A flux-vector splitting method for steady Navier-Stokes equations

The flux-vector splitting method is applied to the convective part of the steady Navier-Stokes equations for incompressible flow. By the use of partial upwind differences in the split first-order part and central differences in the second-order part, a set of discrete equations is obtained which can be solved by vector variants of classical relaxation schemes. It is shown that accurate results can be obtained on one of the GAMM backward-facing step test problems.     

A stable high-order method for the heated cavity problem

A fourth-order method, without using extrapolation, is developed for the steady-state solution of a non-linear system of three simultaneous partial differential equations for the flow of a fluid in a heated closed cavity. The method is a finite difference method which has converged for all Rayleigh numbers Ra of physical interest and all Prandtl numbers Pr attempted. The results are presented and compared with some of the accurate results available in de Vahl Davis and Jones, Shay and Schultz, and Dennis and Hudson. The method used to develop the fourth-order method presented in this paper can be used to develop high-order methods for other partial differential equations. The method was developed to be stable without using the upwinding technique.     

OVERLAPPING CONTROL VOLUME APPROACH FOR CONVECTION–DIFFUSION PROBLEMS

This paper introduces a finite volume method to solve 2D steady state convection–diffusion problems on structured non-orthogonal grids. Overlapping control volumes (OCV) are used to discretize the physical domain and the governing equations are solved without transformation. An isoparametric formulation is used to compute diffusion and for upwinding. Four test problems are solved using this and other schemes. The modelling of diffusion in OCV seems very effective even on distorted meshes. The convection modelling in OCV is found to be second-order-accurate, like QUICK, on regular meshes. Although its accuracy is slightly inferior to the latter on rectangular grids, its faster convergence gives it a better overall performance. On non-orthogonal grids, OCV gives better accuracy for a large and practical range of Peclet numbers than does QUICK applied to the transformed equations using the conventional five-point diffusion modelling. The results obtained also demonstrate that the scheme reduces false diffusion to a considerable extent in comparison with the power-law scheme.     

Advection upwinding splitting method to solve a compressible two‐fluid model

In this study, the advection upwinding splitting method (AUSM) is modified for the resolution of two‐phase mixtures with interfaces. The compressible two‐fluid model proposed by Saurel and Abgrall is chosen as the model equations. Dense and dilute phases are described in terms of the volume fraction and equations of state to represent multi‐phase mixtures. Test cases involving an air–water shock tube, water faucet, and dilute particulate turbulent flows through a 90° bend are used to verify the current work. It is shown that the AUSM based on flux differences (AUSMD) contains the mechanism to correctly capture the contact discontinuity and interfaces between phases. In addition, a successful application to dilute particulate turbulence flows by the AUSMD is demonstrated. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

On finite element approximation and stabilization methods for compressible viscous flows

This work is devoted to the numerical solution of the Navier–Stokes equations for compressible viscous fluids. Finite element approximations and stabilization techniques are addressed. We present methods to implement discontinuous approximations for the pressure and the density. An upwinding methodology is being investigated which combines the ideas behind the stream line Petrov–Galerkin method and the flux limiter methods aiming to introduce numerical diffusion only where it is necessary.     

An upwinded state approximate Riemann solver

Stability is achieved in most approximate Riemann solvers through ‘flux upwinding’, where the flux at the interface is arrived at by adding a dissipative term to the average of the left and right flux. Motivated by the existence of a collapsed interface state in the gas‐kinetic Bhatnagar–Gross–Krook (BGK) method, an alternative approach to upwinding is attempted here; an interface state is arrived at by taking an upwinded average of left and right states, and then the flux is calculated as a function of this ‘collapsed’ interface state. This so called ‘state‐upwinding’ approach gives rise to a new scheme called the linearized Riemann solver for the Euler and Navier–Stokes equations. The scheme is shown to be closely associated with the Roe scheme. It is, however, computationally less expensive and gives qualitatively comparable results over a wide range of problems. Most importantly, this scheme is found to preserve stationary contacts while not exhibiting the carbuncle phenomenon which plagues the Roe and other contact‐preserving schemes. The scheme is therefore motivated as a new starting point to analyze the origin of the carbuncle phenomenon. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Pressure weighted upwinding for flow induced force predictions: application to iced surfaces

