Isolating curvature effects in computing wall-bounded turbulent flows

An adjoint optimization method is utilized to design an inviscid outer wall shape required for a turbulent flow field solution of the So–Mellor convex curved wall experiment using the Navier–Stokes equations. The associated cost function is the desired pressure distribution on the inner wall. Using this optimized wall shape with a Navier–Stokes method, the abilities of various turbulence models to simulate the effects of curvature without the complicating factor of streamwise pressure gradient are evaluated. The one-equation Spalart–Allmaras (SA) turbulence model overpredicts eddy viscosity, and its boundary layer profiles are too full. A curvature-corrected version of this model improves results, which are sensitive to the choice of a particular constant. An explicit algebraic stress model does a reasonable job predicting this flow field. However, results can be slightly improved by modifying the assumption on anisotropy equilibrium in the model's derivation. The resulting curvature-corrected explicit algebraic stress model (EASM) possesses no heuristic functions or additional constants. It slightly lowers the computed skin friction coefficient and the turbulent stress levels for this case, in better agreement with experiment. The effect on computed velocity profiles is minimal.     

Invariant analysis of the Reynolds stress tensor for a nuclear fuel assembly with spacer grid and split type vanes

Invariant analysis of the Reynolds stress tensor anisotropy can give an accurate and deep intuitive understanding of the turbulent structure of a turbulent flow. Lumley's triangle has proven to be a powerful representation of the invariant analysis of the second-order statistics collection provided by the Reynolds stress tensor. In the present work the spectral element code Nek5000 has been used to investigate the turbulent structure of the flow across a pressurized water reactor spacer grid with split type mixing vanes. Wall-resolved large eddy simulation of the flow in a prototypical rod bundle geometry at Re = 14,000 and P/D = 1.32 are performed and validated against particle image velocimetry data. The results are then used to perform an in-depth invariant analysis. The results show a reorganization of the Reynolds stresses components in the downstream region of the spacer grid. The mixing vanes orientation produces a symmetric behavior between sub-channels. The turbulent structure in the fully developed region has the typical behavior of fully-developed channel flow turbulence. When averaging the state across regions of the sub-channels, we observed a transition from disk-like turbulence in the mixing vanes region to rod-like turbulence in the fully developed region.     

Simulation of the Effect of the Freestream Turbulence Parameters on Heat Transfer in an Unsteady Boundary Layer

A variant of the two-parameter turbulence model which makes it possible continuously to calculate a flow region with laminar, transition and turbulent regimes is proposed for investigating the flow under conditions of high freestream turbulence intensity. It is shown that the properties of the thermal transition can be theoretically described using the quasi-steady turbulence model in the case of periodic freestream velocity distribution. The numerical results are compared with theoretical and experimental data. The approach proposed is developed for determining the combined effect of the parameters of harmonic fluctuations of the external velocity and freestream turbulence on the heat transfer characteristics on a flat plate with different boundary conditions for the enthalpy.     

Hybrid URANS/LES Turbulence Simulation of Vortex Shedding Behind a Triangular Flameholder

In this study a detached eddy simulation (DES) model, which belongs to the group of hybrid URANS/LES turbulence models, is used for the simulation of vortex shedding behind a triangular obstacle. In the near wall region or in regions where the grid resolution is not sufficiently fine to resolve smaller structures, the two-equation RANS shear-stress transport (SST) model is used. In the other regions with higher grid resolution a LES model, which uses a transport equation for the turbulent subgrid energy, is applied. The DES model is first investigated for two standard test cases, namely decaying homogeneous isotropic turbulence and the backward facing step, respectively. For the decaying homogeneous isotropic turbulence test case the evolution of the energy spectra in wavenumber space for different times are studied for both the DES and a Smagorinsky type LES model. Different grid resolutions are analyzed with a special emphasis on the modeling constant connecting the filter length scale to the grid size. The results are compared to experimental data. The backward facing step test case is used to study the model behavior for a case with a transition region between a RANS modeling approach close to the wall and LES based modeling in the intense shear flow region. The final application is the simulation of the vortex shedding behind a triangular obstacle. First, the influence of the inlet condition formulation is studied in detail as they can have a significant influence especially for LES based models. Detailed comparisons between simulation and experiment for the flow structure past the obstacle and statistical quantities such as the shedding frequency are shown. Finally the additional temporal and spatial information provided by the DES model is used to show the predicted anisotropy of turbulence.     

