Toward low‐noise synthetic turbulent inflow conditions for aeroacoustic calculations

The accuracy of boundary conditions for computational aeroacoustics is a well‐known challenge, due in part to the necessity of truncating the flow domain and replacing the analytical boundary conditions at infinity with numerical boundary conditions. In particular, the inflow boundary condition involving turbulent velocity or scalar fields is likely to introduce spurious waves into the domain, therefore degrading the flow behavior and deteriorating the physical acoustic waves. In this work, a method to generate low‐noise, divergence‐free, synthetic turbulence for inflow boundary conditions is proposed. It relies on the classical view of turbulence as a superposition of random eddies convected with the mean flow. Within the proposed model, the vector potential and the requirement that the individual eddies must satisfy the linearized momentum equations about the mean flow are used. The model is tested using isolated eddies convected through the inflow boundary and an experimental benchmark data for spatially decaying isotropic turbulence. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Scale resolving simulations of a high-temperature turbulent jet in a cold crossflow: Comparison of two approaches

A high-temperature turbulent jet in a cold crossflow is investigated with the help of two scale-resolving simulation approaches. This work aims at improving the methodologies used to predict the thermal footprint of exhaust gases issuing from helicopter engines onto the fuselage. Specific attention is brought to the capability of scale resolving simulations to correctly reproduce flow dynamics and turbulent mixing. Mean flow features, turbulent quantities and temperature fields are compared and validated against wind tunnel test measurements. In addition, the present work highlights the importance of synthetic turbulence injection at pipe inlet to obtain a fair prediction of both flow dynamics and temperature field.     

LES study of grid-generated turbulent inflow conditions with moderate number of mesh cells at low Re numbers

A passive grid-generated turbulence technique for generating turbulent inflow conditions in large-eddy simulation (LES) is developed on moderate number of mesh cells and the results are compared with synthetic methods and wind tunnel experiments performed at Reynolds (Re) number of order 100 (based on Taylor microscale). Consistent with previous investigations, it is found that the synthetic methods turbulence dissipate the turbulence kinetic energy very quickly while the present technique represents this decay more accurately. However, this pre-computation method usually requires considerable computational cost. The aim of this study is, therefore, to decrease the computational cost by employing a relatively coarse mesh resolution accompanied with an appropriate wall modelling approach in the solid boundary. The results are within an acceptable accuracy and, therefore, offer a cost-effective solution to generate inflow turbulence parameters for their use in different aerodynamic applications at low Re numbers.     

On the effect of inflow conditions in simulation of a turbulent round jet

This paper investigates the impact of the inflow conditions on simulations of a round jet discharging from a wall into a large space. The fluid dynamic characteristics of a round jet are studied numerically. A numerical method based on the control volume approach with collocated grid arrangement is employed. The k-e{k-\varepsilon} model is utilized to approximate turbulent stresses by considering six different inlet conditions. The velocity field is presented, and the rate of decay at the jet centerline is determined. The results showed that inflow conditions had a strong influence on the jet characteristics. This paper also investigates both sharp-edged and contoured nozzles. The effects of velocity, turbulence intensity, turbulence kinetic energy, and turbulence dissipation rate on flow field characteristics are examined. Results showed that the present simulations in both types of nozzles are in good agreement with experiments when considering the appropriate inflow conditions.     

Large Eddy Simulation of the sound field of a round turbulent jet

In this paper we will use Large Eddy Simulation (LES) to obtain the flow field of a turbulent round jet at a Reynolds number based on the jet orifice velocity of 11000. In the simulations it is assumed that the flow field is incompressible. The acoustic field of the jet is calculated with help of the Lighthill acoustic analogy. The coupling between the flow solver and the acoustic solver is discussed in detail. The Mach number used in the acoustic calculation was equal to 0.6. It is shown that the decay of the jet centerline velocity and centerline rms are in good agreement with experimental data of [12]. Furthermore, it is shown that the influence of the LES modeling on the acoustic field is very small, if the dynamic subgrid model is used.     

Computational modeling of turbulent mixing in a jet in crossflow

The jet in crossflow is a configuration of highest theoretical and practical importance, in which the turbulent mixing plays a major role. High-resolution measurements using Particle Image Velocimetry combined with Laser Induced Fluorescence have been conducted and used to validate simulations ranging from simple steady-state Reynolds-averaged Navier Stokes to sophisticated large-eddy simulation. The reasons for the erratic behavior of steady-state simulations in the given case, in which large-scale structures dominate the turbulent mixing, have been discussed. The analysis of intermittency proved to be an appropriate framework to account for the influence of these flow structures on the jet in crossflow, contributing to the explanation of the poor performance of the steady-state simulations.     

