A STUDY OF SOLVING NAVIER-STOKES EQUATIONS WITH A FINITE

VOLUME METHOD BASED ON POLYGONAL UNSTRUCTURED GRIDS

AND THE COMPUTATIONAL ANALYSIS OF GROUND VEHICLE AERO-
DYNAMICS

by

JIANNAN TAN, B.S.

A Dissertation

In

MECHNICAL ENGINEERING

Submitted to the Graduate Faculty

of Texas Tech University in
Partial Fulfillment of
the Requirements for
the Degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

Approved

Siva Parameswaran, Ph.D.

Chair of the Committee

Jingzhou Yang, Ph.D.

Zhaoming He, Ph.D.

Sukalyan Bhattacharya, Ph.D.

Xinzhong Chen, Ph.D.

Fred Hartmeister, Dean of the Graduate School

December, 2010
Copyright 2010, Jiannan Tan
 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December2010

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Although the following dissertation is an individual work, I could never complete it
without the help from a lot of people. Firstly I’d like to express my sincere gratitude to
my advisor, Dr. Siva Parameswaran for his consistent guidance and encouragement in
the past five years. His knowledge, expertise and enthusiasm on CFD have always
been the driving force throughout my graduate research career at Texas Tech Univer-
sity. I want to thank my committee professors, Dr. Jingzhou Yang, Dr. Zhaoming He,
Dr. Sukalyan Bhattacharya and Dr. Xinzhong Chen for their kind support and help in
the past few years.

My thanks also extend to my lab mates: Dongdae Lee, Zixi Chen, Tengxiao Liu, Di-
vya R. and Suranga Dharmarathne. Working with them has always been a pleasure,
which makes my research progressive and my life cheerful and colorful.

Finally, my very special thanks go to my family, especially my wife, Ou Zhang. This

piece of work would never exist without her supervision and support on a daily basis.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS………………………………………………………………………... ii

ABSTRACT……………………………………………………………………………………….. v

LIST OF TABLES……………………………………………………………………………….. vi

LIST OF FIGURES……………………………………………………………………………... vii

1. INTRODUCTION.................................................................................................1

1.1 The Development of Computational Fluid Mechanics .............................1

1.2 Objectives ...............................................................................................2
1.3 Contents of Dissertation ..........................................................................3

2. THE DISCRETIZATION OF N-S EQUATIONS ......................................................4

2.1 Derivation and Description of the Navier-Stokes (N-S) Equations ..........4

2.2 N-S Equations under Cartesian Coordinating System in A 2-D Case .......5
2.3 Finite Volume Method ............................................................................5
2.4 The Discretization of 2-D N-S Equations ................................................6
2.4.1 Gauss’s Theorem in a 2-D Polygonal Cell Case ............................................... 6
2.4.2 Discretization of 2-D N-S Equations by casting Gauss’s Theorem..................... 7
2.4.3 Important Variables of the Discretized N-S Equations ....................................... 8

3. GRID STRUCTURE AND GRID GENERATION ....................................................9

3.1 Structured and Unstructured Grids/Mesh ................................................9

3.2 Triangular, Quadrilateral and Polygonal Grids/Mesh ............................ 10
3.3 Cartesian Grids ..................................................................................... 11
3.4 Grid Generation .................................................................................... 12
3.5 The Data Structure of the Mesh ............................................................ 12
3.6 An Example: The Data Structure of a 2-D Mesh File from ANSYS®
FLUENT® ............................................................................................................. 14
3.6.1 Point Information Block .................................................................................. 14
3.6.2 Face Information Block................................................................................... 16
3.6.3 Cell Information Block .................................................................................... 18
3.6.4 User Defined Information Block ...................................................................... 18
3.6.5 The Internal Code and the Corresponding Boundary Condition....................... 19
3.6.6 The Demonstrated Data structured of the Mesh in Figure 3.5 ......................... 19

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4. SOLVING THE DISCRETIZED N-S EQUATIONS ............................................... 21

4.1 The Goals of Solving the N-S Equations ............................................... 21

4.2 The Positions of the Flow Variables ...................................................... 21
4.3 The Iterative Method ............................................................................ 22
4.4 Handling Diffusive Term, Convective Term and Pressure Term ........... 23
4.4.1 The Diffusive Term ......................................................................................... 24
4.4.2 The Pressure Term and Least Square Method ............................................... 25
4.4.3 Convective Term and Momentum Interpolation for Face Velocity .................... 27
4.4.4 A New Momentum Interpolation Method ......................................................... 27
4.5 Conclusion............................................................................................ 39

5. CFD VALIDATION ............................................................................................ 40

5.1 Internal Flow in a Straight Channel ....................................................... 40

5.2 Internal Flow in a Z-Pipe ...................................................................... 42
5.3 Internal Flow In a Jet ............................................................................ 45
5.4 Laminar Flow Past a Square Cylinder ................................................... 49
5.5 Conclusion............................................................................................ 54

6. EFFECTS OF CROSS WIND ON SPORT UTILITY VEHICLES (SUV): A

COMPUTATIONAL STUDY....................................................................................... 56

6.1 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................ 56

6.2 Aerodynamic Forces and coefficients.................................................... 57
6.2.1 Aerodynamic forces and coefficients .............................................................. 57
6.2.2 Method of determining yaw angle and the resultant wind velocity ................... 58
6.3 CAD models and cfd simulation ........................................................... 59
6.3.1 Vehicle CAD model ........................................................................................ 59
6.3.2 The wind tunnel geometry and boundary configuration ................................... 59
6.3.3 Blockage ratio ................................................................................................ 60
6.3.4 Method of dealing with different angles of attack............................................. 61
6.3.5 Mesh generation and simulation ..................................................................... 62
6.4 Results and discussion .......................................................................... 63
6.5 Concluding remarks .............................................................................. 65

REFERENCES........................................................................................................... 68

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ABSTRACT
Navier-Stokes (N-S) equations describe the motion of fluid flow in the nature and they
are called the governing equations of fluid flows. Solving Navier-Stokes equations is
of great interest to the scientists and researchers. Due to the high nonlinearity, achiev-
ing the analytical solutions for the N-S equations is extremely difficult, if not impossi-
ble. Thus, people have to switch to numerical solutions with putting on certain restric-
tions on the N-S equations. This leads to the development of Computational Fluid Dy-
namics (CFD).

This dissertation contains two major sections. The first section is about theoretical
study of CFD. We go through the whole process that a CFD analysis normally re-
quires: generating mesh, setting boundary conditions and achieving numerical solu-
tions of N-S equations, and post-processing to achieve flow field plots. An in-house 2-
D CFD code based on unstructured polygonal mesh is presented, in which a new mo-
mentum interpolation method is developed and implemented to calculate the flow flux
on the cell faces. The 2-D code is also validated by comparing the numerical results
with widely-known analytical results, if available, or by benchmarking with the results
produced by commercial CFD software packages. The second section of this disserta-
tion is about one of the applications of CFD in modern auto industry – ground vehicle
aerodynamics. The cross wind effect on a sport utility vehicle (SUV) is studied and
analyzed using CFD methods and compared with available wind tunnel experimental
results. The first section contributes to the philosophy of mechanical physics and the
second section aims to fulfill the purpose of engineering.

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LIST OF TABLES
Table 3.1 Table of Internal Code ........................................................................... 19

Table 4.1 Momentum equations coefficients of cell 2 ............................................ 30

Table 4.2 Momentum equations coefficients of cell 6 ............................................ 31

Table 4.3 Momentum equations coefficients of cell 8 ............................................ 31

Table 4.4 Momentum equations coefficients of cell 4 ............................................ 32

Table 4.5 Momentum equations coefficients of cell 5 ............................................ 32

Table 4.6 Velocity and Pressure of Cell 5 after Each Iteration Step ....................... 38

Table 6.1 Velocity inlet under different angles of attack ........................................ 62

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LIST OF FIGURES
2.1 A typical polygonal cell ........................................................................................6
3.1 Structured and unstructured grids ........................................................................ 10
3.2 Quadrilateral, triangular and hexagonal grids ...................................................... 11
3.3 Cartesian Grids.................................................................................................... 11
3.4 Grid point, face and volume ................................................................................ 13
3.5 A meshed rectangular box ................................................................................... 14
3.6 The point information block ................................................................................ 15
3.7 The face information block.................................................................................. 17
3.8 Interpretation of face data structure ..................................................................... 18
3.9 The cell information block .................................................................................. 18
3.10 User defined information block ......................................................................... 18
3.11 Mesh in Figure 3.5 demonstrated with point, face and cell IDs .......................... 20
4.1 Staggered grids.................................................................................................... 21
4.2 Center-stored velocity and pressure ..................................................................... 22
4.3 Definition sketch ................................................................................................. 24
4.4 Least square method ............................................................................................ 26
4.5 Initial velocity field and pressure distribution ...................................................... 28
4.6 Local face ID arrangements ................................................................................. 29
4.7 Face velocity distribution of cell 5 after momentum interpolation........................ 35
4.8 Pressure v.s. iteration step (Left) and mass imbalance v.s. iteration step .............. 38
5.1 Mesh of straight channel ..................................................................................... 40
5.2 Flow velocity plot of my 2D code ....................................................................... 41
5.3 Flow velocity plot of FLUENT ........................................................................... 41
5.4 Mesh of Z-pipe .................................................................................................... 42
5.5 Flow velocity plot of my 2D code ....................................................................... 43
5.6 Flow velocity plot of FLUENT ........................................................................... 43
5.7 Flow streamline plot of FLUENT ........................................................................ 44
5.8 Reattachment length comparison ......................................................................... 45