Numerical simulation of compressible turbulent flow via improved gas‐kinetic BGK scheme

In order to solve compressible turbulent flow problems, this study focuses on incorporating the Spalart–Allmaras turbulence model into gas‐kinetic BGK (Bhatnagar–Gross–Krook) scheme. The Spalart–Allmaras turbulence model is solved using finite difference discretization. The variables on the cell interface are interpolated via the van Leer limiter in the reconstruction stage. Simulation of subsonic and transonic flow over a NACA0012 airfoil has been implemented using two‐dimensional body‐fitted grids. The numerical results obtained appear in good agreement with the AGARD results, demonstrating the effectiveness and usefulness of the strategy of coupling the Spalart–Allmaras turbulence model with the BGK scheme for compressible turbulent flow simulation. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Numerical simulations of non‐equilibrium turbulent boundary layer flowing over a bump

Large‐eddy simulation (LES) and Reynolds‐averaged Navier–Stokes simulation (RANS) with different turbulence models (including the standard k?ε, the standard k?ω, the shear stress transport k?ω (SST k?ω), and Spalart–Allmaras (S–A) turbulence models) have been employed to compute the turbulent flow of a two‐dimensional turbulent boundary layer over an unswept bump. The predictions of the simulations were compared with available experimental measurements in the literature. The comparisons of the LES and the SST k?ω model including the mean flow and turbulence stresses are in satisfied agreements with the available measurements. Although the flow experiences a strong adverse pressure gradient along the rear surface, the boundary layer is unique in that intermittent detachment occurring near the wall. The numerical results indicate that the boundary layer is not followed by mean‐flow separation or incipient separation as shown from the numerical results. The resolved turbulent shear stress is in a reasonable agreement with the experimental data, though the computational result of LES shows that its peak is overpredicted near the trailing edge of the bump, while the other used turbulence models, except the standard k?ε, underpredicts it. Analysis of the numerical results from LES confirms the experimental data, in which the existence of internal layers over the bump surface upstream of the summit and along the downstream flat plate. It also demonstrates that the quasi‐step increase in skin friction is due to perturbations in pressure gradient. The surface curvature enhances the near‐wall shear production of turbulent stresses, and is responsible for the formation of the internal layers. The aim of the present work is to examine the response and prediction capability of LES with the dynamic eddy viscosity model as a sub‐grid scale to the complex turbulence structure with the presence of streamline curvature generated by a bumpy surface. Aiming to reduce the computational costs with focus on the mean behavior of the non‐equilibrium turbulent boundary layer of flow over the bump surface, the present investigation also explains the best capability of one of the used RANS turbulence models to capture the driving mechanism for the surprisingly rapid return to equilibrium over the trailing flat plate found in the measurements. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Turbulent Transition in the Inlet Region of a Circular Pipe

Calculated and experimental data on turbulent transition in a circular pipe are analyzed. The calculations were performed using the three-parameter turbulence model. The dependence of the distance from the inlet to the point of minimum friction during transition on the Reynolds number for fixed inlet conditions and the distribution of the turbulence parameters over the pipe length and radius are obtained. The dependence of the maximum (critical) Reynolds number, Re^*, for which there is no transition in the pipe, on the inlet intensity and scale of turbulence is found. It is suggested that Re^* depends on the inlet perturbation parameters up to Re^* = 1000, where the friction coefficients for laminar and turbulent flows coincide.     

