A shape optimisation method of a body located in adiabatic flows

The purpose of this study is to derive an optimal shape of a body located in adiabatic flow. In this study, we use the equation of motion, the equation of continuity and the pressure–density relation derived from the Poisson’s law as the governing equation. The formulation is based on an optimal control theory in which a performance function of fluid force is taken into consideration. The performance function should be minimised satisfying the governing equations. This problem can be solved without constraints by using the adjoint equation with adjoint variables corresponding to the state equation. The performance function is defined by the drag and lift forces acting on the body. The weighted gradient method is applied as a minimisation technique, the Galerkin finite element method is used as a spatial discretisation and the implicit scheme is used as a temporal discretisation to solve the state equations. The mixed interpolation, the bubble function for velocity and the linear function for density, is employed as the interpolation. The optimal shape is obtained for a body in adiabatic flows.     

An implicit meshless method for application in computational fluid dynamics

An implicit meshless scheme is developed for solving the Euler equations, as well as the laminar and Reynolds‐averaged Navier–Stokes equations. Spatial derivatives are approximated using a least squares method on clouds of points. The system of equations is linearised, and solved implicitly using approximate, analytical Jacobian matrices and a preconditioned Krylov subspace iterative method. The details of the spatial discretisation, linear solver and construction of the Jacobian matrix are discussed; and results that demonstrate the performance of the scheme are presented for steady and unsteady two dimensional fluid flows. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Multidimensional upwind schemes for the shallow water equations

A multidimensional discretisation of the shallow water equations governing unsteady free-surface flow is proposed. The method, based on a residual distribution discretisation, relies on a characteristic eigenvector decomposition of each cell residual, and the use of appropriate distribution schemes. For uncoupled equations, multidimensional convection schemes on compact stencils are used, while for coupled equations, either system distribution schemes such as the Lax–Wendroff scheme or scalar schemes may be used. For steady subcritical flows, the equations can be partially diagonalised into a purely convective equation of hyperbolic nature, and a set of coupled equations of elliptic nature. The multidimensional discretisation, which is second-order-accurate at steady state, is shown to be superior to the standard Lax–Wendroff discretisation. For steady supercritical flows, the equations can be fully diagonalised into a set of convective equations corresponding to the steady state characteristics. Discontinuities such as hydraulic jumps, are captured in a sharp and non-oscillatory way. For unsteady flows, the characteristic equations remain coupled. An appropriate treatment of the coupling terms allows the discretisation of these equations at the scalar level. Although presently only first-order-accurate in space and time, the classical dam-break problem demonstrates the validity of the approach. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A computationally efficient 3D finite‐volume scheme for violent liquid–gas sloshing

We describe a semi‐implicit volume‐of‐fluid free‐surface‐modelling methodology for flow problems involving violent free‐surface motion. For efficient computation, a hybrid‐unstructured edge‐based vertex‐centred finite volume discretisation is employed, while the solution methodology is entirely matrix free. Pressures are solved using a matrix‐free preconditioned generalised minimum residual algorithm and explicit time‐stepping is employed for the momentum and interface‐tracking equations. The high resolution artificial compressive (HiRAC) volume‐of‐fluid method is used for accurate capturing of the free surface in violent flow regimes while allowing natural applicability to hybrid‐unstructured meshes. The code is parallelised for solution on distributed‐memory architectures and evaluated against 2D and 3D benchmark problems. Good parallel scaling is demonstrated, with almost linear speed‐up down to 6000 cells per core. Finally, the code is applied to an industrial‐type problem involving resonant excitation of a fuel tank, and a comparison with experimental results is made in this violent sloshing regime. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An efficient implicit unstructured finite volume solver for generalised Newtonian fluids

An implicit finite volume solver is developed for the steady-state solution of generalised Newtonian fluids on unstructured meshes in 2D. The pseudo-compressibility technique is employed to couple the continuity and momentum equations by transforming the governing equations into a hyperbolic system. A second-order accurate spatial discretisation is provided by performing a least-squares gradient reconstruction within each control volume of unstructured meshes. A central flux function is used for the convective terms and a solution jump term is added to the averaged component for the viscous terms. Global implicit time-stepping using successive evolution–relaxation is utilised to accelerate the convergence to steady-state solutions. The performance of our flow solver is examined for power-law and Carreau–Yasuda non-Newtonian fluids in different geometries. The effects of model parameters and Reynolds number are studied on the convergence rate and flow features. Our results verify second-order accuracy of the discretisation and also fast and efficient convergence to the steady-state solution for a wide range of flow variables.     