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5.9 Mesh of a jet ....................................................................................................... 46

5.10 Flow velocity plot of my 2D code ..................................................................... 47
5.11 Flow velocity plot of FLUENT.......................................................................... 47
5.12 Flow streamline plot of FLUENT ...................................................................... 48
5.13 Reattachment length comparison ....................................................................... 49
5.14 Mesh of fluid domain ........................................................................................ 50
5.15 Flow velocity plot of my 2D code ..................................................................... 52
5.16 Flow velocity plot of FLUENT.......................................................................... 52
5.17 Flow streamline plot of FLUENT ...................................................................... 53
5.18 Symmetric vortices length comparison .............................................................. 54
6.1 Three aerodynamic forces and coefficients .......................................................... 57
6.2 Method of determining the angle of attack........................................................... 58
6.3 Method of determining the resultant wind velocity .............................................. 59
6.4 SUV CAD model ................................................................................................ 59
6.5 Computation domain configurations .................................................................... 60
6.6(a) Wind tunnel dimensions .................................................................................. 61
6.6(b) List of blockage ratio ...................................................................................... 61
6.7 Mesh around the vehicle ...................................................................................... 62
6.8 Drag coefficients v.s. angles of attack.................................................................. 64
6.9 Lift coefficients v.s. angles of attack ................................................................... 64
6.10 Side force coefficients v.s. angles of attack........................................................ 65
6.11 Cd error v.s. blockage ratio................................................................................ 65

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CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

1.1 The Development of Computational Fluid Mechanics

The fundamental basis of computational fluid dynamics is Navier-Stokes equations

which were set up in 19th century. However, due to the high non-linearity and strongly

coupled pressure and velocity terms in the equations, it was extremely difficult to

achieve an analytical solution in mathematics at that time. In 1960s, along with the

development of modern computer technology, people started to realize that solving the

Navier-Stokes equations in a numerical way has become feasible with the help of de-

cent digital computers. And so comes the new era of computational fluid dynamics

(CFD) technology.

Although it's difficult to tell who is exactly the one performing the earliest CFD calcu-

lation, a few shining attempts were noticed and recorded. Lewis Fry Richardson's

weather forecasting is one of them. He proposed a method for weather forecasting by

solving a set of differential equations by dividing the physical domain into many small

cells which is very similar as today's finite difference method. Although his calcula-

tion results turned out to be inaccurate, his contributions were worthy compliments.

In 1933, A. Thom presented a paper "The Flow Past Circular Cylinders at Low

Speeds" [1], which is considered the earliest academic paper of computational fluids.

From 1958 to 1968, the fluid dynamics group from Los Alamos group in United States

devoted lots of manpower and computer resources to develop advanced CFD technol-

ogies and they achieved many significant achievements which include: Particle-In-

Cell (PIC) method, Fluid-In-Cell (FLIC) method, vorticity and stream function me-

thod, Mark-And-Cell (MAC) method, Implicit Continuous Fluid Eulerian (ICE) me-

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thod, SOLA and reactive flow CFD codes, Lagrangian-Incompressible (LINC) and

Arbitrary-Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) method, Particle-And-Force (PAF) and Free-

Lagrangian methods and the famous k-epsilon turbulence model. Many of these me-

thods are still being widely used today.

In 1970s, Suhas V. Patankar and Dudley Brian Spalding proposed the Semi-Implicit

Method of Pressure-Linked Equations, normally referred as SIMPLE algorithm, which

decouples the pressure and velocity in Navier-Stokes equations and solve the N-S eq-

uations numerically in an iterative manner. SIMPLE algorithm is truly a milestone in

the CFD history. It shows the possibility to solve complex N-S equations using power-

ful digital computers.

Nowadays, CFD has been recognized as a standard process as part of Computer-Aided

Engineering (CAE) spectrum in many industries and used extensively in product de-

sign and product development.

1.2 Objectives
There are numerous commercial CFD codes available on the market. They are user-

friendly, robust and convenient. It’s easy to perform a CFD simulation by using a

commercial CFD code. However, the encapsulation of the commercial codes makes

them blind to the users. User has no access to the detailed codes and cannot debug the

program, which limits its function in the teaching and research activities because re-

searchers always need full control of the codes and want to keep track of the change of

every variable.

The major goals of developing this open-source CFD code based on a popular scientif-

ic programming language, MATLAB, are: 1) test the new momentum interpolation

method proposed in Chapter 4 and 2) provide an open-source CFD code to the De-

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partment of Mechanical Engineering at Texas Tech University to fill in a blank for the

CFD teaching purpose.

The major goals of studying the cross wind effect on a SUV by using a commercial

CFD code are: 1) showing an example of how CFD is utilized in automobile industry

and 2) giving some ideas about the accuracy of the CFD simulation compared with

experimental data.

1.3 Contents of Dissertation

The following chapter contains a review of N-S equations and Finite Volume Method

and explains how to discretize the N-S equations. Chapter 3 explains the mesh struc-

ture in details. Chapter 4 shows the way to solve the discretized N-S equations using

SIMPLE method. Chapter 5 demonstrates the validation of the code in several cases.

Chapter 6 contains a CFD study of ground vehicle dynamics using a commercial code.

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CHAPTER 2

THE DISCRETIZATION OF N-S EQUATIONS

2.1 Derivation and Description of the Navier-Stokes (N-S) Equations

As well known to the public, the general form of the equations which describe the flu-

id motion can be written as [2] [3]:

U
   ( U  U )  p    T  f , (2.1)
t
In the above equation, U is the fluid velocity vector, p is the flow pressure, T is the

stress tensor and f is considered body forces caused by the outside environment. Body

forces can be various and a common example of the body forces is the gravity of the

flow. In some certain circumstances the body forces can be too large to be ignored, for

example, electrified flow in an electric field. However, in most cases, gravity is the

only body force and its influence to the fluid motion is so small that normally it will

be taken out of consideration. Under the assumptions of Newtonian, incompressible

flow and constant viscosity, those cases like sound wave and shock wave are kept out

of consideration, which makes the situation more reasonablely suitable to the discus-

sion in this paper. Furthermore, the transient term is taken out of the equation. Thus, a

simplified steady-state momentum equation for incompressible Newtonian flow is de-

rived as:

 ( UU )  P   2U , (2.2)

where μ is the constant viscosity of the fluid.

With the same assumptions, the continuity equation for steady-state, incompressible

Newtonian flow can be written as:

  ( U )  0 (2.3)

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where ρ is the constant density of the fluid.

Equation 2.2 and 2.3 are named Navier-Stokes equations in memory of Claude-Louis

Navier and George Gabriel Stokes.

2.2 N-S Equations under Cartesian Coordinating System in A 2-D Case

The u-momentum equation:

P
  ( Uu )      2 u (2.4)
x
The v-momentum equation:

P
  ( Uv)      2v (2.5)
y

The continuity equation:

(  u ) (  v)
 0 (2.6)
x y

2.3 Finite Volume Method

The finite volume method (FVM) is a method of discretizing partial differential equa-

tions to algebraic equations [4][5]. For the finite volume method, the usual approach is

to divide the physical space into many small sub-domains which are called control vo-

lumes or “cells”. The shape of cells can be arbitrary while triangular cell and rectangu-

lar cell are the most popular two types. The partial differential equations are recast on

these cells and approximated by the nodal values or central values of the control vo-

lumes. The advantage of performing finite volume method is straight as is in FVM’s

definition. People can solve the approximated algebraic equations instead of the origi-

nal partial differential equations, which makes life much easier and still keeps consi-

derable levels of control of the accuracy of the solution.

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2.4 The Discretization of 2-D N-S Equations

2.4.1 Gauss’s Theorem in a 2-D Polygonal Cell Case

Gauss’s Theorem, or in other words Divergence Theorem, is the basic method utilized

to discretize the N-S equations. It can be mathematically stated as:

 (  F )  dV   ( F  n )  dS
V S
(2.7)

From equation 2.7, we have a very interesting observation that Gauss’s Theorem turns

a volume integral of the divergence of a vector F to a surface integral of the same vec-

tor. Theoretically, the volume can be in arbitrary shape so definitely the volume can be

polygonal. In this case, equation 2.7 can be recast as:

 (  F )  dV   ( F  n )  dS   ( F  n ) 
V S i
i  Si (2.8)

where ni represents the outward normal vector of the face i of the volume and ΔSi

stands for the surface area of the face i. Figure 2.1 below demonstrates a typical poly-

gonal cell which is commonly seen.