Modeling the Effect of Freestream Turbulence on Unsteady Boundary Layer Flow

We present a new version of the two-equation turbulence model, which makes it possible to calculate continuously the entire flow range from laminar to turbulent, including transition, in the case of a time-periodic, high-turbulence-level freestream. The influence of the parameters characterizing the harmonic fluctuations of the external velocity and the freestream turbulence intensity and scale on the parameters of the flat-plate flow are analyzed. A comparison of the numerical solutions with the experimental and theoretical data indicates the possibility of describing the wall flow properties on the basis of a quasi-stationary turbulence model, as the Reynolds number varies from low to high values.     

NUMERICAL UNCERTAINTIES IN TRANSONIC FLOW CALCULATIONS FOR AEROFOILS WITH BLUNT TRAILING EDGES

Numerical uncertainties are quantified for calculations of transonic flow around a divergent trailing edge (DTE) supercritical aerofoil. The Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes equations are solved using a linearized block implicit solution procedure and mixing-length turbulence model. This procedure has reproduced measurements around supercritical aerofoils with blunt trailing edges that have shock, boundary layer and separated regions. The present effort quantifies numerical uncertainty in these calculations using grid convergence indices which are calculated from aerodynamic coefficients, shock location, dimensions of the recirculating region in the wake of the blunt trailing edge and distributions of surface pressure coefficients. The grid convergence index is almost uniform around the aerofoil, except in the shock region and at the point where turbulence transition was fixed. The grid convergence index indicates good convergence for lift but only fair convergence for moment and drag and also confirms that drag calculations are more sensitive to numerical error. © 1997 by John Wiley and Sons, Ltd.     

A gas‐kinetic scheme for the simulation of turbulent flows on unstructured meshes

This paper presents a numerical method for simulating turbulent flows via coupling the Boltzmann BGK equation with Spalart–Allmaras one equation turbulence model. Both the Boltzmann BGK equation and the turbulence model equation are carried out using the finite volume method on unstructured meshes, which is different from previous works on structured grid. The application of the gas‐kinetic scheme is extended to the simulation of turbulent flows with arbitrary geometries. The adaptive mesh refinement technique is also adopted to reduce the computational cost and improve the efficiency of meshes. To organize the unstructured mesh data structure efficiently, a non‐manifold hybrid mesh data structure is extended for polygonal cells. Numerical experiments are performed on incompressible flow over a smooth flat plate and compressible turbulent flows around a NACA 0012 airfoil using unstructured hybrid meshes. These numerical results are found to be in good agreement with experimental data and/or other numerical solutions, demonstrating the applicability of the proposed method to simulate both subsonic and transonic turbulent flows. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Transition and heat transfer predictions in a turbine cascade at various free‐stream turbulence intensities through a one‐equation turbulence model

The one‐equation Spalart–Allmaras turbulence model, coupled with criteria for the prediction of the transition onset, is employed for the numerical prediction of the heat transfer along the nozzle guide vanes of a high‐pressure turbine, at various operating conditions. Emphasis is put on how to overcome a known shortcoming of the Spalart–Allmaras model, i.e. its insensitivity to free‐stream turbulence. For this purpose, an extra viscosity coefficient is defined and used in the mean flow equations. This extra viscosity is proportional to the free‐stream turbulence with a damping in the boundary layer. Its use is adequate to circumvent the aforementioned weakness of the Spalart–Allmaras model, without any other intervention in the model itself. For the prediction of the onset of transition, the Abu‐Ghannam and Shaw and the Mayle criteria are used, depending on the level of free‐stream turbulence. Both yield very satisfactory predictions in a wide range of Reynolds numbers and/or turbulence intensities. From a numerical point of view, this paper proposes techniques for the implementation of the solution method on unstructured grids with triangular elements and reconfirms findings of previous works, like the suitability of the containment‐circle tessellation in highly stretched grids. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Interaction of a normal shock wave with a compressible turbulent flow

A speckle photographic method, which is sensitive to changes of gradients in fluid density, is applied for analyzing a compressible turbulent air flow with density fluctuations. Spatial correlation coefficients, turbulent length scales, and energy spectra are determined under the assumption of homogeneous isotropic turbulence. The experiments are performed in a shock tube where the flow is passed through a turbulence grid. Measurements are taken before and after the turbulent regime interacts with the normal shock wave reflected from the tube's end wall. Amplification of the turbulence intensity by the shock interaction process is verified quantitatively and is shown to be restricted to the lower wave numbers in the spectrum.A version of this paper was presented at the 11th Symposium on Turbulence, University of Missouri-Rolla, Oct. 17–19, 1988.To Professor Dr.-Ing. Klaus Gersten on the occasion of his 60th birthday     