Generation of turbulent inflow and initial conditions based on multi‐correlated random fields

Direct or large eddy simulation of a turbulent flow field is strongly influenced by its initial or inflow boundary condition. This paper presents a new stochastic approach to generate an artificial turbulent velocity field for initial or inflow boundary condition based on digital filtering. Each velocity component of the artificial turbulent velocity field is generated by linear combination of individual uncorrelated random fields. These uncorrelated random fields are obtained by filtering random white‐noise fields. Using common elements in these linear combinations results in multi‐correlation among different velocity components. The generated velocity field reproduces locally desired Reynolds stress components and integral length scales including cross‐integral length scales. The method appears to be simple, flexible and more accurate in comparison with previously developed methods. The accuracy and performance of the method are demonstrated by numerical simulation of a homogeneous turbulent shear flow with high and low shear rates. To assess the accuracy and performance of the method, simulation results are compared with a reference simulation. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Unsteady phenomena of an oscillating turbulent jet flow inside a cavity: Effect of aspect ratio

Self-sustained oscillatory phenomena in confined flow may occur when a turbulent plane jet is discharging into a rectangular cavity. An experimental set-up was developed and the flow analysis has been made using mainly hot-wire measurements, which were complemented by visualisation data. Previous studies confirmed that periodic oscillations may occur, depending on the location of the jet exit nozzle inside the cavity, and also the distance between the side-walls. The present study deals with the symmetrical interaction between a turbulent plane jet and a rectangular cavity and the influence of the geometrical characteristics of the cavity on the oscillatory motion. The size and aspect ratio of the cavity were varied together with the jet width compared to that of the cavity. The study is carried out both numerically and experimentally. The numerical method solves the unsteady Reynolds averaged Navier–Stokes equations (URANS) together with the continuity equation for an incompressible fluid. The closure of the flow equations system is achieved using a two-scale energy-flux model at high Reynolds number in the core flow coupled with a wall function treatment in the vicinity of the wall boundaries. The fundamental frequency of the oscillatory flow was found to be practically independent of the cavity length. Moreover, the oscillations are attenuated as the cavity width increases, until they disappear for a critical value of the cavity width. Contour maps of the instantaneous flow field are drawn to show the flow pattern evolution at the main phases of oscillation. They are given for several aspect ratios of the cavity, keeping constant values for the cavity width and the jet thickness. The proposed approach may help to investigate further the oscillation mechanisms and the entrainment process occurring in pressure driven jet–cavity interactions.     

Second-moment closure and its use in modelling turbulent industrial flows

Second-moment turbulence models focus directly on the transport equations for the Reynolds stresses rather than supposing the stress and strain fields to be directly linked via an eddy viscosity. This elaboration enables the effects of complex strains and force fields on the turbulence structure to be better captured. The paper summarizes the principal modelling strategies adopted for the unknown processes in these equations and presents the forms that have been found most useful in engineering calculations. Methods adopted for overcoming significant problems of numerical instability and lack of convergence compared with eddy-viscosity-based schemes are also presented. Applications involving momentum and heat transfer in complex flows are drawn from the advanced technology sectors of the power generation and aircraft industries.     

Assessment of Reynolds stresses tensor reconstruction methods for synthetic turbulent inflow conditions. Application to hybrid RANS/LES methods

Hybrid or zonal RANS/LES approaches are recognized as the most promising way to accurately simulate complex unsteady flows under current computational limitations. One still open issue concerns the transition from a RANS to a LES or WMLES resolution in the stream-wise direction, when near wall turbulence is involved. Turbulence content has then to be prescribed at the transition to prevent from turbulence decay leading to possible flow relaminarization. The present paper aims to propose an efficient way to generate this switch, within the flow, based on a synthetic turbulence inflow condition, named Synthetic Eddy Method (SEM). As the knowledge of the whole Reynolds stresses is often missing, the scope of this paper is focused on generating the quantities required at the SEM inlet from a RANS calculation, namely the first and second order statistics of the aerodynamic field. Three different methods based on two different approaches are presented and their capability to accurately generate the needed aerodynamic values is investigated. Then, the ability of the combination SEM + Reconstruction method to manufacture well-behaved turbulence is demonstrated through spatially developing flat plate turbulent boundary layers. In the mean time, important intrinsic features of the Synthetic Eddy method are pointed out. The necessity of introducing, within the SEM, accurate data, with regards to the outer part of the boundary layer, is illustrated. Finally, user’s guidelines are given depending on the Reynolds number based on the momentum thickness, since one method is suitable for low Reynolds number while the second is dedicated to high ones with a transition located around Re_θ = 3000.     

