in the

adjacent runner (top), and corresponding velocity
contour (bottom).

(b)
Figure 11: (a) Velocity contour at t=0.0250s, at which the
velocity at the throat reach maximum, and correspond
static pressure contour (b).

Pressure variation plots were made to observe the static

pressure in the sections as shown in Figure 12. The
time dependence results are shown in Figure 13 and 14.

Right at the entrance of the bend (Section A-A), the

pressure plots changes in a regular pattern. The flow is
consistent during the intake in one of the cylinders. But
some flows fluctuations were observed between the
intake strokes. Pressure drops slightly due to the
accelerated flow between intakes strokes.
It is also shown, as predicted, pressure slope occurs due
to the bending, the pressure close to the outer edge of
the duct stayed higher, while pressure near the inner
edge experiences greater loss due to the accelerated
flow at smaller diameter bending corner (Figure 13a).

B-B

A-A

At the exit of the bend (Section B-B), the pressure profile

is following a periodic pattern. Figure 14 (a) shows
smooth pressure profile across the duct at the instance
the first valve is opened, followed by the some pressure
fluctuations built up, then settled when the next valve is
opened (Figure 14(f)).

Figure 12: Sections at which Figure 13 and 14 were

plotted.

(a)

(b)

(c)

(d)

(e)

(f)

Figure 13: The pressure profile across the duct at section A-A. (a) t=0.0225s. (b) t=0.0235s. (c) t=0.0245s. (d) t=0.0255s.
(e) t=0.0265s. (f) t=0.0275s.

(a)

(b)

(c)

(d)

(e)

(f)

Figure 14: Pressure profile across the duct at section B-B. (a) t=0.0225s. (b) t=0.0235s. (c) t=0.0245s. (d) t=0.0255s. (e)
t=0.0265s. (f) t=0.0275s.

4.3 VENTURI
CFD simulations were also performed on the venturi
alone to further understand the flow characteristics,
using the pressure ratio setting given by the earlier
simulations of the whole inlet manifold as outlet
boundary condition. Due to the refined grid, which is not
appropriate to be used on the complete induction
system, the simulation gave more detail and accurate
results.
Steady flow simulations were used to examine the flows
through the venturi nozzle. Figure 15 shows the k-
model of the flow through the venturi throat. With grid
size of 0.0001mm, and the use of partial axissymmetrical 2D model, the result agreed with the result
estimated by the equation [12]:

P = Po 1 +
M2
2

As the intake strokes take place alternatively for each

cylinder, pressure and velocity fluctuations are minimal
at the venturi restriction. Turbulence was observed in
the induction/plenum system.
Non-symmetrical
induction system was proved to be more complex than
the symmetrical manifolds. It was shown the uneven
pressure variation occurred across the whole system.
The 90 bend introduced a variation of suction losses
across the duct due to different local bending radiuses.
To improve the manifold system design, it is suggested
the plenum must be of sufficiently large in physical
volume, and the runners must be located widely apart
from each other to avoid reverse flows caused by
pressure waves in nearby runners.

REFERENCES
1

At pressure ratio of 0.6, the venturi is close to choking

condition.
With inlet stagnation pressure set to
atmospheric, the flow velocity reached 470ms-1
immediate downstream of the throat is considered close
to the limit. Large Eddy Simulation (LES) was also
performed on the same model and the result was a
match to the k- model (Figure 15(lower)).

Figure 15: Velocity magnitude contour of the venture

restriction (top), where maximum velocity downstream of
the throat reached 470ms-1, and its LES version (bottom)

5. CONCLUSION
In this simulation, it can be seen that flow fluctuations
occur in the manifold system when the engine speed
exceeded the tuned speed. Pressure waves form as
local expansions travelling inside the runners and
causes reverse flow in the adjacent runners.

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Engine Manifolds: Wave Action Methods for IC
Engines, SAE International, 2001, UK
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University of Sydney 2001
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and exhaust system for a small displacement
restricted engine using WAVE, University of Sydney
2004
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Sydney 2004
5. Ohata & Ishida, Dynamics Inlet Pressure and
Volumetric Efficiency of Four Cycle Four Cylinder
Engine, SAE Technical 820407.
6. M. Safri & M. Ghamari. Intake Manifold Optimisation
by Using 3D CFD Analysis. SAE Technical
20034373
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System Design and a Comparison Between
Prediction and Results from a Single Cylinder Diesel
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