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The paper describes the most important items in the aerodynamic research related to the development of a racing car. The methodologies of scale model wind tunnel testing and track testing are analyzed. In detail these are applied to the development of the Alfa Romeo 156 ST. The wind tunnel used is described as well as the car instrumentation in the track tests. A comparative analysis is performed between model and full scale aerodynamic results. Finally the influence of the moving belt in the lift measurements of the scale model is considered and the use of the aerodynamic load distribution in the development of the Alfa Romeo 156 ST is described.

Objective of the present work is the development and validation of a computational methodology for the prediction of flow-induced noise around a vehicle. The technique employed makes use of the Lighthill's acoustic analogy revised for low Mach number flows and consists of two steps: prediction of noise sources over the body surface by means of a suitable Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) technique and subsequent prediction of the radiated noise by solving the Ffowks-Williams Hawkings equation. For testing the methodology flows around a cylinder and a test shape, generating the type of flows occuring around the A-pillar of a car, have been employed. Results are compared with experimental data. The paper demonstrates the feasibility of computational prediction of aerodynamic noise even for turbulent high Reynolds number flows.