Figure 2.1 A typical polygonal cell

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2.4.2 Discretization of 2-D N-S Equations by casting Gauss’s Theorem

By doing volume integration to equation 2.4, 2.5 and 2.6 and casting Gauss’s Theorem
we obtain:
p
   ( U  u)  dV   ( x )  dV      u  dV
2

V V V

p
  ( U  ni  u   Si ) face  (  V )cell     (u  ni   Si ) face (2.9)
i x i

p
   ( U  v)  dV   ( y )  dV      v  dV
2

V V V

p
  ( U  ni  v   Si ) face  (  V )cell     (v  ni   Si ) face (2.10)
i y i

   ( U )  dV  0
V

  ( U  ni   Si ) face  0 (2.11)

i

Upon observation, we find out that the term ρU niΔSi equals the mass flux of the fluid

flow through the face i. Let’s use Fi to represent the mass flux. Equation 2.9, 2.10 and

2.11 can be given as:

p
 (F  u)i face  (  V )cell     (u  ni   Si ) face (2.12)
i x i

p
 ( F  v)
i face  (  V )cell     (v  ni   Si ) face (2.13)
i y i

 (F )
i
i face 0 (2.14)

Where Fi =ρU niΔSi.is the outward mass flux going through the face. If the flow goes

from the inside to the outside, the value of Fi is positive. Otherwise, Fi is negative. The

terms on the left-hand side of equation 2.12 and 2.13, Fiu and Fiv together are called

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convective term because they represent the fluid convection. The two terms on the

right-hand side are pressure term and diffusive terms, separately. The ways to calcu-

late convective term, diffusive term and pressure term will be explained in detail in

next chapter, after the grid structure is well established.

2.4.3 Important Variables of the Discretized N-S Equations

From equation 2.12, 2.13 and 2.14, we can find the important variables which need to

be calculated unavoidably. They are:

1) Mass flux of the flow through the face, Fi =ρU niΔSi;

2) Flow velocity U on the face, or its components in x and y directions, u and v;

3) The area of the face, ΔSi.;

4) The normal vector of the face, ni;

5) The spatial gradients of the velocity components on the face;

6) The volume of the cell, ΔVi;

7) The spatial pressure gradients of the cells in x and y directions.

These variables are so important that they are not only essential to the discretized N-S

equations, but also critical to building the grid structure and deciding where to put the

physical parameters such as velocity and pressure components that will be calculated

and/or interpolated on the finite volume grids.

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CHAPTER 3

GRID STRUCTURE AND GRID GENERATION

This chapter will have a brief review of modern popular builds of modern grids, or

called mesh, which have been widely accepted and successfully applied with examples

of several business CFD software packages. A few grid generation principles will be

introduced, but expanded research and discussion are excluded in this paper. In the

end of this chapter, one grids structure is selected and the corresponding data structure

is developed and introduced, as a necessary preparation work for developing an N-S

equations solver.

3.1 Structured and Unstructured Grids/Mesh

Based on the connectivity, all grids/mesh can be divided into two different groups,

structured girds and unstructured grids. The biggest difference of them is that every

single cell of a structured grids system can be uniquely identified within an I-J-K sys-

tem (or I-J system for 2-D grids) while unstructured grids cannot do so or do not do so.

The connectivity rule restricts 2-D structured grids to be quadrilateral and 3-D struc-

tured grids to be hexahedral. As an example, Figure 3.1 gives a comparison of struc-

tured grids and unstructured grids:

Figure 3.1 Structured and unstructured grids

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For structured girds, every cell has the same number of neighbor cells; every face is

shared by the same number of cells; every point is shared by the same number of lines

and cells.

For Unstructured grids, there are many different kinds. Theoretically, unstructured

grid can be arbitrarily polygonal, so it doesn’t necessarily need to satisfy the rules for

structured grids.

In some rare cases, structured grids and unstructured grids are mixed together. This

kind of mesh is called hybrid grids or mixed grids.

3.2 Triangular, Quadrilateral and Polygonal Grids/Mesh

According to the shape of the grids, there are three majors groups of grids: triangular

girds, quadrilateral grids and polygonal grids. The most popular two types of grids are

triangular grids (or tetrahedral grids in 3-D) and quadrilateral grids (or hexahedral gr-

ids in 3-D). Sometimes these two types of grids are mixed together in order to better

capture the physical boundary of the geometry. In recent years, along with the devel-

opment of the meshing technology, polygonal grids in 2-D and polyhedral grids in 3-D

are becoming popular. A good example is the hexagonal grids used in STAR-CD,

which is a commercial CFD software package from its vendor, CD- Adapco. Figure

3.2 gives a demonstration of these 3 types of grids:

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Figure 3.2 Quadrilateral, triangular and hexagonal grids

3.3 Cartesian Grids

There is a special type of grids which is named Cartesian Grids. It can be classified as

a unique type of unstructured quadrilateral grids with a special connectivity, as shown

in Figure 3.3:

Figure 3.3 Cartesian Grids

Cartesian girds use square elements consistently and allow a cell face to be shared by

3 or more cells at the same time. The mesh generation process is easy, fast and robust,

although the total number of cells is significantly increased, especially in those areas

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

which lie close to the surface of the solid geometry because a large number of cells are

needed to capture the solid geometry accurately in order to reduce the model facetiza-

tion.

3.4 Grid Generation

Grid generation can be defined as a process of dividing a physical domain into many

small sub-domains which can be called ‘cells’ or ‘elements’ [6]. Nowadays, mesh

generation has become a very interesting research topic due to its wide application and

large influence on those technologies which involve numerical methods and computa-

tional solutions, such as CFD analysis, FEA analysis, CAD design, etc. [7].

For structured grids, algebraic method and elliptic method are the two most popular

methods for grid generation. For unstructured grids, Delaunay method and Octree me-

thod are used most [8].

3.5 The Data Structure of the Mesh

Data structure refers how the mesh information is stored.

A grid has 3 basic geometric composites: points, faces and volumes, as shown in Fig-

ure 3.4:

Figure 3.4 Grid point, face and volume

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Points describe the corners of the cell, and faces describe the connectivity of the points.

When points and faces are fixed, volume is already fixed. In other words, the informa-

tion of points and faces can be independent, and the information of volume depends

on points and faces. Hence, the information of both points and faces must be stored in

the data structure.

For the information of point, every point in the whole mesh needs a unique ID number.

So does the face and cell. At the end of Chapter 2, we mentioned that the normal vec-

tor of cell face needs to be identified, which also makes the cell face directional. Be-

sides, the cell face needs to be issued a boundary property, such as solid wall, interior

interface inside flow, porous media, etc.. So far we conclude that a mesh data should

include at least the following 3 basic information:

1) Point information. Accurate description of point position and unique ID num-

ber for every point in the mesh.

2) Face information. Description of the points which compose the face and the

direction of the face.

3) Cell information. Unique ID number for every cell. Description of the faces

which compose the cell.

Besides, the data structure of grids may include extra information which can be further

utilized in the flow solver, just for convenience. For example, the property of the faces,

such as wall, interior, mass flow inlet or outlet, pressure outlet, porous media, etc..

These kinds of information are totally optional but not necessary. They can be in-

cluded in the girds information, or can be specified by users in the flow solver before

the simulation is started.

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

3.6 An Example: The Data Structure of a 2-D Mesh File from ANSYS®
FLUENT®
ANSYS® FLUENT® (Referred as FLUENT for convenience) is a popular commercial

CFD software package widely accepted by both academic and industrial fields. Al-

though some general concepts about mesh structure is introduced in the user’s manual

of the software, the data structure of the mesh file is never revealed officially. Howev-

er, the mesh file (*.msh) is stored in such a format that it can be opened in text format

and it is very readable. In the following section, the data structure of FLUENT mesh

file is taken as an example and explained in details. Figure 3.5 gives a rectangular box

meshed with triangular grids:

Figure 3.5 A meshed rectangular box

And boundary conditions are clearly marked in Figure 3.5. We can see that the mesh

file has 4 major data blocks: point information block, face information block, cell in-

formation block and user defined information block.

