Wind Tunnel Testing by HBM: Best in Class Accuracy and Precision

Efficiency and performance are crucial aspects for aircraft and spacecraft. Engineers push materials and structures to physical limits to gain even the smallest improvement. Also, for cars, trains and even sports equipment the understanding and optimization of aerodynamic characteristics under different flow conditions are of outmost importance. This is where highest accuracy and precision matter most.

Testing starts virtually at the PC. These simulations play a vital role to achieve the desired results. For aerodynamics, models created by finite volume method (FVM) run through computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulating different test conditions.

However, simulations cannot efficiently cover all cases. The results need to be validated by physical testing to increase confidence and data integrity. Thus, wind tunnel tests remain an important part of many development programs.

The need of fully synchronized measurements of relevant physical quantities such as forces, moments, strains, accelerations, pressures, and temperatures require accurate sensors, but also high performance DAQ systems and software.

See how our customer RUAG relies on HBM solutions to cover the measurement needs in its wind tunnels.