Genuinely multidimensional characteristic‐based scheme for incompressible flows

This paper presents a novel multidimensional characteristic‐based (MCB) upwind method for the solution of incompressible Navier–Stokes equations. As opposed to the conventional characteristic‐based (CB) schemes, it is genuinely multidimensional in that the local characteristic paths, along which information is propagated, are used. For the first time, the multidimensional characteristic structure of incompressible flows modified by artificial compressibility is extracted and used to construct an inherent multidimensional upwind scheme. The new proposed MCB scheme in conjunction with the finite‐volume discretization is employed to model the convective fluxes. Using this formulation, the steady two‐dimensional incompressible flow in a lid‐driven cavity is solved for a wide range of Reynolds numbers. It was found that the new proposed scheme presents more accurate results than the conventional CB scheme in both their first‐ and second‐order counterparts in the case of cavity flow. Also, results obtained with second‐order MCB scheme in some cases are more accurate than the central scheme that in turn provides exact second‐order discretization in this grid. With this inherent upwinding technique for evaluating convective fluxes at cell interfaces, no artificial viscosity is required even at high Reynolds numbers. Another remarkable advantage of MCB scheme lies in its faster convergence rate with respect to the CB scheme that is found to exhibit substantial delays in convergence reported in the literature. The results obtained using new proposed scheme are in good agreement with the standard benchmark solutions in the literature. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Incompressible Roe‐like scheme for turbulent flows

In the current study, numerical investigation of incompressible turbulent flow is presented. By the artificial compressibility method, momentum and continuity equations are coupled. Considering Reynolds averaged Navier–Stokes equations, the Spalart–Allmaras turbulence model, which has accurate results in two‐dimensional problems, is used to calculate Reynolds stresses. For convective fluxes a Roe‐like scheme is proposed for the steady Reynolds averaged Navier–Stokes equations. Also, Jameson averaging method was implemented. In comparison, the proposed characteristics‐based upwind incompressible turbulent Roe‐like scheme, demonstrated very accurate results, high stability, and fast convergence. The fifth‐order Runge–Kutta scheme is used for time discretization. The local time stepping and implicit residual smoothing were applied as the convergence acceleration techniques. Suitable boundary conditions have been implemented considering flow behavior. The problem has been studied at high Reynolds numbers for cross flow around the horizontal circular cylinder and NACA0012 hydrofoil. Results were compared with those of others and a good agreement has been observed. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A co‐ordinate system independent streamwise upwind method for fluid flow computation

A new co‐ordinate invariant streamwise upwind formulation for convection dominated flows is developed. The eddy diffusivity/viscosity is added directly to the equations in order to remove the oscillations in the solution. The equations then can be solved by any high‐order scheme and the solution retains the accuracy of the high‐order scheme. The accuracy and reduced lateral thickness growth rate are demonstrated with several numerical examples, including pure convective flows and lid‐driven cavity flow. The lateral spreading due to the numerical diffusion is controlled by the anisotropic tensor. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A transformation‐free HOC scheme for incompressible viscous flows on nonuniform polar grids

We recently proposed a transformation‐free higher‐order compact (HOC) scheme for two‐dimensional (2‐D) steady convection–diffusion equations on nonuniform Cartesian grids (Int. J. Numer. Meth. Fluids 2004; 44 :33–53). As the scheme was equipped to handle only constant coefficients for the second‐order derivatives, it could not be extended directly to curvilinear coordinates, where they invariably occur as variables. In this paper, we extend the scheme to cylindrical polar coordinates for the 2‐D convection–diffusion equations and more specifically to the 2‐D incompressible viscous flows governed by the Navier–Stokes (N–S) equations. We first apply the formulation to a problem having analytical solution and demonstrate its fourth‐order spatial accuracy. We then apply it to the flow past an impulsively started circular cylinder problem and finally to the driven polar cavity problem. We present our numerical results and compare them with established numerical and analytical and experimental results whenever available. This new approach is seen to produce excellent comparison in all the cases. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A hybrid Padé ADI scheme of higher‐order for convection–diffusion problems

