A hybrid method technique for design and

optimization of Formula race car exhaust

muffler

International Review of BARHM MOHAMAD1p , JALICS KAROLY1,

Applied Sciences and ANDREI ZELENTSOV2 and SALAH AMROUNE3
Engineering
1
11 (2020) 2, 174–180 Faculty of Mechanical Engineering and Informatics, University of Miskolc, Miskolc 3515, Hungary
2
DOI: Piston Engine Department, Bauman Moscow State Technical University, Moscow 105005, Russia
10.1556/1848.2020.20048 3
Universit
e Mohamed Boudiaf, B.P 166 ICHBELIA, M'sila, 28000, Algeria
© 2020 The Authors

Received: September 14, 2019 • Accepted: November 20, 2019

Published online: June 30, 2020

ABSTRACT
ORIGINAL RESEARCH
PAPER In this work a multilevel Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis has been applied for the design of a
Formula race car exhaust muffler with improved characteristics of sound pressure level (SPL) and fluid dy-
namic response. The approaches developed and applied for the optimization process range from the 1D to
fully 3D CFD simulation, exploring hybrid approaches based on the integration of a 1D model with 3D tools.
Modern mufflers typically have a complex system of chambers and flow paths. There are a variety of sound
damping and absorbing mechanisms working to quiet the sound flowing through a muffler and piping system.
Two calculation methods were selected for this study. The muffler has a complex inner structure containing
perforated pipe and fiber material. Computer-aided design (CAD) file of the muffler was established for
developing Finite Element Analysis (FEA) model in AVL BOOST v2017 and another commercial advanced
design software (SolidWorks 2017). FEA model was made to monitor the flow properties, pressure and ve-
locity. After the model was verified, sensitivity studies of design parameters were performed to optimize the
SPL of the muffler. The software analysis results are included in the paper. Recommendations are made for
obtaining smoother SPL curves for various measurement methods.

KEYWORDS
exhaust system, muffler, sound pressure level, finite element analysis, 1D and 3D simulation

1. INTRODUCTION
The design of a muffler plays an important role in the overall Noise, vibration and harshness
(NVH) performance of a Formula race car. Generally, the control of both the level and quality
of formula race car engine parts noise is a key aspect of the design process of a new engine
powertrain system, in order to satisfy the legislation limits and provide a characteristic exterior
sound [1]. In particular, the gas dynamic noise is radiated from the engine intake and exhaust
duct systems due to the highly unsteady flows in the pipes, originated by the periodic cylinder
gas exchange process. The insertion loss and the transmission loss of the muffler are used to
assess its performance. There are numerous publications available in the acoustic design and
the measurement methods of exhaust mufflers. The attenuation of gas dynamic noise relies on
suitable reactive and dissipative with hybrid mufflers, designed and optimized to damp or
emphasize certain spectral components of the engine noise. Therefore, the design of complex
*Corresponding author.
E-mail: [email protected] damping systems is a time-consuming operation, which must be carried out by means of
concurrent numerical simulations. The objective of this paper is to conduct a sensitivity
analysis of Formula Student race car muffler on three key design parameters, i.e. partition
(perforated pipe) location, chamber volume variation, and inserting absorbent material in a
reactive muffler. Mohamad [2] presented in his technical paper an efficient process to optimize

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International Review of Applied Sciences and Engineering 11 (2020) 2, 174–180 175

