Time-dependent natural convection in a square cavity: Application of a new finite volume method

A new finite volume (FV) approach with adaptive upwind convection is used to predict the two-dimensional unsteady flow in a square cavity. The fluid is air and natural convection is induced by differentially heated vertical walls. The formulation is made in terms of the vorticity and the integral velocity (induction) law. Biquadratic interpolation formulae are used to approximate the temperature and vorticity fields over the finite volumes, to which the conservation laws are applied in integral form. Image vorticity is used to enforce the zero-penetration condition at the cavity walls. Unsteady predictions are carried sufficiently forward in time to reach a steady state. Results are presented for a Prandtl number (Pr) of 0-71 and Rayleigh numbers equal to 10³, 10⁴ and 10⁵. Both 11 × 11 and 21 × 21 meshes are used. The steady state predictions are compared with published results obtained using a finite difference (FD) scheme for the same values of Pr and Ra and the same meshes, as well as a numerical bench-mark solution. For the most part the FV predictions are closer to the bench-mark solution than are the FD predictions.     

An efficient Legendre-Galerkin spectral method for the natural convection in two-dimensional cavities

An efficient numerical method is developed for solving the natural convection in two-dimensional cavities. The numerical scheme is proposed by using second-order projection scheme in time direction and Legendre-spectral in spatial variable of the incompressible flow. Finally, a series of numerical examples are presented to demonstrate the efficiency of our algorithm. The numerical strategies developed in this article could be readily applied to study other incompressible fluid problems.     

Galerkin technique based on beam functions in application to the parametric instability of thermal convection in a vertical slot

A Fourier–Galerkin spectral technique for solving coupled higher‐order initial‐boundary value problems is developed. Conjugated systems arising in thermoconvection that involve both equations of fourth and second spatial orders are considered. The set of so‐called beam functions is used as basis together with the harmonic functions. The necessary formulas for expressing each basis system into series with respect to the other are derived. The convergence rate of the spectral solution series is thoroughly investigated and shown to be fifth‐order algebraic for both linear and nonlinear problems. Though algebraic, the fifth‐order rate of convergence is fully adequate for the generic problems under consideration, which makes the new technique a useful tool in numerical approaches to convective problems. An algorithm is created for the implementation of the method and the results are thoroughly tested and verified on different model examples. The spatial and temporal approximation of the scheme is tested. To further validate the scheme, a singular asymptotic expansion is derived for small values of the modulation frequency and amplitude and the numerical and analytic results are found to be in good agreement. The new technique is applied to the G‐jitter flow, and the Floquet stability diagrams are produced. We obtain the expected alternating isochronous and subharmonic branches and find that stable motions are always isochronous while unstable motions can be either isochronous or subharmonic. The numerical investigation also leads to novel conclusions regarding the dependence of the amplitude of the solutions on some of the governing parameters. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Investigation of low-intensity convection regimes in a rectangular cavity with a heat flux on the boundary

The characteristics of heat transfer during natural thermogravitational fluid convection of low intensity in a rectangular cavity heated from below (cooled from above) are investigated. Local convection effects are studied. The dependence of local superheating (supercooling) on the Grashof number and the cavity side ratio is found for single-, two-and three-vortex steady motions. The limits of the convection regimes are estimated.     

A spectral solution of the magneto‐convection equations in spherical geometry

A fully three‐dimensional solution of the magneto‐convection equations—the nonlinearly coupled momentum, induction and temperature equations—is presented in spherical geometry. Two very different methods for solving the momentum equation are presented, corresponding to the limits of slow and rapid rotation, and their relative advantages and disadvantages are discussed. The possibility of including a freely rotating, finitely conducting inner core in the solution of the momentum and induction equations is also discussed. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Simulation of natural convection melting in a cavity with fin using lattice Boltzmann method

