Wind Tunnel Simulations

The wind tunnel is an amazing engineering tool - with the right set up and sensors,  (close to) actual speed conditions can be simulated and drag and lift forces can be determined. For sports engineering, this means we could determine the drag and lift coefficient in sports wheelchairs and bicycles; estimate what's the optimum position for skiers and snow boarders when they are racing down the hills or doing a jump; and find out the aerodynamic drag of soccer and rugby balls. Although there are simulation software packages that could perform CFD (computational fluid dynamics) and save the trouble of going to the wind tunnel but due to limitations in the programs, certain conditions are impossible to simulate on the computer.

I have been very privileged over the past year to have done tests in the wind tunnel for different sports. Even found out recently that one of the ski athletes who did some tests in the wind tunnel won a gold medal in the Ski Cross World Cup! A first for Australia! Here are some snap shots:

Inside wind tunnel: aerodynamic flow
around a cylinder  

Rugby wheelchair on a force plate

Wheelchair on a hanging platform

Snow boarder adjusting his position

Even though the wind tunnel is really awesome and the one that I used could simulate wind speeds up to 150kph, there are still some limitations and constraints that we have to consider before running experiments. I was doing some tests at the wind tunnel the other day, and this professor walked in to pick up something; he had a look at the wind tunnel setup and started commenting about a couple of things and questioned if we did the proper calibrations and considered the accuracy of the laminar flow and so on. To be honest, it can be a little bit annoying when someone walks in and questions every little thing they see. Unfortunately, that's the way engineering or science simulations works; to get proper results for publishing, one needs to pay attention to details.

But at the same time, I reckon no matter how hard we try to simulate sports movements and high speed environments, it will always be falling short of the actual condition. For example when a ski jumper is going down a slope and preparing for a jump, there will be so much excitement and adrenaline in the athlete that can't be re-created in a wind tunnel environment (unless we could add in a 3D virtual goggles, that might come close and I hope I get to see that one day).

Believing in God is kinda like that. There is one true and living God in the world and there is simply no substitute and there is nothing: no other god or religion or hobby or whatever that could come close to Him. We could try to fill our lives with many things (family, friends, love, work, fun, holidays, etc) but we will never be truly satisfied unless we come to know God through Jesus Christ.

Here's a video that explains it a little more:-