the transmission loss of Audi A6 C6 2.0 TDi reactive muffler software, including inlet, outlet, perforated pipe and cham-
by using Ffowcs Williams and Hawkings analytical method, ber. The perforate pipe was placed in the middle of the
and this review depicts velocity, pressure distribution and cylindrical shaped chamber of the muffler. The cross section
sound power level along the muffler ducts, the paper reveals and the dimensions of muffler are explained in Fig. 1.
that the nonlinear acoustic solver can be applied to model
noise generation and transmission from an initial statistically
steady turbulent flow also Ffowcs Williams–Hawking (FW– 3. ANALYTICAL BACKGROUND
H) acoustic analogy. Mohamad and Zelentsov [3] used CFD
analysis for the design of an engine intake manifold with
3.1. Software setup
improved characteristics of noise reduction and fluid dynamic
response. The approaches developed and applied for the Several procedures were made to perform the modeling
optimization process range from the 1D to fully 3D CFD using computational fluid dynamics tools and to create the
simulation by coupling technique method. Mohamad and optimum design for a case study using AVL BOOST v 2017
Amroune [4] explored hybrid approaches based on the optimization (commercial software). The muffler was made
integration of a 1D model and 3D tools to describe the flow from titanium alloy, so the gas properties were selected
effects on engine exhaust chamber acoustic level, and they directly from both software databases. The boundary con-
showed the transmission loss of muffler at different frequency ditions considered for the flow acoustic analysis are repre-
from the solver. Mohamad et al. [5] study acoustic charac- sentative for the exhaust system at several engine speeds.
terization based on the transfer matrix method (TMM) The details are shown in the scheme below (Fig. 2).
technique, the result of their study of an existing muffler has The 1D model created in AVL Boost implies a one-dimen-
been compared with vehicle level test experimental data. The sional approach to the description of processes in the intake and
transmission loss has been optimized for new muffler design; exhaust systems of the piston engine. The one-dimensional
other literatures played a significant role in validate their re- statement of the problem allows estimating the influence of pipe
sults. Mohamad [6] studied several new techniques through and channels dimensions (diameters, lengths, fillet radii) on the
that literature review; the latest development has been done gas flow. The entire cylinder (section) is considered as a single
on exhaust systems with regard to acoustic performance. The volume in which the processes of intake, compression, combus-
basic theory behind both approaches is explained as well as a tion, expansion and outlet occur. This volume, unlike the three-
source characterization technique that can be used to link the dimensional approach, is not divided into subdomains (control
two methods. Some acoustic software tool has been applied to or finite volumes). The system of equations (energy, continuity,
a variety of exhaust systems. gas state) is written only for one volume that changes with time
(in the three-dimensional approach – the system of equations is
solved for each control volume) (Tables 1 and 2).
2. METHODOLOGY Inlet boundary conditions (BCs) were mass flow and
temperature values from measuring points MP 19, 9, 21, 10
(Fig. 3), outlet BC – pressure in MP 10.
2.1. CAD model In addition, the wall temperature of an external chamber
The geometry was implemented based on current FS reactive of the muffler was set: Tw 5 573 K, and heat transfer co-
muffler prototype using SolidWorks 2017 advanced design efficient (hc) 5 50 W/m2/K.

Fig. 1. The cross section and the dimensions of FS muffler

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176 International Review of Applied Sciences and Engineering 11 (2020) 2, 174–180

Table 2. Model cells properties

Properties Cells
Basic Mesh Dimensions Nx 5 82, Ny 5 16, Nz 5 20
Fluid cells 565,554
Solid cells 259,408
Trimmed cells 0
Total cells 824,962

muffler. Its surface mesh was refined to establish the finite

element analysis of PPiP muffler. All internal walls are set as
real walls with a surface roughness of 0.5 mm.

3.2. Mathematical analysis

The mathematical model is based on the fundamental
equations of three-dimensional nonstationary transport: the
equations of momentum (Navier–Stokes), energy (Fourier–
Kirchhoff) and the conservation of mass (continuity), which
take the form of Reynolds after the averaging procedure by
the Favre method:
" ! #
dWi vp v vWi vWj 2 vWk
r ¼ Gi  þ m þ  dij  r W0i W0j ;
dt vxi vxj vxj vxi 3 vxk
 
dH vp v   v vT
r ¼ jGj Wj þ þ τij Wj þ λ  cp r T j ;
dt vt vxi vxj vxj

vr v  
þ r Wj ¼ 0;
vt vxj
(1)

where Wi, Wj, Wk are the projections of velocity vector, m/s;

p is the pressure, N/m2; Gi is the projection of the density
vector of the volume forces (N/m3) onto the Oxi axis of a
rectangular Cartesian coordinate system; H is the total
specific energy, J/kg; T is the temperature, K; m is the
Fig. 2. Flowchart of the design and an optimization process

The initial conditions were the temperature and pressure

inside the calculated volume at the initial moment of calculation
(the data were taken from the calculation results in Boost).
The pressure drop was defined as the difference between
the pressure in the exhaust manifold at the cylinder outlet
and the cross section at the outlet of the muffler (compu-
tational volume) (Figs 4 and 5).
This paper adopted finite element analysis using Solid-
Works 2017 3D flow simulation to calculate product per-
formance and capabilities of the geometric model of the