In this study, a numerical investigation of melting phenomenon with natural convection in a cavity with fin has been performed using enthalpy‐based lattice Boltzmann method. The lattice D2Q9 model was applied to determine the density and velocity fields, and the D2Q5 model for the temperature field. The effect of vertical position and length of the fin on the melting rate was studied. The simulations were carried out for Stefan number of 10, Rayleigh number of 10 ⁵ and relative thermal conductivity (k_fin∕k_fluid) ranging from 5 to 30. The obtained results show that the rate of melting increases when the relative thermal conductivity and the length of the fin become greater. We also found that the variation of vertical position of the fin from bottom to middle has an insignificant effect on melting while it causes the increase of full melting time when the fin is mounted on the top of the cavity. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Mass and heat transfer by natural convection in a vertical cavity

This paper reports a fundamental study of laminar natural convection in a rectangular enclosure with heat and mass transfer from the side, when the bouyancy effect is due to density variations caused by either temperature or concentration variations. In the first part of the study scale analysis is used to determine the scales of the flow, temperature and concentration fields in boundary layer flow for all values of Prandtl and Lewis numbers. In particular, scale analysis shows that in the extreme case where the flow is driven by bouyancy due to temperature variations, the ratio of mass transfer rate divided by heat transfer rate scales as $\text{Le}{}^{\mathrm{<mtext>1</mtext><mtext>2</mtext>}}$ only if (Pr > 1, Le < 1) or (Pr < 1, Sc < 1), and as $\text{Le}{}^{\mathrm{<mtext>1</mtext><mtext>3</mtext>}}$ if (Pr > 1, Le > 1) or (Pr < 1, Sc > 1). In the second part of the study, the boundary layer scales derived in the first part are used to determine the heat and mass transport characteristics of a vertical slot filled with fluid. Criteria for the existence of distinct thermal and concentration boundary layers in the slot are determined. Numerical solutions for the flow and concentration fields in a slot without distinct thermal boundary layers are reported. These solutions support further the method of scale analysis employed in the first part of the study     

Numerical simulation of natural and mixed convection flows by Galerkin‐characteristic method

A numerical investigation is performed to study the solution of natural and mixed convection flows by Galerkin‐characteristic method. The method is based on combining the modified method of characteristics with a Galerkin finite element discretization in primitive variables. It can be interpreted as a fractional step technique where convective part and Stokes/Boussinesq part are treated separately. The main feature of the proposed method is that, due to the Lagrangian treatment of convection, the Courant–Friedrichs–Lewy (CFL) restriction is relaxed and the time truncation errors are reduced in the Stokes/Boussinesq part. Numerical simulations are carried out for a natural convection in squared cavity and for a mixed convection flow past a circular cylinder. The computed results are compared with those obtained using other Eulerian‐based Galerkin finite element solvers, which are used for solving many convective flow models. The Galerkin‐characteristic method has been found to be feasible and satisfactory. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The numerical solution of the unsteady natural convection flow in a square cavity at high Rayleigh number using SADI method

The unsteady natural convection flow in a square cavity at high Rayleigh number Ra=10 ⁷ and 2×10 ⁷ has been computed using cubic spline integration. The required solutions to the two dimensional Navier-Stokes and energy equations have been obtained using two alternate numerical formulations on non-uniform grids. The main features of the transient flow have been briefly discussed. The results obtained by using the present method are in good agreement with the theoretical predictions ^[1,2].The steady state results have been compared with accurate solutions presented recently for Ra=10 ⁷.     

Magnetic control of natural convection in the horizontal Bridgman configuration using a spectral method: transversal plan

The present study investigates the electromagnetic braking of buoyancy convective flows occurring in differentially heated cavities, filled with low Prandtl, dilute, incompressible and electrically conducting alloys, and subjected to a constant horizontal temperature gradient. In practice, such flows known as ‘Hadley circulation’ are relevant in material processing technologies, such as the horizontal Bridgman configuration. A collocation spectral numerical method is developed to solve the two-dimensional Navier–Stokes equations, modelling the flow phenomena occurring in such configurations, using a vorticity–stream function formulation. The two components of the velocity are deduced from the stream function and the temperature distribution is obtained through the resolution of the energy conservation equation. The results in terms of velocity and temperature distributions for a given Grashof number are obtained for various Hartmann numbers and show that as the Hartmann number increases, the electromagnetic braking of the flow is observed. Moreover, the results illustrate the changes affecting the flow structure which becomes quasi-parallel in the core region of the cavity for sufficiently high values of Ha and the onset of the Hartmann and parallel layers along the boundaries. Also, with increasing Ha, the isotherms are less affected by the convective flow and become parallel to the vertical walls indicating that heat transfer is mainly achieved by conduction.     