A numerical experiment on the interaction between a film and a turbulent jet

This work is focused on the study of the impingement of a turbulent plane jet on a moving film. A computational fluid dynamics code has been used to simulate the interaction between the turbulent plane jet and the moving film. Since the problem of coupling between turbulence and free surface flow is poorly understood and experiments in this problem are difficult to carry out, this new numerical tool has been designed to give insight into global and local parameters of the free surface flow. To cite this article: D. Lacanette et al., C. R. Mecanique 333 (2005).     

Novel Implementation and Assessment of a Digital Filter Based Approach for the Generation of LES Inlet Conditions

A novel implementation of a digital filter based inlet condition generator for Large Eddy Simulation (LES) is presented. The effect of using spatially varying turbulence scales as inputs is investigated; it is found that this has impact on both accuracy and affordability, and has prompted the algorithm implementation changes described in the paper. LES of a channel flow with a periodically repeating constriction was used as a test case. The accuracy of the present simulation using a streamwise periodic boundary condition (PBC) was first established by comparison with a previously published highly resolved LES study. Post-processed statistics from the PBC simulation were then input into a Digital Filter Generator (DFG) algorithm. Three time series were created using the DFG for subsequent use as LES inlet conditions. In the first, as well as inputting the spatially varying first and second moments of the velocity field over the inlet plane from the PBC simulation, the turbulence scales input into the DFG were chosen to be spatially uniform with values specified by an area weighted average across the channel inlet height. In the second and third time-series, the turbulence scales were allowed to change in the wall normal direction, their variation again being deduced from the PBC simulation. These various time series were then used as inlet boundary conditions for LES prediction of the same flow case. Analysis of the results and comparison to the PBC predictions showed that the use of spatially varying turbulence scales increased the accuracy of the simulation in some important areas. However, the cost of generating unsteady inlet conditions using the DFG approach increased significantly with the use of spatially varying turbulence scales. Consequently, a new technique applied as part of the DFG approach is described (used as an ‘on the fly’ method), which significantly reduces the cost of generating LES inlet conditions, even when spatially non-uniform turbulent scales are used.     

Hybrid LES-RANS using synthesized turbulent fluctuations for forcing in the interface region

The main bottleneck in using Large Eddy Simulations at high Reynolds number is the requirement of very fine meshes near walls. One of the main reasons why hybrid LES-RANS was invented was to eliminate this limitation. In this method unsteady RANS (URANS) is used near walls and LES is used away from walls. The present paper evaluates a method for improving standard LES-RANS. The improvement consists of adding instantaneous turbulent fluctuations (forcing conditions) at the matching plane between the LES and URANS regions in order to trigger the equations to resolve turbulence. The turbulent fluctuations are taken from synthesized homogeneous turbulence assuming a modified von Kármán spectrum. Both isotropic and non-isotropic fluctuations are evaluated. The new approach is applied to fully developed channel flow and it is shown that the imposed fluctuations considerably improve the predictions. It is found that increasing the prescribed turbulent length scale of the synthesized turbulence provides excellent agreement with the classical log-law.     

Numerical investigation of turbulent free jet flows issuing from rectangular nozzles: the influence of small aspect ratio

In this research, the fluid and thermal characteristics of a rectangular turbulent jet flow is studied numerically. The results of three-dimensional jet issued from a rectangular nozzle are presented. A numerical method employing control volume approach with collocated grid arrangement was employed. Velocity and pressure fields are coupled with SIMPLEC algorithm. The turbulent stresses are approximated using k–e{\varepsilon} model with two different inlet conditions. The velocity and temperature fields are presented and the rates of their decay at the jet centerline are noted. The velocity vectors of the main flow and the secondary flow are illustrated. Also, effect of aspect ratio on mixing in rectangular cross-section jets is considered. The aspect ratios that were considered for this work were 1:1 to 1:4. The results showed that the jet entrains more with smaller AR. Special attention has been drawn to the influence of the Reynolds number (based on hydraulic diameter) as well as the inflow conditions on the evolution of the rectangular jet. An influence on the jet evolution is found for smaller Re, but the jet is close to a converged state for higher Reynolds numbers. The inflow conditions have considerable influence on the jet characteristics.     

