Numerical simulation of viscous oscillatory flow past four cylinders in square arrangement

The results of a numerical study of the viscous oscillating flow past four circular cylinders, for a constant frequency parameter equal to 50 and KC ranging between 0.2 and 10, are presented. The cylinders were placed on the vertices of a square, two sides of which were perpendicular and two parallel to the oncoming flow, for pitch ratios, P/D, ranging between 2 and 5. The finite-element method was employed for the solution of the Navier-Stokes equations, in the formulation where the stream function and the vorticity are the field variables, whereas the pressure distribution throughout the computational domain was obtained from the solution of Poisson’s equation. When the Keulegan-Carpenter number is lower than 4, the flow remains symmetrical with respect to the horizontal axis of symmetry of the solution domain and periodic at consecutive cycles. As KC increases to 4, the flow becomes aperiodic in different cycles, although symmetry with respect to the horizontal central line of the domain is preserved. For KC equal to 5, asymmetries appear intermittently in the flow, which are eventually amplified as KC increases still further. These asymmetries, in association with the aperiodicity of flow in different cycles, lead to an almost chaotic configuration as KC grows larger. For characteristic cases the flow pattern and the time histories of the in-line and transverse forces exerted on the cylinders are presented. The mean transverse forces acting on the cylinders, the r.m.s. values of the in-line and transverse forces, together with the drag and inertia coefficients of the in-line force, were evaluated for each pitch ratio in the range of Keulegan-Carpenter numbers examined and are presented in diagrams.     

Control of mean and fluctuating forces on a circular cylinder at high Reynolds numbers

A narrow strip is used to control mean and fluctuating forces on a circular cylinder at Reynolds numbers from 2.0 × 10⁴ to 1.0 × 10⁵. The axes of the strip and cylinder are parallel. The control parameters are strip width ratio and strip position characterized by angle of attack and distance from the cylinder. Wind tunnel tests show that the vortex shedding from both sides of the cylinder can be suppressed, and mean drag and fluctuating lift on the cylinder can be reduced if the strip is installed in an effective zone downstream of the cylinder. A phenomenon of mono-side vortex shedding is found. The strip-induced local changes of velocity profiles in the near wake of the cylinder are measured, and the relation between base suction and peak value in the power spectrum of fluctuating lift is studied. The control mechanism is then discussed from different points of view. The project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (10172087 and 10472124). The English text was polished by Yunming Chen.     

Application of local DFD method to simulate unsteady flows around an oscillating circular cylinder

In this paper, the recently proposed local domain‐free discretization (DFD) method is applied to simulate incompressible flows around an oscillating circular cylinder. It is found that it is very easy for the local DFD method to handle such moving boundary flow problems. This is because it does not need to move the mesh, which is indeed needed in traditional methods. Numerical experiments show that the present numerical results agree very well with the available data in the literature, and that the local DFD method is an effective tool for the computation of moving boundary flow problems. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Numerical investigation on vortex-induced vibration of an elastically mounted circular cylinder at low Reynolds number using the fictitious domain method

A direct numerical simulation of two-dimensional (2D) flow past an elastically mounted circular cylinder at low Reynolds number using the fictitious domain method had been undertaken. The cylinder motion was modelled by a two degree-of-freedom mass–spring–damper system. The computing code was verified against a benchmark problem in which flow past a stationary circular cylinder is simulated. Then, analyses of vortex-induced vibration (VIV) responses, drag and lift forces and the phase and vortex structures were carried out. Results show that the cylinder's non-dimensional cross-flow response amplitude reaches its summit of 0.572 in the ‘lock-in’ regime. The ‘2S’, instead of the ‘2P’, vortex shedding mode is dominated in the ‘lower’ branch for this 2D low-Re VIV. A secondary oscillation is observed in the lift force when ‘lock-in’ occurs. It is shown that this secondary component changes the phase, offset the energy input by the primary component and thus reduces the cylinder responses. Effects of the Skop–Griffin parameter on cylinder responses were also investigated.     

Effect of blockage on critical parameters for flow past a circular cylinder

The effect of location of the lateral boundaries, of the computational domain, on the critical parameters for the instability of the flow past a circular cylinder is investigated. Linear stability analysis of the governing equations for incompressible flows is carried out via a stabilized finite element method to predict the primary instability of the wake. The generalized eigenvalue problem resulting from the finite element discretization of the equations is solved using a subspace iteration method to get the most unstable eigenmode. Computations are carried out for a large range of blockage, 0.005?D/H ?0.125, where D is the diameter of the cylinder and H is the lateral width of the domain. A non‐monotonic variation of the critical Re with the blockage is observed. It is found that as the blockage increases, the critical Re for the onset of the instability first decreases and then increases. However, a monotonic increase in the non‐dimensional shedding frequency at the onset of instability, with increase in blockage, is observed. The increased blockage damps out the low‐frequency modes giving way to higher frequency modes. The blockage is found to play an important role in the scatter in the data for the non‐dimensional vortex shedding frequency at the onset of the instability, from various researchers in the past. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Numerical investigation of fluid flow past circular cylinder with multiple control rods at low Reynolds number

Laminar flow past a circular cylinder with multiple small-diameter control rods is numerically investigated in this study. The effects of rod-to-cylinder spacing ratio, rod and cylinder diameter ratio, cylinder Reynolds number, number of control rods and angle of attack on the hydrodynamics of the main circular cylinder are investigated. Four different flow regimes are identified based on the mechanism of lift and drag reduction. The range of rod-to-cylinder spacing ratio where significant force suppression can be achieved is found to become narrower as the Reynolds number increases in the laminar regime, but is insensitive to the diameter ratio. The numerical results for the case with six identical small control rods at Re=200 show that the lift fluctuation on the main cylinder can be suppressed significantly for a large range of spacing ratio and various diameter ratios, while the drag reduction on the main cylinder is also achieved simultaneously. The six-control-rod arrangement has shown better performance in flow control than the arrangements with less control rods, especially in terms of force reduction at various angles of attack.