An application of Discontinuous Galerkin space and velocity discretisations to the solution of a model kinetic equation

An approach based on a Discontinuous Galerkin discretisation is proposed for the Bhatnagar–Gross–Krook model kinetic equation. This approach allows for a high-order polynomial approximation of molecular velocity distribution function both in spatial and velocity variables. It is applied to model one-dimensional normal shock wave and heat transfer problems. Convergence of solutions with respect to the number of spatial cells and velocity bins is studied, with the degree of polynomial approximation ranging from zero to four in the physical space variable and from zero to eight in the velocity variable. This approach is found to conserve mass, momentum and energy when high-degree polynomial approximations are used in the velocity space. For the shock wave problem, the solution is shown to exhibit accelerated convergence with respect to the velocity variable. Convergence with respect to the spatial variable is in agreement with the order of the polynomial approximation used. For the heat transfer problem, it was observed that convergence of solutions obtained by high-degree polynomial approximations is only second order with respect to the resolution in the spatial variable. This is attributed to the temperature jump at the wall in the solutions. The shock wave and heat transfer solutions are in excellent agreement with the solutions obtained by a conservative finite volume scheme.     

Regular wave integral approach to numerical simulation of radiation and diffraction of surface waves

A regular wave integral method is developed in the discretisation of a linear hydrodynamic problem on radiation and diffraction of surface waves by a floating or submerged body. The velocity potential of the problem is expressed as a solution of a body boundary integral equation involving the pulsating free surface Green function or pulsating free surface sources distributed on the body surface. With the use of a discretisation on the regular wave integral rather than discretisations on the singular wave integral of the Green function as in earlier investigations, the singular wave integral is approximated as an expansion of regular (or nonirregular) wave potentials. Influence coefficients between pulsating free surface source points are computed by the approximate expansion together with Hess–Smith panel integral formulas. Thus the velocity potential solution is evaluated by a boundary element algorithm. The numerical results produced from the proposed method agree well with semi-analytic solution results.     

Relaxation system based sub-grid scale modelling for large eddy simulation of Burgers' equation

An implicit sub-grid scale model for large eddy simulation is presented by utilising the concept of a relaxation system for one dimensional Burgers' equation in a novel way. The Burgers' equation is solved for three different unsteady flow situations by varying the ratio of relaxation parameter (ε) to time step. The coarse mesh results obtained with a relaxation scheme are compared with the filtered DNS solution of the same problem on a fine mesh using a fourth-order CWENO discretisation in space and third-order TVD Runge-Kutta discretisation in time. The numerical solutions obtained through the relaxation system have the same order of accuracy in space and time and they closely match with the filtered DNS solutions.     

A numerical method for 3D barotropic flows in turbomachinery

A numerical method for the simulation of 3D inviscid barotropic flows in rotating frames is presented. A barotropic state law incorporating a homogeneous-flow cavitation model is considered. The discretisation is based on a finite-volume formulation applicable to unstructured grids. A shock-capturing Roe-type upwind scheme is proposed for barotropic flows. The accuracy of the proposed method at low Mach numbers is ensured by ad-hoc preconditioning, preserving time consistency. An implicit time advancing only relying on the algebraic properties of the Roe flux function, and thus applicable to a variety of problems, is presented. The proposed numerical ingredients, already validated in a 1D context and applied to 3D non-rotating computations, are then applied to the 3D water flow around a typical turbopump inducer.     