Experimental and numerical study of turbulent flow and heat transfer inside hexagonal duct

Flow and heat transfer characteristics in transition and turbulent regions are studied experimentally and numerically in a horizontal smooth regular hexagonal duct under constant wall temperature boundary condition covering a range of Reynolds number from 2.3 × 10³ to 52 × 10³. Two types of k-omega (standard and shear stress transport (SST)) and three types of k-ε (standard, renormalization (RNG), and realizable) turbulence model are employed for transition and turbulent regions, respectively. Both average and fully developed Darcy friction factor and Nusselt number are presented as a function of Reynolds number. It is seen that k-omega SST and k-ε realizable turbulence models gave the best agreement with the experimental data in transition and turbulent regions, respectively. All the experimental results are correlated within an accuracy of ±13 % and ±7 % for Nusselt number and Darcy friction factor, respectively. Results obtained in this study are compared with circular duct results using hydraulic diameter.     

Assessment of scale-adaptive turbulence models for volute-type centrifugal pumps at part load operation

Unsteady three-dimensional (3D) computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations are conducted with the open-source software OpenFOAM to assess the scale-adaptive k-ω-SST-SAS turbulence model (SAS) on a radial, volute-type centrifugal pump at part load operation which is characterized by high unsteadiness and flow separation. SAS results are compared to spatially high resolved and ensemble-averaged flow measurement data in terms of flow angle and turbulence intensity (TI) in the rotor–stator interaction region. Differences to simulation results obtained with the statistical state-of-the-art k-ω-SST turbulence model (SST) are highlighted. The flow angle is predicted with a reasonable agreement to measurement data by both, SST and SAS models. In the highly transient flow of strong rotor–stator interaction near the volute tongue, SST results show a significant overprediction of measured TI while the SAS model yields a considerably better agreement to measurement data even with a typical URANS grid resolution. A grid refinement does not further improve the agreement to measurement data. An in-depth analysis of the SAS model on separated flow, i.e., periodic hill test case, together with a large eddy simulation (LES) reference solution is performed and reveals that with successive grid refinement, in contrast to LES, the SAS model in its present form of Egorov and Menter (2008) does not resolve a successively larger portion of the turbulence spectrum, and the modeled part is not successively reduced. For that purpose, a re-calibration or even a re-formulation of the scale-adaption source term in the transport equation of the turbulent dissipation rate may be indispensable, which will be the subject of future studies.     

A differential equation for approximate wall distance

A partial differential equation to compute the distance from a surface is derived and solved numerically. The benefit of such a formulation especially in combination with turbulence models is shown. The details of the formulation as well as several examples demonstrating the influence of its parameters are presented. The proposed formulation has computational advantages and can be favourably incorporated into one‐ and two‐equation turbulence models like e.g. the Spalart–Allmaras, the Secundov or Menter's SST model. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An improved anisotropy-resolving subgrid-scale model for flows in laminar–turbulent transition region