3.6.1 Point Information Block

In this block, the total number of points is recorded. Every point is given a unique ID

number, and its Cartesian coordinates are stored as the description of the point’s spa-

tial position, as shown in Figure 3.6:

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 3.6 The point information block

FLUENT uses hexadecimal system to store the IDs of the points. Let’s take a look at

the first line. It is a summary of all the points in the mesh. ‘1’ means the point ID

starts from 1. Due to the hexadecimal system, ‘11’ means the last point’s ID is 17,

which tells the fact that there are 17 points in total in the whole mesh. The second line

is a summary of a points group. ‘1’ means this group starts with point ID 1, and ‘11’

means the last point’s ID in this group is 17. Since the number of points in this group

is equal to the number of total points in the whole mesh as stated in the first line, it’s

very clear that in this mesh, there are only one point group. In some other cases, points

in the mesh are divided into several different groups, and the number of points in each

group is not necessarily equal to each other. However, you can expect that when the

numbers of points of all groups are summed together, the total number has to be equal

to the points number stated in the first line which summarizes the point information of

the whole mesh.

The coordinates of each point are listed as an N by 2 matrix in a format of (x, y). The

point ID is not clearly listed, but it is equal to the line number. For example, the first

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

point with an ID of 1 has the coordinates of (0, 0); the second point with an ID of 2

has the coordinates of (4, 0).

3.6.2 Face Information Block

In this block, the total number of faces is recorded. Every face is assigned a unique

face ID. The IDs of those points which compose the face are stored. The IDs of the

cells which share the face are stored, too, as shown in Figure 3.7.

Line 1 is a notation which claims the beginning of face information block. Line 2

summarizes the number of faces in the whole mesh. As we can see in Figure 3.7, the

face ID starts from ‘1’ and ends with ‘24’, which means there are 2x16+4=36 faces in

total in the mesh. Line 3 summarizes the information of face group 1. ‘3’ is an internal

code referring the boundary condition of this face group. ‘1’ means the face ID in this

group starts from 1, ‘2’ means the face ID in this group ends with ‘2’.

So far we can conclude that there are only 2 faces in this face group. And then the de-

tailed information of the faces is listed in line 4 and line 5. Let’s take line 4 for exam-

ple, it says: 2 2 7 6 0. The first ‘2’ means this face is composed of 2 points. The next

‘2’ and ‘7’ stand for the IDs of the starting point and the ending point, separately,

which also defines the direction of this face. The following ‘7’ and ‘0’ are the cell IDs

on the left-hand side and right-hand side of this face, as shown in Figure 3.8. A cell

with a cell ID of ‘0’ is a void cell which is considered out of fluid flow.

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 3.7 The face information block

Figure 3.8 Interpretation of face data structure

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

3.6.3 Cell Information Block

Since face information block has fixed the IDs for cells already, no more detailed cell

information is needed. FLUENT just keeps a few lines to state the total number of

cells in the mesh as a summary, as shown in Figure 3.9.

Figure 3.9 The cell information block

The cell ID starts from ‘1’ and ends with ‘14’, which means there are 20 cells in total.

And there is only one cell group, which implies all cells are in the same property.

3.6.4 User Defined Information Block

User defined information block stores the boundary names input by the user, as shown

in Figure 3.10:

Figure 3.10 User defined information block

The first line is just a notation. Let’s take a look at the second line. ‘2’ is the internal

code referring the boundary condition of the face group. ‘fluid’ is the internal name of

this boundary condition, and the next ‘fluid’ is the user defined or system-default

name to call this face group.

This block is not essential to the flow solver and can be ignored.

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

3.6.5 The Internal Code and the Corresponding Boundary Condition

As we discussed in 3.6.2, all the faces in the same face group have the same boundary

condition and it’s referred by an internal code in the summary of the face group infor-

mation line. These referred codes can be found in User Defined Information Block.

For convenience, a table is provided here:

Table 3.1 Table of Internal Code

Boundary Code Boundary Code

Wall 3 Porous-jump E
Axis 25 Pressure-far-field 9
Exhaust-Fan 5 Pressure-inlet 4
Fan E Pressure-outlet 5
Inlet-Vent 4 Radiator E
Intake-fan 4 Recirculation-inlet 4
Interface 18 Recirculation- 5
outlet
Interior 2 Symmetry 7
Internal F Velocity-inlet A
Mass-flow-inlet 14 Outlet-vent 5
Outflow 24 Periodic

From this table we find something really interesting that some boundary conditions

with different names actually have the same internal boundary condition code. For ex-

ample, ‘Inlet-Vent’, ‘Intake-fan’, ‘Pressure-inlet’ and ‘Recirculation-inlet’ are sharing

the same code ‘4’. This probably implies the flow solver FLUENT would treat these

four boundary conditions in the same way.

3.6.6 The Demonstrated Data structured of the Mesh in Figure 3.5

After analyzing the data structure of the mesh file which generates the grids in Figure

3.5, we can put on all the point IDs, face IDs and cell IDs on the mesh to achieve a

clearer overview of the whole mesh data structure. It is demonstrated in Figure 3.11.

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Face IDs and cell IDs are highlighted with green and red, separately while point IDs

are highlighted with white.

Figure 3.11 Mesh in Figure 3.5 demonstrated with point, face and cell IDs

In Section 2.3.3 of Chapter 2, we proposed 7 important variables which are necessary

to a flow solver of N-S equations. They are: 1) mass flux of the flow through faces, 2)

flow velocity vectors on faces, 3) the area of faces, 4) the normal vectors of faces, 5)

the spatial gradients of the velocity components on faces, 6) the volumes of cells and 7)

the spatial pressure gradients of cells in both x and y directions. From Figure 3.11, it’s

clear that under the proposed mesh data structure, we have achieved 3), 4), 6) out of

the 7 necessary variables. These 3 variables are determined by the geometry of the

mesh and will never be changed by other physical variables of the flow field, such as

flow velocity, pressure, temperature, etc..

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

CHAPTER 4

SOLVING THE DISCRETIZED N-S EQUATIONS

After setting up the grids, the next step is to solve the N-S equations. Before going in-

to any details, we need to do some preparations.

4.1 The Goals of Solving the N-S Equations

Why are we solving the N-S equations? What are our goals? These questions need to

be answered clearly. The flow velocity field and the pressure distribution are what we

are interested in and they are our goals. The N-S equations govern the physics of the

fluid flow, that’s the reason we are solving these equations.

4.2 The Positions of the Flow Variables

Our goals are flow velocity and pressure. And here directly comes the next question:

Where to put the flow velocity and pressure on the grids?

In structured grids, the “staggered” mesh is used, and pressure is stored in the center of

the cell while velocity components are stored in “staggered” faces as shown in Figure

4.1.

Figure 4.1 Staggered grids

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

In unstructured grids, the velocity and pressure are both stored in the center of each

cell, as shown in Figure 4.2. And the velocity and pressure on the cell face can be in-

terpolated by the cell central values of the two neighbor cells.

Figure 4.2 Center-stored velocity and pressure

4.3 The Iterative Method

In former discussion, we proposed 7 necessary variables for solving the N-S equations.

In Sections 3.6.6, we already achieve 3 out of the 7 and 4 variables are left behind.

They are: 1) mass flux of the flow through faces, 2) flow velocity vectors on faces, 5)

the spatial gradients of the velocity components on faces, 7) the spatial pressure gra-

dients of cells in both x and y directions.

We find that these 4 variables need to be derived from the cell-center based velocity

and pressure. This is a huge dilemma: the cell-center based flow velocity and pressure

are our goals of solving the N-S equations meanwhile we need them to derive the 4

variables to start solving the N-S equations. The only way out is the iterative method.

We first assign an arbitrary velocity and pressure filed to the cell centers, calculate the

4 variables and solve the N-S equations to get a new velocity and pressure field. Then

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

we correct the velocity and pressure somehow to make them closer to the accurate

values at the end of the iteration and use the corrected values to start a new iteration

level, so on and so forth until a satisfactorily accurate velocity and pressure filed is

achieved. Here we will perform the famous SIMPLE method [9].

4.4 Handling Diffusive Term, Convective Term and Pressure Term

As proposed in Section 2.3.2, the N-S equations are listed as:

p
 (F  u)
i face  (  V )cell     (u  ni   Si ) face (2.12)
i x i

p
 ( F  v)
i face  (  V )cell     (v  ni   Si ) face (2.13)
i y i

 (F )
i
i face 0 (2.14)

Equation 2.12 and 2.13 are also called momentum equations are equation 2.14 is

called continuity equation. The left-hand side of momentum equations is convective

term. The right-hand side is pressure term and diffusive term, separately.

Figure 4.3 is a sketch of two neighbor cells that we will cast our equations on. We will

take it as an example to demonstrate how to calculate convective, diffusive and pres-

sure terms.