A high‐order Padé alternating direction implicit (ADI) scheme is proposed for solving unsteady convection–diffusion problems. The scheme employs standard high‐order Padé approximations for spatial first and second derivatives in the convection‐diffusion equation. Linear multistep (LM) methods combined with the approximate factorization introduced by Beam and Warming (J. Comput. Phys. 1976; 22 : 87–110) are applied for the time integration. The approximate factorization imposes a second‐order temporal accuracy limitation on the ADI scheme independent of the accuracy of the LM method chosen for the time integration. To achieve a higher‐order temporal accuracy, we introduce a correction term that reduces the splitting error. The resulting scheme is carried out by repeatedly solving a series of pentadiagonal linear systems producing a computationally cost effective solver. The effects of the approximate factorization and the correction term on the stability of the scheme are examined. A modified wave number analysis is performed to examine the dispersive and dissipative properties of the scheme. In contrast to the HOC‐based schemes in which the phase and amplitude characteristics of a solution are altered by the variation of cell Reynolds number, the present scheme retains the characteristics of the modified wave numbers for spatial derivatives regardless of the magnitude of cell Reynolds number. The superiority of the proposed scheme compared with other high‐order ADI schemes for solving unsteady convection‐diffusion problems is discussed. A comparison of different time discretizations based on LM methods is given. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Implicit preconditioned high‐order compact scheme for the simulation of the three‐dimensional incompressible Navier–Stokes equations with pseudo‐compressibility method

This paper combines the pseudo‐compressibility procedure, the preconditioning technique for accelerating the time marching for stiff hyperbolic equations, and high‐order accurate central compact scheme to establish the code for efficiently and accurately solving incompressible flows numerically based on the finite difference discretization. The spatial scheme consists of the sixth‐order compact scheme and 10th‐order numerical filter operator for guaranteeing computational stability. The preconditioned pseudo‐compressible Navier–Stokes equations are marched temporally using the implicit lower–upper symmetric Gauss–Seidel time integration method, and the time accuracy is improved by the dual‐time step method for the unsteady problems. The efficiency and reliability of the present procedure are demonstrated by applications to Taylor decaying vortices phenomena, double periodic shear layer rolling‐up problem, laminar flow over a flat plate, low Reynolds number unsteady flow around a circular cylinder at Re = 200, high Reynolds number turbulence flow past the S809 airfoil, and the three‐dimensional flows through two 90°curved ducts of square and circular cross sections, respectively. It is found that the numerical results of the present algorithm are in good agreement with theoretical solutions or experimental data. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Development of an Artificial Compressibility Methodology with Implicit LU-SGS Method

A numerical method has been developed to solve the steady and unsteady incompressible Navier-Stokes equations in a two-dimensional, curvilinear coordinate system. The solution procedure is based on the method of artificial compressibility and uses a third-order flux-difference splitting upwind differencing scheme for convective terms and second-order center difference for viscous terms. A time-accurate scheme for unsteady incompressible flows is achieved by using an implicit real time discretization and a dual-time approach, which introduces pseudo-unsteady terms into both the mass conservation equation and momentum equations. An efficient fully implicit algorithm LU-SGS, which was originally derived for the compressible Eulur and Navier-Stokes equations by Jameson and Toon [1], is developed for the pseudo-compressibility formulation of the two dimensional incompressible Navier-Stokes equations for both steady and unsteady flows. A variety of computed results are presented to validate the present scheme. Numerical solutions for steady flow in a square lid-driven cavity and over a backward facing step and for unsteady flow in a square driven cavity with an oscillating lid and in a circular tube with a smooth expansion are respectively presented and compared with experimental data or other numerical results.     

A new characteristic approach for incompressible thermo‐flow in Cartesian and non‐Cartesian grids

A virtual‐characteristic approach is developed for thermo‐flow with finite‐volume methodology in which a multidimensional characteristic (MC) scheme is applied along with artificial compressibility. To obtain compatibility equations and pseudo‐characteristics, energy equation is taken into account in the MC scheme. With this inherent upwinding of convective fluxes, no artificial viscosity is required even at high Reynolds numbers. Another remarkable advantage of the MC scheme lies in its faster convergence rate with respect to the averaging scheme that is found to exhibit substantial delays in convergence. As benchmarks, forced and mixed convections in a cavity and in flow over cylinder and between parallel plates are examined for a wide range of Reynolds, Grashof, and Prandtl numbers. The MC and averaging schemes are applied for simulation purposes. Results show the better performance of the MC scheme in forced and mixed convections. Results confirm the robustness of the MC scheme in terms of accuracy and convergence. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Fourier analysis of several finite difference schemes for the one‐dimensional unsteady convection–diffusion equation