Investigation on development of free-surface structures in turbulent liquid lithium flow

The liquid lithium film thickness facing the Deuterium beam of the International Fusion Material Irradiation Facility (IFMIF) determines the neutron flux to be generated. Hence, apart from its thickness also its spatio-temporal behaviour plays a decisive role in the performance of the target. Two aspects contributing to the free surface shape are the evolution of the viscous wall boundary layer in the nozzle and the development of turbulence downstream the nozzle exit, which are analysed here numerically by means of a fluid dynamic Large Eddy Simulation (LES). The numerical method is validated by experiments conducted at Osaka University with respect to mean and turbulent flow quantities in a broad spectrum of mean flow velocities. Thereby, both a qualitative and a quantitative agreement have been attained identifying different flow regimes and, moreover, allowing for a more refined, realistic IFMIF target prediction performance.     

Coherent structures in trailing-edge cooling and the challenge for turbulent heat transfer modelling

The present paper tests the capability of a standard Reynolds-Averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) turbulence model for predicting the turbulent heat transfer in a generic trailing-edge situation with a cutback on the pressure side of the blade. The model investigated uses a gradient-diffusion assumption with a scalar turbulent-diffusivity and constant turbulent Prandtl number. High-fidelity Large-Eddy Simulations (LES) were performed for three blowing ratios to provide reliable target data and the mean velocity and eddy viscosity as input for the heat transfer model testing. Reasonably good agreement between the LES and recent experiments was achieved for mean flow and turbulence statistics. The LES yielded coherent structures which were analysed, in particular with respect to their effect on the turbulent heat transfer. For increasing blowing ratio, the LES replicated an also experimentally observed counter-intuitive decrease of the cooling effectiveness caused by the coherent structures becoming stronger. In contrast, the RANS turbulent heat transfer model failed in predicting this behaviour and yielded significantly too high cooling effectiveness. It is shown that the model cannot predict the strong upstream and wall-directed turbulent heat fluxes caused by large coherent structures, which were found to be responsible for the counter-intuitive decrease of the cooling effectiveness.     

Progress in subgrid-scale transport modelling for continuous hybrid non-zonal RANS/LES simulations

The partially integrated transport modelling (PITM) method can be viewed as a continuous approach for hybrid RANS/LES modelling allowing seamless coupling between the RANS and the LES regions. The subgrid turbulence quantities are thus calculated from spectral equations depending on the varying spectral cutoff location [Schiestel, R., Dejoan, A., 2005. Towards a new partially integrated transport model for coarse grid and unsteady turbulent flow simulations. Theoretical and Computational Fluid Dynamics 18, 443–468; Chaouat, B., Schiestel, R., 2005. A new partially integrated transport model for subgrid-scale stresses and dissipation rate for turbulent developing flows. Physics of Fluids, 17 (6)] The PITM method can be applied to almost all statistical models to derive its hybrid LES counterpart. In the present work, the PITM version based on the transport equations for the turbulent Reynolds stresses together with the dissipation transport rate equation is now developed in a general formulation based on a new accurate energy spectrum function E(κ) valid in both large and small eddy ranges that allows to calibrate more precisely the c_sgs2 function involved in the subgrid dissipation rate _sgs transport equation. The model is also proposed here in an extended form which remains valid in low Reynolds number turbulent flows. This is achieved by considering a characteristic turbulence length-scale based on the total turbulent energy and the total dissipation rate taking into account the subgrid and resolved parts of the dissipation rate. These improvements allow to consider a large range of flows including various free flows as well as bounded flows. The present model is first tested on the decay of homogeneous isotropic turbulence by referring to the well known experiment of Comte-Bellot and Corrsin. Then, initial perturbed spectra E(κ) with a peak or a defect of energy are considered for analysing the model capabilities in strong non-equilibrium flow situations. The second test case is the classical fully turbulent channel flow that allows to assess the performance of the model in non-homogeneous flows characterised by important anisotropy effects. Different simulations are performed on coarse and refined meshes for checking the grid independence of solutions as well as the consistency of the subgrid-scale model when the filter width is changed. A special attention is devoted to the sharing out of the energy between the subgrid-scales and the resolved scales. Both the mean velocity and the turbulent stress computations are compared with data from direct numerical simulations.