Lattice Boltzmann simulation of MHD natural convection in a cavity with porous media and sinusoidal temperature distribution

The lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) is used to simulate the effect of magnetic field on the natural convection in a porous cavity. The sidewalls of the cavity are heated sinusoidally with a phase derivation, whereas the top and bottom walls are thermally insulated. Numerical simulation is performed, and the effects of the pertinent parameters, e.g., the Hartmann number, the porosity, the Darcy number, and the phase deviation, on the fluid flow and heat transfer are investigated. The results show that the heat transfer is affected by the temperature distribution on the sidewalls clearly. When the Hartmann number is 0, the maximum average Nusselt number is obtained at the phase deviation 90°. Moreover, the heat transfer enhances when the Darcy number and porosity increase, while decreases when the Hartman number increases.     

Numerical simulation of MHD natural convection flow in a wavy cavity filled by a hybrid Cu-Al_2O_3-water nanofluid with discrete heating

We consider the combined effect of the magnetic field and heat transfer inside a square cavity containing a hybrid nanofluid(Cu-Al_2O_3-water). The upper and bottom walls of the cavity have a wavy shape. The temperature of the vertical walls is lower,the third part in the middle of the bottom wall is kept at a constant higher temperature,and the remaining parts of the bottom wall and the upper wall are thermally insulated.The magnetic field is applied under the angle γ, an opposite clockwise direction. For the numerical simulation, the finite element technique is employed. The ranges of the characteristics are as follows: the Rayleigh number(10~3≤Ra≤10~5), the Hartmann number(0≤Ha≤100), the nanoparticle hybrid concentration(?_(Al_2O_3),?_(Cu) = 0, 0.025, 0.05),the magnetic field orientation(0≤γ≤2π), and the Prandtl number P_r, the amplitude of wavy cavity A, and the number of waviness n are fixed at P_r = 7, A = 0.1, and n = 3, respectively. The comparison with a reported finding in the open literature is done,and the data are observed to be in very good agreement. The effects of the governing parameters on the energy transport and fluid flow parameters are studied. The results prove that the increment of the magnetic influence determines the decrease of the energy transference because the conduction motion dominates the fluid movement. When the Rayleigh number is raised, the Nusselt number is increased, too. For moderate Rayleigh numbers, the maximum ratio of the heat transfer takes place for the hybrid nanofluid and then the Cu-nanofluid, followed by the Al_2O_3-nanofluid. The nature of motion and energy transport parameters has been scrutinized.     

封闭水平矩形腔内流体自然对流第一次逆叉形分岔的数值研究

本文采用二阶全展开ETG(Euler-Taylor-Galerkin)分裂步有限元方法,对长宽比为3.5(L/B=3.5,如图 1所示)的封闭矩形腔体内,三种Pr数条件下,定常层流范围内,流体自然对流叉形分岔随Rayleigh数的演化过程进行了数值模拟。研究结果表明,该矩形腔内对应三种Pr数条件下,流体的叉形分岔的演化过程中,在第二次模态Ⅱ型叉形分岔之后,均会出现两个较小尺度涡旋合并,突变为一个较大尺度涡旋的全新叉形分岔模态。即在某临界Ra数两侧,存在定常四涡结构和定常三涡结构两个定常解支,当系统控制参数Ra越过临界值,前者被后者突发性取代,这是完全不同于传统叉形分岔的逆叉形分岔。其数值预报,则采用分半法结合流动拓扑结构及典型截面处速度扩线上鞍点的变化来确定。计算结果表明,在计算的Pr数条件下,随Pr数的增加逆叉形分岔对应临界Ra数的取值也会提高。     