This paper addresses two main topics, namely the development of a pressure‐weighted upwinding method and its application to flow induced forces on iced cylinders. Although the near‐wall convective upwinding exhibits special applicability to iced surfaces, its capabilities extend more generally to other applications. By fully linking pressure and velocity at a sub‐element level near the wall, a higher order accuracy can be obtained. Also, a non‐physical de‐coupling between pressure and velocity can be prevented. The method is developed under the context of a control‐volume‐based finite element method for 2‐D, incompressible flows. Drag and lift coefficients are predicted, based on the pressure weighted upwinding near the wall. The numerical predictions are successfully compared against experimental data, including flow induced forces on iced cables. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Numerical studies of slow viscous rotating flow past a sphere. III

The flow of steady incompressible viscous fluid rotating about the z-axis with angular velocity ω and moving with velocity u past a sphere of radius a which is kept fixed at the origin is investigated by means of a numerical method for small values of the Reynolds number Re_ω. The Navier–Stokes equations governing the axisymmetric flow can be written as three coupled non-linear partial differential equations for the streamfunction, vorticity and rotational velocity component. Central differences are applied to the partial differential equations for solution by the Peaceman–Rachford ADI method, and the resulting algebraic equations are solved by the ‘method of sweeps’. The results obtained by solving the non-linear partial differential equations are compared with the results obtained by linearizing the equations for very small values of Re_ω. Streamlines are plotted for Ψ = 0·05, 0·2, 0·5 for both linear and non-linear cases. The magnitude of the vorticity vector near the body, i.e. at z = 0·2, is plotted for Re_ω = 0·05, 0·24, 0·5. The correction to the Stokes drag as a result of rotation of the fluid is calculated.     

The numerical solution of the flow in a general bifurcating channel at moderately high Reynolds number using boundary-fitted co-ordinates,primitive variables and Newton iteration

A numerical code has been implemented for the numerical solution of the steady, incompressible Navier–Stokes equations using primitive variables in a bifurcating channel. A boundary-fitted, numerically generated grid is placed onto the domain of the channel which is transformed into either a rectilinear C- or T-shaped region. The differenced equations are solved using Newton's iteration which makes upwinding at high Reynolds number unnecessary. Practical implications of inverting the huge Jacobian matrix of Newton's method are discussed. The results have relative error of 2–3 × 10^?3 at Reynolds number 100, with T-geometry being marginally but significantly more accurate than C-geometry. Results have been obtained for Reynolds numbers up to 1000 for three bifurcations one of which models the carotid arterial bifurcation in the human head. For this latter bifurcation the wall shear stress is calculated in connection with the onset of atherosclerosis. Finally, the results of flows having different daughter tube end pressures are presented.     

A new decoupled finite element algorithm for viscoelastic flow. Part 1: Numerical algorithm and sample results

This paper presents an algorithm for two-dimensional Steady viscoelastic flow Simulation in which the Solution of the momentum and continuity equations is decoupled from that of the constitutive equations. The governing equations are discretized by the finite element method, with 3 × 3 element subdivision for the stress field approximation. Non-consistent Streamline upwinding is also used. Results are given for flow through a converging channel and through an abrupt planar 4:1 contraction.     

NUMERICAL STUDY OF HIGH-REYNOLDS-NUMBER FLOW PAST A BLUFF OBJECT

A semi-explicit finite difference scheme is proposed to study unsteady two-dimensional, incompressible flow past a bluff object at high Reynolds number. The bluff object comes from a class of elliptical cylinders in which the aspect ratio and the angle of attack are two controlled parameters. Associated with the streamfunction–vorticity formulation, the interior vorticity, streamfunction and wall vorticity are updated in turn for each time step. The streamfunction and wall vorticity are solved by means of a multigrid method and a projection method respectively. In regard to the vorticity transport equation, implicitness is merely associated with the diffusion operator, which can be made semi-explicit via approximate factorization. Low-diffusive upwinding is devised to handle the convection part. Numerical results are reported for Reynolds numbers up to 40,000. Comparisons with other numerical or physical experiments are included.     