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

eη
P n
y eξ A

x a

Figure 4.3 Definition sketch

Cell P and Cell A shares a face. The direction of the face is from point a to point b,

and its normal vector is n. ξ-η system is a curvilinear coordinate system and eξ, eη are

the unit vectors along ξ and η direction. They can be expressed as follows:

y ˆ  x ˆ yb  ya ˆ xb  xa ˆ
nˆ  i j i j (4.1)
  | ab | | ab |

x A  xP ˆ y A  y P ˆ x A  xP ˆ y A  y P ˆ
eˆ  i j i j (4.2)
  | PA | | PA |

x ˆ  y ˆ xb  xa ˆ yb  ya ˆ

eˆ  i j i j (4.3)
  | ab | | ab |

4.4.1 The Diffusive Term

Diffusive term is expressed as follows:

   (u  ni   Si ) face = [ D(uE  u P )+S D cross,u ] face (4.4)

i i

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

   (v  ni   Si ) face = [ D(vE  vP )+S D cross ,v ] face (4.5)

i i

Where:

 nˆ  nˆ
D   | ab | (4.6)
ˆ ˆ
  n  e

eˆ  eˆ u u
S D cross ,u      | ab |  b a (4.7)
nˆ  eˆ 

eˆ  eˆ v v
S D cross ,v      | ab |  b a (4.8)
nˆ  eˆ 

So far, the momentum equations 2.12 and 2.13 can be recast as:

p
aP  uP   (aE  uE )  (  V ) P (4.9)
nb x

p
aP  vP   (aE  vE )  (  V ) P (4.10)
nb y

Where:

aE  De  MIN (0, Fe ) (4.11)

aP   (aE  Fe ) (4.12)
nb

4.4.2 The Pressure Term and Least Square Method

The traditional way of calculate pressure term is to perform Gauss Theorem [10] on it

and transform it into a discrete form so that the momentum equation 4.9 and 4.10 can

be written as:

aP  u P   (aE  u E )   ( P   y ) face (4.13)

nb nb

aP  vP   (aE  vE )   ( P   x ) face (4.14)

nb nb

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Please note that P in equation 4.13 and 4.14 are the pressure on cell face, which need

to be interpolated by the cell-center pressure PA and PP.

Here we try to avoid the pressure interpolation and introduce another method to calcu-

late the pressure term: Least Square Method [11]. With this method, we can directly

achieve the spatial pressure gradients in both x and y directions.

Figure 4.4 Least square method

Figure 4.4 show a cell P and its neighbor cells, A1, A2, A3, …, Ai. According to the 2nd

order Taylor expansion, we have:

p p (4.15)
PA  PP  ( ) P  ( x A  xP )  ( ) P  ( y A  yP )
x y

where (xA, yA),( xP, yP) are the coordinates of the centers of cell A and cell P.

Repeat equation 4.15 for all the neighbor cells of cell P, we have:

 xA1  xP y A1  yP   pA1 
   p   
 x A 2  xP y A 2  yP 
 x   p A2 
 x A3  x P y A3  yP      p A2   pP  X p  p (4.16)
   p   
     y    
cell
 xAi  xP y Ai  yP   p Ai 

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

X is an over-determined i by 2 matrix. The spatial pressure gradient in the center of

cell P can be determined by:

p  ( X T X )1  ( X T p) (4.17)

Least Square Method has three distinct advantages:

1) Feasible for the grids with arbitrary shapes;

2) Matrix X is determined by the mesh geometry. It only needs to be calculated

once.

3) Avoiding to interpolate face pressure.

4.4.3 Convective Term and Momentum Interpolation for Face Velocity

Convective term is a little more complex than the diffusive term and pressure term.

From equation 2.12 and 2.13 we find that the convective term on a cell face is the dot

product of the mass flow flux and the flow velocity component on this cell face. Al-

though it seems that the mass flow flux can be directly calculated with the velocity

components, that is not the case here. In order to suppress the potential ‘checker

board’ oscillatory pressure distribution which cannot be detected due to the finite dif-

ference method, momentum interpolations must be taken to calculate the mass flow

flux. Meanwhile, the velocity component can be treated as a normal scalar like tem-

perature and be approximated by upwind scheme or similar schemes.

4.4.4 A New Momentum Interpolation Method

Here we use a simple example to demonstrate the new momentum method, which is

different from the traditional Rhie-Chow method [12]. In Figure 4.5, we have 9 cells.

Cell 5 residents in the center of the computational domain, and other 8 cells surround

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

cell 5. Only cell 5 has 0 initial velocity and 0 initial pressure. Other cells have constant

velocity components u=1, v=1 and constant pressure P=1 in the center of each cell.

Figure 4.5 Initial velocity field and pressure distribution

We are going to apply iterative method and the new momentum interpolation method.

You will see how the velocity and pressure of cell 5 approach to the value of 1 while

iterations advance.

Assume every cell numbers its faces locally in a clockwise manner, as shown in Fig-

ure 4.6. Under this system, the 2nd face of cell P and the 4th face of cell E are actually

the same face shared by cell P and cell E.

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 4.6 Local face ID arrangements

Let’s go back to Figure 4.5 and think about what initial values we can calculate for

equation 4.9 – 4.12 to get the iteration started.

Firstly, we can calculate the pressure term using the least square method. According to

equation 4.16, we can calculate the spatial pressure gradient for cell 5:

cell 2   0 1   p  1  p 
  
cell 6   1 0   x  1  
x 0 
   0      (4.18)
cell 8   0 1  p  1  p  0 
      
cell 4   1 0   y  cell 5 1  y  cell 5

And by following the same method, we can also calculate the spatial pressure gradient

of cell 2, cell 6, cell 8 and cell 4, which are the neighbor cells of cell 5:

cell 2 N   0 1   p  0  p 
        0
cell 2 E  1 0 0
    x  x
  0     1  (4.19)
cell 5   0 1  p   1  p   
        2
cell 2W   1 0   y  cell 2  0   y  cell 2

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

cell 6 N   0 1   p  0  p 
        1
cell 6 E  1 0 x 0  x
     0      2 (4.20)
 
cell 6 S  0 1  p   0   p   
        0
cell 5   1 0   y  cell 5  1  y
  cell 6

cell 5   0 1   p   1  p 
         0 
cell 8 E  1 0 0
    x     0   x 
  1 (4.21)
cell8S   0 1  p  0  p   
         2
cell8W   1 0   y  cell 5  0   y  cell 8

cell 4 N   0 1   p  0  p 
         1
cell 5  1 0 1 
    x     0   x 
  2 (4.22)
cell 4S   0 1  p  0  p   
         0 
cell 4W   1 0   y  cell 5  0   y  cell 5

Secondly, we need to assemble the momentum equations for cell 2, cell 6, cell 8, cell 4

and cell 5.

For cell 2, we obtain Table 4.1:

Table 4.1 Momentum equations coefficients of cell 2

Local Face ID Flux through face aE Contribution to ap

1 1 1 +2
2 1 1 +2
3 -1/2 3/2 +1
4 -1 2 +1

Therefore, the discretised momentum equations for cell 2 are:

3 p
6  u2  u2 N  u3   u5  2  u1  (  V )cell 2 (4.23)
2 x

3 p
6  v2  v2 N  v3   v5  2  v1  (  V ) cell 2 (4.24)
2 y

For cell 6, we obtain Table 4.2:

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Table 4.2 Momentum equations coefficients of cell 6

Local Face ID Flux through face aE Contribution to ap

1 1 1 +2
2 1 1 +2
3 -1 2 +1
4 -1/2 3/2 +1

Therefore, the discretised momentum equations for cell 6 are:

3 p
6  u6  u3  u6 E  2  u9   u5  (  V )cell 6 (4.25)
2 x

3 p
6  u6  v3  v6 E  2  v9   v5  (  V ) cell 6 (4.26)
2 y

Here u6E stands for the east face u-velocity of cell 3.

For cell 8, we obtain Table 4.3.

Table 4.3 Momentum equations coefficients of cell 8

Local Face ID Flux through face aE Contribution to ap

1 1/2 1 +3/2
2 1 1 +2
3 -1 2 +1
4 -1 2 +1
Therefore, the discretised momentum equations for cell 8 are:

11 p
 u8  u5  u9  2  u8S  2  u7  (  V )cell 8 (4.27)
2 x

11 p
 v8  v5  v9  2  v8 S  2  v7  (  V ) cell 8 (4.28)
2 y

Here u8S stands for the south face u-velocity of cell 8.

For cell 4, we obtain Table 4.4:

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Table 4.4 Momentum equations coefficients of cell 4

Local Face ID Flux through face aE Contribution to ap

1 1 1 +2
2 1/2 1 +3/2
3 -1 2 +1
4 -1 2 +1

Therefore, the discretised momentum equations for cell 4 are:

11 p
 u4  u1  u5  2  u7  2  u4W  (  V )cell 4 (4.29)
2 x

11 p
 v4  v1  v5  2  v7  2  v4W  (  V ) cell 4 (4.30)
2 y

Here u4W stands for the south face u-velocity of cell 4.