封闭方腔内空气和水自然对流每一次分岔数值预报

采用二阶全展开ETG分裂步有限元方法,通过对流动拓扑的详细分析,在排除网格密度影响的基础上,结合二分法给出封闭方腔内空气和水两种典型流体自然对流发生第一次分岔时的临界Rayleigh数。计算结果表明,该方法可用于进行不同Prandtl数条件下方腔内自然对流流动第一次分岔的数值预报,可作为后续各阶分岔及转捩数值预报研究的基础。在相应的条件下,封闭方腔内空气比水更容易发生分岔,且空气的流动结构相对于水表现出一定的倾斜性。     

A boundary layer analysis of combined heat and mass transfer by natural convection from a concentrated source in a saturated porous medium

A boundary layer analysis was carried out to investigate the coupled phenomena of heat and mass transfer by natural convection from concentrated heat and mass sources embedded in saturated porous media. Both line and point source problems were treated. The boundary layer equations based on Darcy's law and Boussinesq approximation were solved by means of similarity transformation to obtain the details of velocity, temperature and concentration distributions above a concentrated heat source. Two important parameters, namely the Lewis number Le and the buoyancy ratioN were identified to conduct a series of numerical integrations. For the case of small Le, a substance diffuses further away from the plume centerline, such that the mass transfer influences both velocity and temperature profiles over a wide range. For large Le, on the other hand, the substance diffuses within a narrow range along the centerline. Naturally, the influence of mass transfer is limited to the level of the centerline velocity, so that a peaky velocity profile appears for positiveN whereas a velocity defect emerges along the centerline for negativeN. For such cases of large Le, the temperature profiles are found to be fairly insensitive to Le.     

Efficient computation of natural convection in a concentric annulus between an outer square cylinder and an inner circular cylinder

In this work, the natural convection in a concentric annulus between a cold outer square cylinder and a heated inner circular cylinder is simulated using the differential quadrature (DQ) method. The vorticity‐stream function formulation is used as the governing equation, and the coordinate transformation technique is introduced in the DQ computation. It is shown in this paper that the outer square boundary can be approximated by a super elliptic function. As a result, the coordinate transformation from the physical domain to the computational domain is set up by an analytical expression, and all the geometrical parameters can be computed exactly. Numerical results for Rayleigh numbers range from 104 to 106 and aspect ratios between 1.67 and 5.0 are presented, which are in a good agreement with available data in the literature. It is found that both the aspect ratio and the Rayleigh number are critical to the patterns of flow and thermal fields. The present study suggests that a critical aspect ratio may exist at high Rayleigh number to distinguish the flow and thermal patterns. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Natural convection in porous media—dual reciprocity boundary element method solution of the Darcy model

This paper describes the solution of a steady state natural convection problem in porous media by the dual reciprocity boundary element method (DRBEM). The boundary element method (BEM) for the coupled set of mass, momentum, and energy equations in two dimensions is structured by the fundamental solution of the Laplace equation. The dual reciprocity method is based on augmented scaled thin plate splines. Numerical examples include convergence studies with different mesh size, uniform and non‐uniform mesh arrangement, and constant and linear boundary field discretizations for differentially heated rectangular cavity problems at filtration with Rayleigh numbers of Ra*=25, 50, and 100 and aspect ratios of A=1/2, 1, and 2. The solution is assessed by comparison with reference results of the fine mesh finite volume method (FVM). Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Conjugate natural convection from an array of discrete heat sources: part 1 — two- and three-dimensional model validation

Two- and three-dimensional (2- and 3-D) numerical models have been developed for conjugate natural convection in a discretely heated cavity. Experimental results obtained for the same geometry, using water and FC-77 as the coolants, were in excellent agreement with the 3-D numerical predictions. In contrast, because of the inability to account for thermal spreading in the lateral direction, the 2-D model overpredicted measured average surface temperatures of the discrete heat sources. However, the 2-D model still predicted general trends and flow patterns that were experimentally obtained. The nature and extent of 3-D effects on the flow and heat transfer have been delineated.