This paper reports a comparative study on the stability limits of nine finite difference schemes to discretize the one‐dimensional unsteady convection–diffusion equation. The tested schemes are: (i) fourth‐order compact; (ii) fifth‐order upwind; (iii) fourth‐order central differences; (iv) third‐order upwind; (v) second‐order central differences; and (vi) first‐order upwind. These schemes were used together with Runge–Kutta temporal discretizations up to order six. The remaining schemes are the (vii) Adams–Bashforth central differences, (viii) the Quickest and (ix) the Leapfrog central differences. In addition, the dispersive and dissipative characteristics of the schemes were compared with the exact solution for the pure advection equation, or simple first or second derivatives, and numerical experiments confirm the Fourier analysis. The results show that fourth‐order Runge–Kutta, together with central schemes, show good conditional stability limits and good dispersive and dissipative spectral resolution. Overall the fourth‐order compact is the recommended scheme. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A high‐order compact finite‐difference lattice Boltzmann method for simulation of steady and unsteady incompressible flows

A high‐order compact finite‐difference lattice Boltzmann method (CFDLBM) is proposed and applied to accurately compute steady and unsteady incompressible flows. Herein, the spatial derivatives in the lattice Boltzmann equation are discretized by using the fourth‐order compact FD scheme, and the temporal term is discretized with the fourth‐order Runge–Kutta scheme to provide an accurate and efficient incompressible flow solver. A high‐order spectral‐type low‐pass compact filter is used to stabilize the numerical solution. An iterative initialization procedure is presented and applied to generate consistent initial conditions for the simulation of unsteady flows. A sensitivity study is also conducted to evaluate the effects of grid size, filtering, and procedure of boundary conditions implementation on accuracy and convergence rate of the solution. The accuracy and efficiency of the proposed solution procedure based on the CFDLBM method are also examined by comparison with the classical LBM for different flow conditions. Two test cases considered herein for validating the results of the incompressible steady flows are a two‐dimensional (2‐D) backward‐facing step and a 2‐D cavity at different Reynolds numbers. Results of these steady solutions computed by the CFDLBM are thoroughly compared with those of a compact FD Navier–Stokes flow solver. Three other test cases, namely, a 2‐D Couette flow, the Taylor's vortex problem, and the doubly periodic shear layers, are simulated to investigate the accuracy of the proposed scheme in solving unsteady incompressible flows. Results obtained for these test cases are in good agreement with the analytical solutions and also with the available numerical and experimental results. The study shows that the present solution methodology is robust, efficient, and accurate for solving steady and unsteady incompressible flow problems even at high Reynolds numbers. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An upwind finite element scheme for high-Reynolds-number flows

A new upwind finite element scheme for the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations at high Reynolds number is presented. The idea of the upwind technique is based on the choice of upwind and downwind points. This scheme can approximate the convection term to third-order accuracy when these points are located at suitable positions. From the practical viewpoint of computation, the algorithm of the pressure Poisson equation procedure is adopted in the framework of the finite element method. Numerical results of flow problems in a cavity and past a circular cylinder show excellent dependence of the solutions on the Reynolds number. The influence of rounding errors causing Karman vortex shedding is also discussed in the latter problem.     