Table 1. Parameters of perforated pipe

Porosity 0.047
Porosity Discharge Coefficient In 0.6
Porosity Discharge Coefficient Out 0.6
Perforation-Hole Diameter 3 mm
Fig. 3. Scheme of Honda CBR 600RR (PC 37) race car engine with
Perforation-Wall Thickness 0.5 mm
perforated pipe in pipe (PPiP) as part of muffler

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International Review of Applied Sciences and Engineering 11 (2020) 2, 174–180 177

References [11–13] emphasized that this mathematical

model is typical for CFD calculations of processes in piston
engines.
The effect of flow noise generated by turbulence were
declared by ref. [14]:
Lw ¼ hw þ 10Log ðPamb 0:0075Þ  17:5Log T þ 20Log D
þ 45Log u  26:9 (2)

where Lw is the overall flow generated noise power level

radiated (dB); hw is the efficiency factor (dB); pamb is the
atmospheric pressure (Pa); D is the diameter of the pipe(m)
and u the gas flow velocity (m/s).
Fig. 4. Refinement mesh of perforated tube
The formula predicts the noise power level once the
value of the efficiency factor is known from experimental
measurements for the specific silencing device. This includes
the effects of all parts of the system including flow area
changes and perforates. The predicted flow noise is across
the complete range of frequencies and not at specific fre-
quencies.
For the exhaust muffler of engines, different muffler
structures and parameters obviously had different influences
on reducing the noise. Due to the complex work process of
Fig. 5. Position of system boundary relative to the microphone the muffler, how to theoretically compute and design the
inner structure of the muffler has been a topic which was
constantly discussed. To show the effect of absorptive ma-
dynamic viscosity, kg/(m/s), τij is the averaged Reynolds stress terial (AM) and porosity of pipe on sound pressure level can
for components, cp is the heat capacity at constant pressure, J/ be described as equation below:
(kg/K), λ is the thermal conductivity, W/(m/K); dij is the Kro- Material Porosity ¼ 1  ðPacking DensityÞ=ðMaterial DensityÞ
necker symbol; t is time value, s; and dtd is the substantial de-
(3)
rivative. The equations use the representation of any parameter
F (it can be velocity W, pressure p, enthalpy H, etc.) as the sum Material properties resources including density value can
of its averaged F and pulsation F0 values. be found in software database.
The system of transport equations in the Reynolds form
(1) is closed by the k-ζ-f turbulence model. This model was
specially developed and verified for the processes of flow, 4. RESULTS
combustion, and heat transfer in piston engines [7, 8]. k-ζ-f
model has three equations: for the k kinetic energy of tur- 4.1. Flow trajectory
bulence, for the « dissipation rate of this energy known from
In Fig. 6 the contour of flow field distribution of the muffler
the k-« model of turbulence, and the equations for the
2
system is shown. As can be seen, the largest flow velocity
normalized velocity scale ζ 5 W /k [9]. (52.799 m/s) was in the connection pipe of PPiP at the outlet
Hybrid wall functions [10] were used to determine pa- of the muffler and the largest pressure of the body muffler
rameters of gas flow and heat transfer into the boundary layer. (102,325.35 Pa) was at the inlet, as seen in Fig. 7.

Fig. 6. Velocity distribution start from the right (inlet) and leaves at the left (outlet) in PPiP muffler

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178 International Review of Applied Sciences and Engineering 11 (2020) 2, 174–180

Fig. 7. Pressure contour (Flow trajectories) in perforated tube and the volume part of muffler (The inlet at the left and outlet at the right)

Most of the fluid in the internal of PPiP muffler directly Using different types of exhaust muffler to current FS
entered into the muffler volume from the perforated pipe. In engine has no effect on power output, since there is no
addition, perforated tube located inside the muffler had catalyst convertor or intercooler to create high back pressure
holes whose diameter was very small (3 mm). Due to large (as shown in Fig. 8).
resistance, the fluid was greatly reduced when it flowed from
holes, details in Fig. 7. 4.3. Noise level
On the basis of three-dimensional calculations, the values
of the pressure drop in the simulated muffler were obtained, As it can be seen from Fig. 9, modified muffler makes it
taking into account the presence of an internal perforated possible to decrease the noise levels but for n > 3,000 rpm
pipe. Also, three-dimensional models allowed to clarify the noise level is still higher than in case of muffler construction
value of Material Porosity. Further these values were used to with only volume.
calibrate the 1D model of exhaust system in AVL Boost. This paper aimed to optimize the average SPL of the
muffler instead of taking SPL at all frequencies. This is
resulting an increase of SPL with increase of engine speed
4.2. Power output which may act in frequency domain.
Influence of diameter (Dm_in), diameter of hole of perfo-
4.4. The effect of muffler design parameter on noise
rated inner pipe (Dm_hole), diameter out of muffler shell
(Dm_out) and the length of the muffler variation on Honda level
engine performance were monitored and optimized based The effect of geometrical parameters of muffler on its noise
on AVL BOOST solver. reduction performance is studied and reported. Fig. 10