Efficient and stable spectral element methods for predicting the flow of an XPP fluid past a cylinder

Stable and accurate spectral element methods for predicting the flow of branched polymer melts past a confined cylinder are presented. The fluid is modelled using a modification of the pom–pom model known as the extended pom–pom (XPP) model. Steady and transient flows are considered in this paper. The operator integration factor splitting technique is used to discretize the governing equations in time, while the spectral element method is used in space. An iterative solution algorithm that decouples the computation of velocity and pressure from that of stress is used to solve the discrete equations. Appropriate preconditioners are developed for the efficient solution of these problems. Local upwinding factors are used to stabilize the computations. Numerical results are presented demonstrating the performance of the algorithm and the predictions of the model. The influence of the model parameters on the solution is described and, in particular, the dependence of the drag on the cylinder as function of the Weissenberg number.     

Numerical solution of 2D and 3D turbulent internal flow problems

The paper describes a method for solving numerically two-dimensional or axisymmetric, and three-dimensional turbulent internal flow problems. The method is based on an implicit upwinding relaxation scheme with an arbitrarily shaped conservative control volume. The compressible Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes equations are solved with a two-equation turbulence model. All these equations are expressed by using a non-orthogonal curvilinear co-ordinate system. The method is applied to study the compressible internal flow in modern power installations. It has been observed that predictions for two-dimensional and three-dimensional channels show very good agreement with experimental results.     

Numerical analysis of density flows in adiabatic two-phase fluids through characteristic finite element method

The purpose of this study is to analyze the density flow in adiabatic two-phase fluids through the characteristic finite element method. The fluids are assumed to be liquids. The equations of conservations of mass and momentum for the adiabatic flows and the Birch–Murnaghan equation of state are employed as the governing equations. The employed finite element method is a combination of the characteristic method and the implicit method. The governing equations are divided into two parts: the advection part and the non-advection part. The characteristic method is applied to the advection part. The Hermite interpolation function, which is based on the complete third-order polynomial interpolation using triangular finite element is employed for the interpolation of both velocity and density. Using the discontinuity conditions, an interface translocation method can be derived. The interface of the two flow densities are interpolated through the third-order spline function, using which the curvature of the interface can be directly computed. For the numerical study, the development of density flow over the Tokyo bay is presented. It is detected out that high density area is abruptly diffused over the whole area. According to the differences in the two densities, various flow patterns are computed.     

NUMERICAL PREDICTION OF FORCE ON RECTANGULAR CYLINDERS IN OSCILLATING VISCOUS FLOW

Numerical results are presented for an oscillating viscous flow past a square cylinder with square and rounded corners and a diamond cylinder with square corners at Keulegan–Carpenter numbers up to 5. This unsteady flow problem is formulated by the two-dimensional Navier–Stokes equations in vorticity and stream-function form on body-fitted coordinates and solved by a finite-difference method. Second-order Adams-Bashforth and central-difference schemes are used to discretize the vorticity transport equation while a third-order upwinding scheme is incorporated to represent the nonlinear convective terms. Since the vorticity distribution has a mathematical singularity at a sharp corner and since the force coefficients are found in experiments to be sensitive to the corner radius of rectangular cylinders, a grid-generation technique is applied to provide an efficient mesh system for this complex flow. Local grid concentration near the sharp corners, instead of any artificial treatment of the sharp corners being introduced, is used in order to obtain high numerical resolution. The elliptic partial differential equation for stream function and vorticity in the transformed plane is solved by a multigrid iteration method. For an oscillating flow past a rectangular cylinder, vortex detachment occurs at irregular high frequency modes at KC numbers larger than 3 for a square cylinder, larger than 1 for a diamond cylinder and larger than 3 for a square cylinder with rounded corners. The calculated drag and inertia coefficients are in very good agreement with the experimental data. The calculated vortex patterns are used to explain some of the force coefficient behavior.     