Two‐dimensional flow past circular cylinders using finite volume lattice Boltzmann formulation

In this article, an extension to the total variation diminishing finite volume formulation of the lattice Boltzmann equation method on unstructured meshes was presented. The quadratic least squares procedure is used for the estimation of first‐order and second‐order spatial gradients of the particle distribution functions. The distribution functions were extrapolated quadratically to the virtual upwind node. The time integration was performed using the fourth‐order Runge–Kutta procedure. A grid convergence study was performed in order to demonstrate the order of accuracy of the present scheme. The formulation was validated for the benchmark two‐dimensional, laminar, and unsteady flow past a single circular cylinder. These computations were then investigated for the low Mach number simulations. Further validation was performed for flow past two circular cylinders arranged in tandem and side‐by‐side. Results of these simulations were extensively compared with the previous numerical data. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

ONSET OF ASYMMETRY: FLOW PAST CIRCULAR AND ELLIPTIC CYLINDERS

A computational study of the development of two- dimensional unsteady viscous incompressible flow around a circular cylinder and elliptic cylinders is undertaken at a Reynolds number of 10,000. A higher- order upwind scheme is used to solve the Navier–Stokes equations by the finite difference method in order to study the onset of computed asymmetry around bluff bodies. For the computed cases the ellipses develop asymmetry much earlier than the circular cylinder. The receptivity of the computed flows in the presence of discrete roughness and surface vibration is studied. Finally, the role of discrete roughness in triggering asymmetry for flow past a circular cylinder is studied and compared with flow visualization experiments at Re=10,000     

Two‐dimensional implicit time‐dependent calculations on adaptive unstructured meshes with time evolving boundaries

An implicit multigrid‐driven algorithm for two‐dimensional incompressible laminar viscous flows has been coupled with a solution adaptation method and a mesh movement method for boundary movement. Time‐dependent calculations are performed implicitly by regarding each time step as a steady‐state problem in pseudo‐time. The method of artificial compressibility is used to solve the flow equations. The solution mesh adaptation method performs local mesh refinement using an incremental Delaunay algorithm and mesh coarsening by means of edge collapse. Mesh movement is achieved by modeling the computational domain as an elastic solid and solving the equilibrium equations for the stress field. The solution adaptation method has been validated by comparison with experimental results and other computational results for low Reynolds number flow over a shedding circular cylinder. Preliminary validation of the mesh movement method has been demonstrated by a comparison with experimental results of an oscillating airfoil and with computational results for an oscillating cylinder. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A finite volume unstructured multigrid method for efficient computation of unsteady incompressible viscous flows

An unstructured non‐nested multigrid method is presented for efficient simulation of unsteady incompressible Navier–Stokes flows. The Navier–Stokes solver is based on the artificial compressibility approach and a higher‐order characteristics‐based finite‐volume scheme on unstructured grids. Unsteady flow is calculated with an implicit dual time stepping scheme. For efficient computation of unsteady viscous flows over complex geometries, an unstructured multigrid method is developed to speed up the convergence rate of the dual time stepping calculation. The multigrid method is used to simulate the steady and unsteady incompressible viscous flows over a circular cylinder for validation and performance evaluation purposes. It is found that the multigrid method with three levels of grids results in a 75% reduction in CPU time for the steady flow calculation and 55% reduction for the unsteady flow calculation, compared with its single grid counterparts. The results obtained are compared with numerical solutions obtained by other researchers as well as experimental measurements wherever available and good agreements are obtained. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Parallel three‐dimensional simulation of the injection molding process

This paper describes the development of a parallel three‐dimensional unstructured non‐isothermal flow solver for the simulation of the injection molding process. The numerical model accounts for multiphase flow in which the melt and air regions are considered to be a continuous incompressible fluid with distinct physical properties. This aspect avoids the complex reconstruction of the interface. A collocated finite volume method is employed, which can switch between first‐ and second‐order accuracy in both space and time. The pressure implicit with splitting of operators algorithm is used to compute the transient flow variables and couple velocity and pressure. The temperature equation is solved using a transport equation with convection and diffusion terms. An upwind differencing scheme is used for the discretization of the convection term to enforce a bounded solution. In order to capture the sharp interface, a bounded compressive high‐resolution scheme is employed. Parallelization of the code is achieved using the PETSc framework and a single program multiple data message passing model. Predicted numerical solutions for several example problems are considered. The first case validates the solution algorithm for moderate Reynolds number flows using a structured mesh. The second case employs an unstructured hybrid mesh showing the capability of the solver to describe highly viscous flows closer to realistic injection molding conditions. The final case presents the non‐isothermal filling of a thick cavity using three mesh sizes and up to 80 processors to assess parallel performance. The proposed algorithm is shown to have good accuracy and scalability. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Application of a preconditioned high‐order accurate artificial compressibility‐based incompressible flow solver in wide range of Reynolds numbers