So far we already have the velocity and pressure distribution for all cells. However,

these values are just ‘guessed values’ which are used to get the iteration started. Ac-

cording to the SIMPLE method, we need to solve the momentum equations for cell 5

and get the corrected velocity of cell 5 which satisfies the momentum equation of cell

5. For cell 5, we obtain Table 4.5:

Table 4.5 Momentum equations coefficients of cell 5

Local Face ID Flux through face aE Contribution to ap

1 1/2 1 +3/2
2 1/2 1 +3/2
3 -1/2 3/2 +1
4 -1/2 3/2 +1

Therefore, the discretised momentum equations for cell 5 are:

3 3 p
5  u5  u2  u6   u8   u4  (  V )cell 5 (4.31)
2 2 x

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

3 3 p
5  v5  v2  v6   v8   v4  (  V ) cell 5 (4.32)
2 2 y

Let’s expand the pressure terms in the above 2 equations and we obtain:

3 3
5  u5  u2  u6   u8   u4  (0  1)  5 (4.33)
2 2
3 3
5  v5  v2  v6   v8   v4  (0  1)  5 (4.34)
2 2
And we get: u5=1, v5=1.

This is the velocity that satisfies the discretized momentum equation.

Thirdly, we will introduce our new momentum interpolation method that will be used

to calculate the face velocity of cell 5.

Take a look at equation 4.9 and 4.10. The u-momentum equation of cell P can be writ-

ten as:

p
aPu  uP  H Pu  (  V ) P (4.35)
x

And in the same way, the u-momentum equation of cell E can be written as:

p
aEu  u E  H Eu  (  V ) E (4.36)
x

Instead of doing simple average, let’s interpolate the face velocity using the right-hand

side of the whole momentum equation:

u P  uE 1  H Pu H Eu  1  1 p 1 p 
ue    u  u    u  (  V ) P  u  (  V ) E  (4.37)
2 2  aP aE  2  aP x aE x 

In the similar way, we are able to write down the expression of face velocity compo-

nent ve:

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

vP  vE 1  H Pv H Ev  1  1 p 1 p 
ve    v  v    v  (  V ) P  v  (  V ) E  (4.38)
2 2  aP aE  2  aP y aE y 

The following page is going to show how the face velocities of cell 5 are calculated

using our new momentum interpolation method:

For the local face 1 of cell 5, or in other words, the interface between cell 2 and cell 5:

 3 3 3 
u  u6   u8   u 4 u 2 N  u3   u5  2  u1 
1 2 2 2 2 1  1 p 1 p 
u5,1        (  V )cell 5   (  V ) cell 2 
2 a5 a2  2  a5 x a2 x 
  (4.39)
1 11 1 1 1 23
 (1  )  (  0   0) 
2 12 2 5 6 24

 3 3 3 
v  v  v  v v2 N  v3   v5  2  v1 
1 2 6 2 8 2 4 2 1  1 p 1 p 
v5,1        (  V ) cell 5   (  V ) cell 2 
2 a5 a2  2 a
 5  y a 2  y 
  (4.40)
1 11 1 1 1 1 11
 (1  )  (  0   ) 
2 12 2 5 6 2 12

For the local face 2 of cell 5, or in other words, the interface between cell 6 and cell 5:

3 3 3
1 u3  u6 E  2  u9  2  u5 u2  u6  2  u8  2  u4 1  1 p 1 p 
u5,2  (  )    (  V ) cell 5   (  V ) cell 6 
2 a6 a5 2  a5 x a6 x  (4.41)
1 11 1 1 1 1 11
 (  1)  (  0   ) 
2 12 2 5 6 2 12

3 3 3
v3  v6 E  2  v9   v5 v2  v6   v8   v4
v5,2
1
 ( 2  2 2 )  1  1  ( p  V )  1  ( p  V ) 
2 a6 a5

2  a5 y
 cell 5
a6 y
 cell 6  (4.42)

1 11 1 1 1 23
 (  1)  (  0   0) 
2 12 2 5 6 24

For the local face 3 of cell 5, or in other words, the interface between cell 8 and cell 5:

3 3
u2  u6   u8   u4
1 u5  u9  2  u8 S  2  u7 2 2 1  1 p 1 p 
u5,3  (  )    (  V ) cell 5   (  V )cell 8 
2 a8 a5 2  a5 x a8 x 
1 6 1 1 1 23
(4.43)
 (  1)  (  0   0) 
2 11 2 5 11 22
2 2

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

3 3
v2  v6   v8   v4
1 v5  v9  2  v8 S  2  v7 2 2 1  1 p 1 p 
v5,3  (  )    (  V ) cell 5   (  V ) cell 8 
2 a8 a5 2  a5 y a8 y 
1 6 1 1 1 1 12
(4.44)
 (  1)  (  0   )
2 11 2 5 11 2 11
2 2

For the local face 4 of cell 5, or in other words, the interface between cell 4 and cell 5:

3 3
u2  u6   u8   u4
1 u  u  2  u7  2  u4W 2 2 1  1 p 1 p 
u5,4  ( 1 5  )    (  V ) cell 5   (  V ) cell 4 
2 a4 a5 2  a5 x a4 x 
1 6 1 1 1 1 12
(4.55)
 (  1)  (  0   )
2 11 2 5 11 2 11
2 2

3 3
v2  v6   v8   v4
v5,4
1 v  v  2  v7  2  v4W
 ( 1 5  2 2 )  1  1  ( p  V )  1  ( p  V ) 
  cell 5  cell 4 
2 a4 a5 2  a5 y a4 y 
1 6 1 1 1 23
(4.56)
 (  1)  (  0   0) 
2 11 2 5 11 22
2 2

A clear view of the face velocities of cell 5 after the momentum interpolation is pro-

vided in Figure 4.7:

Figure 4.7 Face velocity distribution of cell 5 after momentum interpolation

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

The next step is to build the pressure-correction equation from continuity equation.

The ‘correct’ velocity can be regarded as the sum of two parts, the ‘current’ velocity

that is obtain by solving discretized momentum equations, and the correction parts that

are directly obtained from pressure corrections:

ue  ue*  ue' , ve  ve*  ve' (4.57)

Where:
y x
ue'  (  u )e  ( PP'  PA' ), ve'  (  v )e  ( PP'  PA' ) (4.58)
aP aP

Thus, the discretised continuity equation can be cast as:

*
 [(u e   ye  ve*   xe )  (ue'   ye  ve'   xe )]  0 (4.59)
Or:

y 2  x2
   [( u  v )e  ( PP'  PE' )]e  Inbalance.of .Mass. flux. flowing .into.the.cell


nb. faces .of .cell .5 aP aP

where:

1 1 1
( )    ( u ) P  (1   )  ( u ) E
u e
aP aP aE
(4.60)
1 1 1
( v )e    ( v ) P  (1   )  ( v ) E
aP aP aE

For cell 2, cell 6, cell 8 and cell 4, the pressure is always constant and there is no need

to do pressure or velocity correction. The only cell we need to worry about is cell 5.

Apply equation 4.59 and 4.60 for cell 5, we can achieve the pressure correction value

for cell 5:

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1[02   (  )  (1)2   (  )] (P5' 0) 1[12   (  ) 02   (  )] (P5' 0)
2 6 5 2 6 5 2 6 5 2 6 5
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1[02   (  ) 12   (  )] (P5' 0) 1[(1)2   (  ) 02   (  )] (P5' 0)
2 11 2 5 2 11 2 5 2 11 2 5 2 11 2 5
11 11 12 12
   
12 12 11 11

P5'  0.4656
(4.61)
Thus, the corrected pressure for cell 5 is:

P5  P5*  P5'  0  0.4656  0.4656

(4.62)

So far we have finished the 1st iteration. And the results are:

u5  1
v5  1
P5  0.4656 (4.63)
And these values in equation 4.63 will be used as initial values to continue the itera-

tive procedure. After 23 iteration steps, the convergence is reached. The pressure of

cell 5 hits 0.9990, which can be considered no different with the ambient pressure of

its all other neighbor cells. And the momentum equations are also satisfied at the same

time because the mass imbalance into cell 5 drops to 0, as shown in Figure 4.8:

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 4.8 Pressure v.s. iteration step (Left) and mass imbalance v.s. iteration step

A list of velocity and pressure of cell 5 after each iteration step is given in Table 4.6

for quick reference:

Table 4.6 Velocity and Pressure of Cell 5 after Each Iteration Step

Iterations Step Pressure U V

1 0.4656 1 1
2 0.5992 1 1
3 0.6994 1 1
4 0.7745 1 1
5 0.8309 1 1
6 0.8732 1 1
7 0.9049 1 1
8 0.9287 1 1
9 0.9465 1 1
10 0.9599 1 1
11 0.9699 1 1
12 0.9774 1 1
13 0.9831 1 1
14 0.9873 1 1
15 0.9905 1 1
16 0.9929 1 1
17 0.9946 1 1

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

18 0.9960 1 1
19 0.9970 1 1
20 0.9977 1 1
21 0.9983 1 1
22 0.9987 1 1
23 0.9990 1 1
24 0.9993 1 1

4.5 Conclusion
In this chapter, we include the detailed information on handling different terms in the

discretized N-S equations and solving the equations using iterative method. A new

momentum interpolation method is introduced and verified with a simple example.