Fig. 8. Comparison of power output for Honda CBR 600RR (PC Fig. 9. Comparison of sound pressure level for Honda CBR 600RR
37) race car engine with volume and PPiP (Fig. 3) (PC 37) race car engine muffler with volume and PPiP (Fig. 3)

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International Review of Applied Sciences and Engineering 11 (2020) 2, 174–180 179

Fig. 10. Honda engine acoustic performance in case of base

(Dm_hole 5 3 mm, Dm_in 5 47 mm, Dm_out 5 116 mm, Fig. 12. FS engine sound pressure level with different types of
Lm 5 426 mm) and modified (Dm_hole 5 3 mm, muffler materials
Dm_in 5 47 mm, Dm_out 5 126 mm, Lm 5 436 mm) geometry of
muffler with perforated pipe in pipe performance of the engine. In addition, during the operation
of engine, the sound-absorbing material may be clogged
shows a comparison of noise levels from the engine at a with soot particles present in the exhaust gases, which leads
distance of 1 m from the muffler cut-off in the case of using to a further increase in resistance at the outlet and a dete-
base and modified muffler. The simulation of flow noise rioration in the operating conditions of the engine. The
propagates for base muffler and the discussion of their combustion process was simulated in the engine cylinders.
influencing factors, the effectiveness of this combination In the applied model, it is also possible to simulate the
theory in the field of flow noise in exhaust gas could reflect formation of soot, but for SI engine with external mixing the
the practical condition because the exciting source applied emissions of soot can be neglected. Into the exhaust system
by automobile engine to the muffler was sound pressure the processes of afterburning are not simulated, and the
rather than vibration velocity when the muffler was con- change in the temperature of exhaust gases results from heat
nected with automobile engine. exchange with the environment. A main muffler not only
A significant dependence of the engine operation pa- had a lighter mass, but also needed to ensure the minimum
rameters, including the noise level, on the outlet pipe length SPL at the outlet end, which was a multi-objective optimi-
is determined by the propagation of backward waves from zation problem. All optimization processes were carried out
the open end of the pipe. As a result, the lowest noise level on the commercial software.
while maintaining the power performance of the engine was The use of sound-absorbing material provides a signifi-
achieved when Dm_out 5 126 mm and Lm 5 436 mm cantly greater reduction in the engine noise level at a com-
(Fig. 11). parable size of the muffler.
From Fig. 12 it can be seen that the use of sound- The parameters of AM: porosity 5 0.9 and flow re-
absorbing material allowed reducing the SPL by 15–20% in sistivity 5 10,000 N$s/m4. The material porosity represents
the entire engine speed range. At the same time, the output the fraction of air space within the material (0–1). In our
flow resistance increases, thereby reducing the effective case, a Material Porosity of 0.9 defines that 10% of the
volume is filled with material and 90% is space for the gases.

5. CONCLUSION
The acoustics problem is then solved by using an AM, which
is a possible step in further decreasing of noise level. The
results of using AM into inner pipe first, then to outer pipe
and into both inside the muffler at the same time are given
in Fig. 12. Exhaust muffler could meet the requirements of
exhaust noises, the larger SPL at perforated pipe (PPiP) re-
gion was mainly caused by air flow regeneration. The
muffler mainly reduced the noise through the trans-
formation of airflow into heat energy in a closed space. The
Fig. 11. Results of variation of pipe length (Lm) and diameter use of 1D and 3D simulation of processes in the exhaust
(Dm_out) of non-perforated outer pipe (diameter of perforated system can significantly reduce the time and cost of selecting
inner pipe Dm_in 5 47 mm, n 5 2000 rpm) the optimal size of muffler and exhaust pipes.

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180 International Review of Applied Sciences and Engineering 11 (2020) 2, 174–180

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