In the present study, the preconditioned incompressible Navier‐Stokes equations with the artificial compressibility method formulated in the generalized curvilinear coordinates are numerically solved by using a high‐order compact finite‐difference scheme for accurately and efficiently computing the incompressible flows in a wide range of Reynolds numbers. A fourth‐order compact finite‐difference scheme is utilized to accurately discretize the spatial derivative terms of the governing equations, and the time integration is carried out based on the dual time‐stepping method. The capability of the proposed solution methodology for the computations of the steady and unsteady incompressible viscous flows from very low to high Reynolds numbers is investigated through the simulation of different 2‐dimensional benchmark problems, and the results obtained are compared with the existing analytical, numerical, and experimental data. A sensitivity analysis is also performed to evaluate the effects of the size of the computational domain and other numerical parameters on the accuracy and performance of the solution algorithm. The present solution procedure is also extended to 3 dimensions and applied for computing the incompressible flow over a sphere. Indications are that the application of the preconditioning in the solution algorithm together with the high‐order discretization method in the generalized curvilinear coordinates provides an accurate and robust solution method for simulating the incompressible flows over practical geometries in a wide range of Reynolds numbers including the creeping flows.     

Fictitious domain approach for numerical modelling of Navier–Stokes equations

This study investigates a fictitious domain model for the numerical solution of various incompressible viscous flows. It is based on the so‐called Navier–Stokes/Brinkman and energy equations with discontinuous coefficients all over an auxiliary embedding domain. The solid obstacles or walls are taken into account by a penalty technique. Some volumic control terms are directly introduced in the governing equations in order to prescribe immersed boundary conditions. The implicit numerical scheme, which uses an upwind finite volume method on staggered Cartesian grids, is of second‐order accuracy in time and space. A multigrid local mesh refinement is also implemented, using the multi‐level Zoom Flux Interface Correction (FIC) method, in order to increase the precision where it is needed in the domain. At each time step, some iterations of the augmented Lagrangian method combined with a preconditioned Krylov algorithm allow the divergence‐free velocity and pressure fields be solved for. The tested cases concern external steady or unsteady flows around a circular cylinder, heated or not, and the channel flow behind a backward‐facing step. The numerical results are shown in good agreement with other published numerical or experimental data. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Computing singular solutions of the Navier–Stokes equations with the Chebyshev‐collocation method

The solution of fluid flow problems exhibits a singular behaviour when the conditions imposed on the boundary display some discontinuities or change in type. A treatment of these singularities has to be considered in order to preserve the accuracy of high‐order methods, such as spectral methods. The present work concerns the computation of a singular solution of the Navier–Stokes equations using the Chebyshev‐collocation method. A singularity subtraction technique is employed, which amounts to computing a smooth solution thanks to the subtraction of the leading part of the singular solution. The latter is determined from an asymptotic expansion of the solution near the singular points. In the case of non‐homogeneous boundary conditions, where the leading terms of the expansion are completely determined by the local analysis, the high accuracy of the method is assessed on both steady and unsteady lid‐driven cavity flows. An extension of this technique suitable for homogenous boundary conditions is developed for the injection of fluid into a channel. The ability of the method to compute high‐Reynolds number flows is demonstrated on a piston‐driven two‐dimensional flow. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

On streamline diffusion arising in Galerkin FEM with predictor/multi‐corrector time integration

In the present paper, the author shows that the predictor/multi‐corrector (PMC) time integration for the advection–diffusion equations induces numerical diffusivity acting only in the streamline direction, even though the equations are spatially discretized by the conventional Galerkin finite element method (GFEM). The transient 2‐D and 3‐D advection problems are solved with the PMC scheme using both the GFEM and the streamline upwind/Petrov Galerkin (SUPG) as the spatial discretization methods for comparison. The solutions of the SUPG‐PMC turned out to be overly diffusive due to the additional PMC streamline diffusion, while the solutions of the GFEM‐PMC were comparatively accurate without significant damping and phase error. A similar tendency was seen also in the quasi‐steady solutions to the incompressible viscous flow problems: 2‐D driven cavity flow and natural convection in a square cavity. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.