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CHAPTER 5

CFD VALIDATION

CFD Validation [13] is defined as: The process of determining the degree to which a

model is an accurate representation of the real world from the perspective of the in-

tended uses of the model. Validation examines if the conceptual models, computation-

al models as implemented into the CFD code and computational simulation agree with

real world observations. There are 3 major ways to validate a CFD code : 1) compare

the CFD numerical results with analytical solution; 2) compare the CFD simulation

results with experimental results, and 3) benchmarking: compare the results of a CFD

code to another CFD code which has been validated and accepted.

In this chapter, the validation will be a case-based process. Four cases are presented,

including internal flow in a straight channel, internal flow in a Z-pipe, internal jet flow

and external flow near a submerged cube.

5.1 Internal Flow in a Straight Channel

A 4x1 straight channel is given and the inner space is divided into 400 square finite

volume cells with a 0.1x0.1 size for each cell, as demonstrated in Figure 5.1. Flow is

going to the +x direction. The walls are y=0 and y=1. Inlet is x=0 and outlet is x=4.

Figure 5.1 Mesh of straight channel

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

We assume the inlet flow velocity = 1 m/s and the Reynolds number of the flow is 1.

The flow velocity distribution from my 2D code is shown in Figure 5.2:

Figure 5.2 Flow velocity plot of my 2D code

And the result from FLUENT is shown in Figure 5.3:

Figure 5.3 Flow velocity plot of FLUENT

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Compare Figure 5.2 and Figure 5.3, we can tell that the results are nearly identical.

The maximum velocity is 1.46 m/s in Figure 5.2 and 1.47 m/s in Figure 5.3. The ve-

locity distributions are also in perfect match.

5.2 Internal Flow in a Z-Pipe

A Z-pipe is given and meshed with 600 square finite volume cells with a 0.2x0.2 size

for each cell, as demonstrated in Figure 5.4:

Figure 5.4 Mesh of Z-pipe

Flow is going to the +x direction. The internal flow domain is bounded by 6 wall

boundaries. Inlet is x=-2 and out let is x=6.

In this case the inlet velocity = 1m/s and the flow’s Reynolds number =10. The reason

of making the Reynolds number 10 but not 1 is that under Re=10 the small vortex in

the upper right corner becomes visible while under Re=1 it cannot be seen.

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

The flow velocity distribution from my 2D code is shown in Figure 5.5 and the result

from FLUENT is shown in Figure 5.6.

Figure 5.5 Flow velocity plot of my 2D code

Figure 5.6 Flow velocity plot of FLUENT

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Compare Figure 5.5 and Figure 5.6, we can tell that the results are very close. The

maximum velocity is 1.44 m/s in Figure 5.5 and also 1.44 m/s in Figure 5.6. Due to

the existence of vortex in this case, the reattachment length and vortex flow pattern

can be important criteria to judge whether the results from my 2D code and FLUENT

are in good match or not. Since the color of the background of Figure 5.6 is dark and

the flow velocity of the vortex is small and colored with blue, a flow streamline plot is

introduced here to recognize the vortex flow pattern, as shown in Figure 5.7:

Figure 5.7 Flow streamline plot of FLUENT

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 5.8 Reattachment length comparison

The reattachment length of vortex A is 1.6 in my 2D code compared with 1.59 in

FLUENT, and the reattachment length of vortex B is 0.6 in both cases, as shown in

Figure 5.8. This quantitative comparison of reattachment length indicates that a very

good match of flow patterns is achieved between two codes.

5.3 Internal Flow In a Jet

This case can also be called internal flow with sudden expansions. In Figure 5.9, a

straight channel is connected with another wider, expanded channel. The flow is fac-

ing a 90 degree expansion angle at the connection point, and the flow behavior near

the expansion region is of interest of research. In this case, we will compare the flow

velocity distribution and the vortex reattachment length as we did in last case.

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 5.9 Mesh of a jet

As shown in Figure 5.9, an internal jet is given and meshed with 900 square finite vo-

lume cells with a 0.2x0.2 size for each cell. Flow is going to the +x direction. The in-

ternal flow domain is bounded by 6 wall boundaries. Inlet is x=0 and out let is x=8. In

this case the inlet velocity = 1m/s and the flow’s Reynolds number =10.

The flow velocity distribution from my 2D code is shown in Figure 5.10 and the result

from FLUENT is shown in Figure 5.11.

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 5.10 Flow velocity plot of my 2D code

Figure 5.11 Flow velocity plot of FLUENT

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Compare Figure 5.10 and Figure 5.11, we find that the maximum velocity is 1.35 m/s

in Figure 5.10 and also 1.33 m/s in Figure 5.11. The streamline plot (or called particle

trace plot) is given in Figure 5.12 as a demonstration of the vortex flow patterns:

Figure 5.12 Flow streamline plot of FLUENT

Again here as the important criteria, we have to compare the vortex reattachment

length of these two cases, as shown in Figure 5.13:

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 5.13 Reattachment length comparison

The reattachment length is 2.6 in my 2D code compared with 2.59 in FLUENT.

Another quantitative good match of flow patterns is achieved.

5.4 Laminar Flow Past a Square Cylinder

A square cylinder is submerged in a fluid domain. The fluid domain is meshed with

2450 square finite volume cells with a 0.2x0.2 size for each cell, as demonstrated in

Figure 5.14:

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 5.14 Mesh of fluid domain

Flow is going to the +x direction. Inlet of fluid domain is x=0 and outlet is x=11. The

solid cube area is bounded by 4 wall boundaries: x=4, x=5, y=4 and y=5. The inlet ve-

locity = 1m/s and the flow’s Reynolds number =20.

This case has been studied by many researchers. And in this case, the Reynolds num-

ber is very sensitive and important. It is widely accepted that at very small Reynolds

numbers (Re<1), the flow near the square cylinder’s surface is creeping flow which is

dominated by viscous force and hence no flow separation will be observed behind the

cylinder. When Reynolds number increases (1<Re<Recrit) and below a critical value

Recrit, two steady, symmetric vortices can be observed behind the cylinder. The length

of the vortices increases while Reynolds number increases. After Reynolds number

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

exceeds a critical value Recrit, the famous Karman Vortex Street will be observed, and

the vortices will no longer be steady. This critical value of Reynolds number is still

under discussion, but a widely accepted range of this value is between 54 and 90

[14][15].

Furthermore, research shows that when 4.4< ReD<Recrit, there is an empirical equation

[16] between the length of the symmetric vortices Lr and the characteristic length of

the square cylinder D:

Lr / D  0.05  Re D (5.1)

ReD is defined as:

U MAX D U
Re D   Re MAX (5.2)
 U INLET

In this case, we set the Reynolds number to be 20 which makes it far away from the

critical value to prevent the existence of unsteady vortices. And Re=20 is big enough

to make the symmetric vortices behind the cylinder visible.

The flow velocity distribution from my 2D code is shown in Figure 5.15 and the result

from FLUENT is shown in Figure 5.16. The maximum velocity is 1.42 m/s and 1.43

m/s, separately.

We can see that the maximum velocity in around 1.43 m/s. Therefore, the ReD number

is actually 28.6 according to equation 5.2 for this case. From equation 5.1, we can eas-

ily derive the predicted the length of the symmetric vortices behind the square cylinder:

Lr  0.05  ReD  D  0.05  28.6 1  1.43 (5.3)

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 5.15 Flow velocity plot of my 2D code

Figure 5.16 Flow velocity plot of FLUENT

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

In order to compare the vortex reattachment length, the streamline plot is given in Fig-

ure 5.17:

Figure 5.17 Flow streamline plot of FLUENT

Let’s compare the length of the symmetric vortices:

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

Figure 5.18 Symmetric vortices length comparison

From Figure 5.18, my 2D code gives Lr =1.0 while FLUENT gives Lr =0.95, compared

with the predicted value Lr =1.43 from empirical equation 5.3.

We conclude that, even my 2D code agrees with FLUENT quantitatively on the max-

imum velocity and qualitatively on the flow distribution, it gives a closer prediction of

the symmetric vortices length behind the square cylinder.

5.5 Conclusion
In this chapter, we validate the 2D code through 4 different cases by benchmarking the

simulation results with a popular and validated CFD commercial code, ANSYS FLU-

ENT. And in case 4, we also compare the result with the predicted value which comes

from an empirical equation based on experiments. The well-matched results prove the

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

validity of my 2D code and the success of applying the new momentum interpolation

method in predicting the behavior of two-dimensional incompressible Newtonian

steady-state laminar flow.