Some types of mixed subgrid-scale (SGS) models combining an isotropic eddy-viscosity model and a scale-similarity model can be used to effectively improve the accuracy of large eddy simulation (LES) in predicting wall turbulence. Abe (2013) has recently proposed a stabilized mixed model that maintains its computational stability through a unique procedure that prevents the energy transfer between the grid-scale (GS) and SGS components induced by the scale-similarity term. At the same time, since this model can successfully predict the anisotropy of the SGS stress, the predictive performance, particularly at coarse grid resolutions, is remarkably improved in comparison with other mixed models. However, since the stabilized anisotropy-resolving SGS model includes a transport equation of the SGS turbulence energy, k_SGS, containing a production term proportional to the square root of k_SGS, its applicability to flows with both laminar and turbulent regions is not so high. This is because such a production term causes k_SGS to self-reproduce. Consequently, the laminar–turbulent transition region predicted by this model depends on the inflow or initial condition of k_SGS. To resolve these issues, in the present study, the mixed-timescale (MTS) SGS model proposed by Inagaki et al. (2005) is introduced into the stabilized mixed model as the isotropic eddy-viscosity part and the production term in the k_SGS transport equation. In the MTS model, the SGS turbulence energy, k_es, estimated by filtering the instantaneous flow field is used. Since the k_es approaches zero by itself in the laminar flow region, the self-reproduction property brought about by using the conventional k_SGS transport equation model is eliminated in this modified model. Therefore, this modification is expected to enhance the applicability of the model to flows with both laminar and turbulent regions. The model performance is tested in plane channel flows with different Reynolds numbers and in a backward-facing step flow. The results demonstrate that the proposed model successfully predicts a parabolic velocity profile under laminar flow conditions and reduces the dependence on the grid resolution to the same degree as the unmodified model by Abe (2013) for turbulent flow conditions. Moreover, it is shown that the present model is effective at transitional Reynolds numbers. Furthermore, the present model successfully provides accurate results for the backward-facing step flow with various grid resolutions. Thus, the proposed model is considered to be a refined anisotropy-resolving SGS model applicable to laminar, transitional, and turbulent flows.     

Bypass transition receptivity modes

The prediction of bypass transition remains an important problem in many engineering applications. This is largely because there is no suitable theoretical model for bypass transition and predictions are made using empirical models. This paper presents numerical results for the receptivity of a zero pressure gradient boundary layer subjected to simple freestream waveforms which are the constituent parts of a turbulent flow field. Significant receptivities are only obtained for a minority of freestream waveforms and these lead to two types of flow structure in the boundary layer. The first type of flow structure is essentially two dimensional in nature and consists of two rows of counter-rotating spanwise vortices and is induced by freestream waves of large normal and spanwise wavelength and streamwise wavelengths approximately equal to the boundary layer thickness. The second type of flow structure are the streamwise streaks frequently observed in flow visualisation experiments. These streaks are induced by freestream waves of long streamwise and normal wavelength and spanwise wavelengths in the range of 14.5-46 θ (1.7-5.4δ). The freestream waves can be formed of velocity components in any direction, however the boundary layer is most receptive to fluctuations that lie in a plane perpendicular to the streamwise direction. The overall receptivity to a full spectrum of waves typical of freestream turbulence is considered and is shown to have similar characteristics to those from experiments.     

Sensitivity analysis of freestream turbulence parameters on stagnation region heat transfer using a neural network

A neural network has been used to predict stagnation region heat transfer in the presence of freestream turbulence. The neural network was trained using data from an experimental study to investigate the influence of freestream turbulence on stagnation region heat transfer. The integral length scale, Reynolds number, all three components of velocity fluctuations and the vorticity field were used to characterize the freestream turbulence. The neural network is able to predict 50% of the test data within ±1%, while the maximum error of any data point is under 3%. A sensitivity analysis of the freestream turbulence parameters on stagnation region heat transfer was performed using the trained neural network. The integral length scale is found to have the least influence on the stagnation line heat transfer, while the normal and spanwise turbulence intensities have the highest influence.     

High‐order strand grid methods for low‐speed and incompressible flows

A novel high‐order finite volume scheme using flux correction methods in conjunction with structured finite differences is extended to low Mach and incompressible flows on strand grids. Flux correction achieves a high order by explicitly canceling low‐order truncation error terms across finite volume faces and is applied in unstructured layers of the strand grid. The layers are then coupled together using a source term containing summation‐by‐parts finite differences in the strand direction. A preconditioner is employed to extend the method to low speed and incompressible flows. We further extend the method to turbulent flows with the Spalart–Allmaras model. Laminar flow test cases indicate improvements in accuracy and convergence using the high‐order preconditioned method, while turbulent body‐of‐revolution flow results show improvements in only some cases, perhaps because of dominant errors arising from the turbulence model itself. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.