Nonlinear dynamic stability analysis of Euler–Bernoulli beam–columns with damping effects under thermal environment

In this study, a unified nonlinear dynamic buckling analysis for Euler–Bernoulli beam–columns subjected to constant loading rates is proposed with the incorporation of mercurial damping effects under thermal environment. Two generalized methods are developed which are competent to incorporate various beam geometries, material properties, boundary conditions, compression rates, and especially, the damping and thermal effects. The Galerkin–Force method is developed by implementing Galerkin method into force equilibrium equations. Then for solving differential equations, different buckled shape functions were introduced into force equilibrium equations in nonlinear dynamic buckling analysis. On the other hand, regarding the developed energy method, the governing partial differential equation for dynamic buckling of beams is also derived by meticulously implementing Hamilton’s principles into Lagrange’s equations. Consequently, the dynamic buckling analysis with damping effects under thermal environment can be adequately formulated as ordinary differential equations. The validity and accuracy of the results obtained by the two proposed methods are rigorously verified by the finite element method. Furthermore, comprehensive investigations on the structural dynamic buckling behavior in the presence of damping effects under thermal environment are conducted.     

A numerical method for simulating discontinuous shallow flow over an infiltrating surface

A numerical method based on the MacCormack finite difference scheme is presented. The method was developed for simulating two‐dimensional overland flow with spatially variable infiltration and microtopography using the hydrodynamic flow equations. The basic MacCormack scheme is enhanced by using the method of fractional steps to simplify application; treating the friction slope, a stiff source term, point‐implicitly, plus, for numerical oscillation control and stability, upwinding the convective acceleration term. A higher‐order smoothing operator is added to aid oscillation control when simulating flow over highly variable surfaces. Infiltration is simulated with the Green–Ampt model coupled to the surface water component in a manner that allows dynamic interaction. The developed method will also be useful for simulating irrigation, tidal flat and wetland circulation, and floods. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

NUMERICAL SOLUTION OF THE SLOW TRANSLATION OF A SPHERE MOVING ALONG THE AXIS OF A ROTATING VISCOUS FLUID

The motion of a sphere along the axis of rotation of an incompressible viscous fluid that is rotating as a solid mass is investigated by means of numerical methods for small values of Reynolds numbers and moderate values of Taylor numbers. The Navier-Stokes equations governing the steady, axisymmetric, viscous flow can be written as three coupled, nonlinear, elliptic partial differential equations for the stream function, vorticity and rotational velocity component. Finite difference method is used for solving the governing equations. Second order derivatives are approximated by central differences and nonlinear terms are approximated by upwind differences. Results are presented mostly in the form of graphs of the streamlines and vorticity lines. When 1/ Ro > 2.2, separation occurs and reverse flow is obtained.     

Application of point implicit Runge–Kutta methods to inviscid and laminar flow problems using AUSM and AUSM+ upwinding

Explicit Runge–Kutta methods preconditioned by a pointwise matrix valued preconditioner can significantly improve the convergence rate to approximate steady state solutions of laminar flows. This has been shown for central discretisation schemes and Roe upwinding. Since the first-order approximation to the inviscid flux assuming constant weighting of the dissipative terms is given by the absolute value of the Roe matrix, the construction of the preconditioner is rather simple compared to other upwind techniques. However, in this article we show that similar improvements in the convergence rates can also be obtained for the AUSM⁺ scheme. Following the ideas for the central and Roe schemes, the preconditioner is obtained by a first-order approximation to the derivative of the convective flux. Viscous terms are included into the preconditioner considering a thin shear layer approximation. A complete derivation of the derivative terms is shown. In numerical examples, we demonstrate the improved convergence rates when compared with a standard explicit Runge–Kutta method accelerated with local time stepping.     

Are fem solutions of incompressible flows really incompressible? (or how simple flows can cause headaches!)

It is generally accepted that mixed and penalty finite element methods can routinely solve the incompressible Navier–Stokes equations. This paper shows by means of simple examples that problems can arise even for the simpler Stokes equations. The causes of the problem fall in either of two categories: round-off and ill conditioning, or a poor choice of pressure discretization. Nonsensical solutions can be obtained. Computation of the discrete divergence of the flow field is a simple and powerful tool to diagnose such conditions. In the first part of the paper several simple techniques for minimizing the effect of round-off are reviewed. In the second part it is shown that, for coupled flow problems, care must be exercised in the choice of the pressure approximation. A unified treatment of various observations by different workers is presented. This should prove useful for general users of the finite element method.