A study of time integration schemes for the numerical modelling of free surface flows

A semi‐discrete finite element methodology for the modelling of transient free surface flows in the context of Eulerian interface capturing is proposed. The focus of this study is put on the choice of an appropriate time integration strategy for the accurate modelling of the dynamics of free surfaces and of interfacial physics. It is composed of an adaptive time integration scheme for the Navier–Stokes equations, and of the implicit midpoint rule for the transport equation of the Eulerian marker variable. The adaptive scheme allows the automatic determination of a time‐step size that follows the physics of the problem under study, which facilitates the accurate modelling of stiff free surface flows. It is shown that the implicit midpoint rule reduces mass loss for each fluid. Various free surface flow problems are studied to verify and validate the proposed time integration strategy. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Numerical solutions of systems with (p,δ)‐structure using local discontinuous Galerkin finite element methods

In this paper, we present LDG methods for systems with (p,δ)‐structure. The unknown gradient and the nonlinear diffusivity function are introduced as auxiliary variables and the original (p,δ) system is decomposed into a first‐order system. Every equation of the produced first‐order system is discretized in the discontinuous Galerkin framework, where two different nonlinear viscous numerical fluxes are implemented. An a priori bound for a simplified problem is derived. The ODE system resulting from the LDG discretization is solved by diagonal implicit Runge–Kutta methods. The nonlinear system of algebraic equations with unknowns the intermediate solutions of the Runge–Kutta cycle is solved using Newton and Picard iterative methodology. The performance of the two nonlinear solvers is compared with simple test problems. Numerical tests concerning problems with exact solutions are performed in order to validate the theoretical spatial accuracy of the proposed method. Further, more realistic numerical examples are solved in domains with non‐smooth boundary to test the efficiency of the method. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Three‐dimensional transient Navier–Stokes solvers in cylindrical coordinate system based on a spectral collocation method using explicit treatment of the pressure

A spectral collocation method is developed for solving the three‐dimensional transient Navier–Stokes equations in cylindrical coordinate system. The Chebyshev–Fourier spectral collocation method is used for spatial approximation. A second‐order semi‐implicit scheme with explicit treatment of the pressure and implicit treatment of the viscous term is used for the time discretization. The pressure Poisson equation enforces the incompressibility constraint for the velocity field, and the pressure is solved through the pressure Poisson equation with a Neumann boundary condition. We demonstrate by numerical results that this scheme is stable under the standard Courant–Friedrichs–Lewy (CFL) condition, and is second‐order accurate in time for the velocity, pressure, and divergence. Further, we develop three accurate, stable, and efficient solvers based on this algorithm by selecting different collocation points in r‐, ? ‐, and z‐directions. Additionally, we compare two sets of collocation points used to avoid the axis, and the numerical results indicate that using the Chebyshev Gauss–Radau points in radial direction to avoid the axis is more practical for solving our problem, and its main advantage is to save the CPU time compared with using the Chebyshev Gauss–Lobatto points in radial direction to avoid the axis. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

High-order ALE method for the Navier–Stokes equations on a moving hybrid unstructured mesh using flux reconstruction method

The flux reconstruction (FR) formulation can unify several popular discontinuous basis high-order methods for fluid dynamics, including the discontinuous Galerkin method, in a simple, efficient form. An arbitrary Lagrangian–Eulerian (ALE) extension to the high-order FR scheme is developed here for moving mesh fluid flow problems. The ALE Navier–Stokes equations are derived by introducing a grid velocity. The conservation law are spatially discretised on hybrid unstructured meshes using Huynh’s scheme (Huynh 2007) on anisotropic elements (quadrilaterals) and using Correction Procedure via Reconstruction scheme on isotropic elements (triangles). The temporal discretisation uses both explicit and implicit treatments. The mesh movement is described by node positions given as a time series, instead of an analytical formula. The geometric conservation law is tested using free stream preservation problem. An isentropic vortex propagation test case is performed to show the high-order accuracy of the developed method on both moving and fixed hybrid meshes. Flow around an oscillating cylinder shows the capability of the method to solve moving boundary viscous flow problems, with the numeric method further verified by comparison of the result on a smoothly deforming mesh and a rigid moving mesh.     