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

CHAPTER 6

EFFECTS OF CROSS WIND ON SPORT UTILITY VEHICLES (SUV): A

COMPUTATIONAL STUDY

6.1 INTRODUCTION
Ground vehicles, especially lightweight vehicles like sedans and small SUVs, are sub-

jected to various irregular road conditions as well as to different wind conditions such

as cross winds. A cross wind has significant effects on vehicles so that it not only af-

fects the fuel efficiency and straight line stability but can also cause accidents at ex-

posed locations where the wind effects are magnified by landscape features

[17](Sigbjörnsson et al 1998). In modern industry practice, the traditional wind tunnel

experiment remains as the most reliable and trustworthy way of doing research on

cross wind effects. The pioneering work was carried out in 1960s [18](Beauvais et al

1967). In 2004, Charuvisit et al [19] conducted a scale model in a wind tunnel experi-

ment to evaluate the characteristics of the aerodynamic forces acting on a vehicle. C. J.

Baker [20], at the same time, carried out full-scale and wind tunnel experiments to

measure the cross wind forces and moments on trains. While these real experiments

yield accurate results, they also entail a considerable amount of equipmentations, labor

and time. On the other hand, Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) offers less expen-

sive and more flexible solutions [21]. Diedrichs [22] used CFD models to exemplify

the cross wind stability of high speed trains while Bettle [23] developed a CFD model

of a tractor-trailer truck on a bridge to examine the relationship between wind speed

and the aerodynamic forces.

Although various studies have been done on the cross wind effect on vehicles and

trains, in only very rare cases a full scale, true shape vehicle model was applied and

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

the influence of the wind tunnel dimension on the simulation results was discussed. In

this paper, a 1:1 full scale CFD model of a small production SUV was utilized. Results

of the CFD simulations with different wind tunnel test section dimensions, under dif-

ferent yaw angles were generated and were compared with the wind tunnel experimen-

tal results.

6.2 Aerodynamic Forces and coefficients

6.2.1 Aerodynamic forces and coefficients

The three aerodynamic forces - drag, lift and side forces are demonstrated (Figure 6.1).

The mid-point of the vehicle wheelbase at ground level on the vehicle centerline is

taken as the reference point for these forces.

Figure 6.1 Three aerodynamic forces and coefficients

Drag coefficient (CD), lift coefficient (CL) and side force coefficient (CS) are defined

as:

D L S
CD  , CL  , CS  , (6.1)
1 2 1 2 1 2
 u AV  u AV  u AV
2 2 2

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 Texas Tech University, Jiannan Tan, December 2010

in which D, L, S are drag, lift and side forces, separately. AV is the frontal area of the

vehicle at a 0o angle of attack.

6.2.2 Method of determining yaw angle and the resultant wind velocity
The relative velocity of wind to vehicle U(w,v), airspeed relative to ground U(w,g)

and ground to vehicle U(g,v) yield the following formula:

U ( w, v)  U ( w, g )  U ( g , v ) (6.2)

The angle of attack in yaw is defined to be the angle between the resultant wind veloc-

ity U(w,v) and the relative velocity of ground to vehicle U(g,v) (Figure 6.2).

Assume the angle of attack is given and the wind velocity to ground, U(w,g) is large

enough. For each fixed magnitude of U(g,v) and U(w,g), two solutions are available

for the resultant wind velocity to vehicle, U(w,v) (Figure 6.3). The first solution of

U(w,v) tells that the incoming wind provides a drag force on the vehicle. The second

solution of U(w,v) suggests that the resultant wind seen by the vehicle is reduced by

the wind which is termed a tailwind. In this paper, the first solution is always chosen

as the resultant wind velocity.

Figure 6.2 Method of determining the angle of attack

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Figure 6.3 Method of determining the resultant wind velocity

6.3 CAD models and cfd simulation

6.3.1 Vehicle CAD model

This is a full scale 1:1 Sport Utility Vehicle (SUV) CAD model provided by the man-

ufacturer (Figure 6.4). Reasonable simplifications and geometry manipulations were

performed before generating surface mesh.

6.3.2 The wind tunnel geometry and boundary configuration

The vehicle CAD model is put into a large rectangular computational domain which is

considered as the virtual wind tunnel (Figure 6.5). Proper boundary configurations are

implemented.

Figure 6.4 SUV CAD model

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Figure 6.5 Computation domain configurations

6.3.3 Blockage ratio

The frontal area of the vehicle and wind tunnel test section are two critical parameters

to the success of the simulation because the space of wind tunnel is limited and wall

boundary effects are strong. Blockage ratio is introduced as a variable to quantify the

impact of the wall boundary effect, which is defined as:

AV
B , (6.3)
AW

in which B is blockage ratio, Av is the frontal area of vehicle and Aw is the frontal area

of the wind tunnel test section.

In order to observe the variation of simulation results with different magnitudes of

blockage ratio, four wind tunnel cases were tested (Figure 6.6(a)). The dimension of

the vehicle is 4413 mm in length, 2007 mm in width and 1508 mm in height. Dimen-

sions of wind tunnel can be calculated accordingly (Figure 6.6(b)). All numbers of

dimensional ratio are stated in the format of a:b:c.

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Figure 6.6(a) Wind tunnel dimensions

Figure 6.6(b) List of blockage ratio

6.3.4 Method of dealing with different angles of attack

In order to create different angles of attack, the inlet wind velocity was modified (Ta-

ble 6.1). In this study, the assumed vehicle driving speed U(v,g) was 80mph or 35.763

m/s and the maximum angle of attack to be achieved was 60 degree. Thus, the mini-

mum magnitude of wind velocity U(w,g) which is required to guarantee the 60 degree

angle of attack is 30.972 m/s. These two velocities were fixed for all cases.
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Table 6.1 Velocity inlet under different angles of attack

Angle of attack (degree) U(w,v) (m/s) x-component of U(w,v) (m/s) y-component of U(w,v)
(m/s)
0 66.8 66.8 0
5 66.442 66.189 5.791
10 65.563 64.567 11.385
15 64.101 61.917 16.591
30 56.260 48.723 28.130
45 43.170 30.526 30.526
60 17.882 8.941 15.486

6.3.5 Mesh generation and simulation

Due to the complex surface geometry and detailed accessories (including head lights,

mirrors, gas tank, engine block, etc.) of the CAD model, a rectangular ‘core space’

was made near the vehicle surface and tetrahedral mesh with small volumes (1 cm3 –

10 cm3) were applied to enhance the accuracy of calculation. The mesh of this part

always remained unchanged. Those cells outside this ‘core space’ area were allowed

to be bigger with a maximum volume of 10 m3 to reduce the total amount of volume

cells in order to save resource and time (Figure 6.7). Commercial software ANSYS

ICEM CFD was used in the progress of mesh generation. ANSYS FLUENT was used

for CFD simulation.

Figure 6.7 Mesh around the vehicle

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6.4 Results and discussion

Simulations were performed for 4 cases (Figure 6.6(b)) and for each case 7 different

angles of attack (0o, 5o, 10o, 15o, 30o, 45o and 60o) were tested. The standard k-e turbu-

lence model was applied. Plots of CD, CL and CS (Figures 6.8, 6.9 and 6.10) were pro-

vided and compared with available experimental data with angles of attack of 0o, 2.5o,

5o, 10o, 15o and 20o.

A general match can be observed between the curves of computational data and expe-

rimental results. However, the difference is noticeable, especially in the CL plot (Fig-

ure 6.9). This could be caused by (1) the geometric differences between the production

vehicle and the CFD model which could possibly be over-simplified, (2) the different

resultant airspeeds used for the CFD simulation (various numbers according to yaw

angles) and the wind tunnel experiments (fixed 68 mph or 30.4 m/s), (3) the potential

errors of the wind tunnel experimental data, (4) the mesh quality and (5) the resolution

of the CFD software.

According to the official data provided by the manufacturer, the CD of the SUV is 0.38

at a 0 o yaw angle. Thus, the error of CD is 42.1% for blockage B=8.4%, 23.7% for

B=5%, 10.5% for B=2.8% and 5.3% for B=0.5%. These numbers tell that (1) simula-

tion results tend to give larger numbers than the experimental data and (2) the simula-

tion error is decreasing when blockage ratio is reduced (Figure 6.11). To achieve satis-

factory results of less than 10% error, we suggest that a blockage ratio of no more than

5% need to be applied not only for real wind tunnel tests [24] but also for CFD wind

tunnel simulation.

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Figure 6.8 Drag coefficients v.s. angles of attack

Figure 6.9 Lift coefficients v.s. angles of attack

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Figure 6.10 Side force coefficients v.s. angles of attack

Figure 6.11 Cd error v.s. blockage ratio

6.5 Concluding remarks

This study was aimed at the cross-wind effects on a ground vehicle with different an-

gles of attack. The influence of blockage ratio was also discussed. After better agree-

ment is achieved by polishing the CAD model and refining the mesh, the computa-

tional tool will be applied to study the cross-wind effect of vehicles with trailers.

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