An implicit pseudo‐spectral multi‐domain method for the simulation of incompressible flows

A pseudo‐spectral method for the solution of incompressible flow problems based on an iterative solver involving an implicit treatment of linearized convective terms is presented. The method allows the treatment of moderately complex geometries by means of a multi‐domain approach and it is able to cope with non‐constant fluid properties and non‐orthogonal problem domains. In addition, the fully implicit scheme yields improved stability properties as opposed to semi‐implicit schemes commonly employed. Key components of the method are a Chebyshev collocation discretization, a special pressure–correction scheme, and a restarted GMRES method with a preconditioner derived from a fast direct solver. The performance of the proposed method is investigated by considering several numerical examples of different complexity, and also includes comparisons to alternative solution approaches based on finite‐volume discretizations. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

On relaxation times in the Navier-Stokes-Voigt model

We study analytically and numerically the relaxation time of flow evolution governed by the Navier-Stokes-Voigt (NSV) model. We first show that for the Taylor–Green vortex decay problem, NSV admits an exact solution which evolves slower than true fluid flow. Secondly, we show numerically for a channel flow test problem using standard discretisation methods that although NSV provides more regular solutions compared to usual Navier-Stokes solutions, NSV approximations take significantly longer to reach the steady state.     

A non-intrusive methodology for the representation of crack growth stochastic processes

In this paper, we present a methodology to pursue the uncertainty quantification of the stochastic process that represents the crack growth problem. The main idea of this methodology is to discretize the crack growth process in a sequence of random variables and then, approximate each of them using a stochastic polynomial approach. This methodology is non-intrusive, i.e. it is based on the representation of random variables using stochastic polynomials, whose coefficients are evaluated using a least squares method and only a few realizations of the stochastic process. The Paris–Erdogan law was used as crack growth model in order to focus the reader's attention on the uncertainty quantification methodology. We modeled the parameters of the Paris–Erdogan law as random variables, i.e. the initial crack length and the coefficients of the Paris–Erdogan model are treated as random variables. Two numerical examples are presented in order to shown the effectiveness and accuracy of the proposed methodology. From the results of these examples, it is shown that the proposed methodology is able to successfully approximate the stochastic process that represents the crack growth for the Paris–Erdogan model, with a much lower computational cost than the MCS. The main limitation of the proposed approach is that, in the form it was presented, it is not able to handle random processes as input parameters.     

A spectral solver for the Navier–Stokes equations in the velocity–vorticity formulation

A numerical algorithm intended for the study of flows in a cylindrical container under laminar flow conditions is proposed. High resolution of the flow field, governed by the Navier–Stokes equations in velocity–vorticity formulation relative to a cylindrical frame of reference, is achieved through spatial discretisation by means of the spectral method. This method is based on a Fourier expansion in the azimuthal direction and an expansion in Chebyshev polynomials in the (nonperiodic) radial and axial directions. Several regularity constraints are used to take care of the coordinate singularity. These constraints are implemented, together with the boundary conditions at the top, bottom and mantle of the cylinder, via the tau method. The a priori unknown boundary values of the vorticity are evaluated by means of the influence-matrix technique. The compatibility between the mathematical and numerical formulation of the Navier–Stokes equations is established through a tau-correction procedure. The resolved flow field exhibits high-precision satisfaction of the incompressibility constraints for velocity and vorticity and the definition of the vorticity. The performance of the solver is illustrated by resolution of several configurations representative of generic three-dimensional laminar flows.     

From h to p efficiently: optimal implementation strategies for explicit time‐dependent problems using the spectral/hp element method

We investigate the relative performance of a second‐order Adams–Bashforth scheme and second‐order and fourth‐order Runge–Kutta schemes when time stepping a 2D linear advection problem discretised using a spectral/hp element technique for a range of different mesh sizes and polynomial orders. Numerical experiments explore the effects of short (two wavelengths) and long (32 wavelengths) time integration for sets of uniform and non‐uniform meshes. The choice of time‐integration scheme and discretisation together fixes a CFL limit that imposes a restriction on the maximum time step, which can be taken to ensure numerical stability. The number of steps, together with the order of the scheme, affects not only the runtime but also the accuracy of the solution. Through numerical experiments, we systematically highlight the relative effects of spatial resolution and choice of time integration on performance and provide general guidelines on how best to achieve the minimal execution time in order to obtain a prescribed solution accuracy. The significant role played by higher polynomial orders in reducing CPU time while preserving accuracy becomes more evident, especially for uniform meshes, compared with what has been typically considered when studying this type of problem.© 2014. The Authors. International Journal for Numerical Methods in Fluids published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.