Search results

1 – 10 of 241
Article
Publication date: 31 December 2021

Alexander Idesman and Bikash Dey

The purpose of this paper is as follows: to significantly reduce the computation time (by a factor of 1,000 and more) compared to known numerical techniques for real-world…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is as follows: to significantly reduce the computation time (by a factor of 1,000 and more) compared to known numerical techniques for real-world problems with complex interfaces; and to simplify the solution by using trivial unfitted Cartesian meshes (no need in complicated mesh generators for complex geometry).

Design/methodology/approach

This study extends the recently developed optimal local truncation error method (OLTEM) for the Poisson equation with constant coefficients to a much more general case of discontinuous coefficients that can be applied to domains with different material properties (e.g. different inclusions, multi-material structural components, etc.). This study develops OLTEM using compact 9-point and 25-point stencils that are similar to those for linear and quadratic finite elements. In contrast to finite elements and other known numerical techniques for interface problems with conformed and unfitted meshes, OLTEM with 9-point and 25-point stencils and unfitted Cartesian meshes provides the 3-rd and 11-th order of accuracy for irregular interfaces, respectively; i.e. a huge increase in accuracy by eight orders for the new 'quadratic' elements compared to known techniques at similar computational costs. There are no unknowns on interfaces between different materials; the structure of the global discrete system is the same for homogeneous and heterogeneous materials (the difference in the values of the stencil coefficients). The calculation of the unknown stencil coefficients is based on the minimization of the local truncation error of the stencil equations and yields the optimal order of accuracy of OLTEM at a given stencil width. The numerical results with irregular interfaces show that at the same number of degrees of freedom, OLTEM with the 9-points stencils is even more accurate than the 4-th order finite elements; OLTEM with the 25-points stencils is much more accurate than the 7-th order finite elements with much wider stencils and conformed meshes.

Findings

The significant increase in accuracy for OLTEM by one order for 'linear' elements and by 8 orders for 'quadratic' elements compared to that for known techniques. This will lead to a huge reduction in the computation time for the problems with complex irregular interfaces. The use of trivial unfitted Cartesian meshes significantly simplifies the solution and reduces the time for the data preparation (no need in complicated mesh generators for complex geometry).

Originality/value

It has been never seen in the literature such a huge increase in accuracy for the proposed technique compared to existing methods. Due to a high accuracy, the proposed technique will allow the direct solution of multiscale problems without the scale separation.

Details

International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat & Fluid Flow, vol. 32 no. 8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0961-5539

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 3 April 2023

Nam Mai-Duy, Cam Minh Tri Tien, Dmitry Strunin and Warna Karunasena

The purpose of this paper is to present a new discretisation scheme, based on equation-coupled approach and high-order five-point integrated radial basis function (IRBF…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to present a new discretisation scheme, based on equation-coupled approach and high-order five-point integrated radial basis function (IRBF) approximations, for solving the first biharmonic equation, and its applications in fluid dynamics.

Design/methodology/approach

The first biharmonic equation, which can be defined in a rectangular or non-rectangular domain, is replaced by two Poisson equations. The field variables are approximated on overlapping local regions of only five grid points, where the IRBF approximations are constructed to include nodal values of not only the field variables but also their second-order derivatives and higher-order ones along the grid lines. In computing the Dirichlet boundary condition for an intermediate variable, the integration constants are used to incorporate the boundary values of the first-order derivative into the boundary IRBF approximation.

Findings

These proposed IRBF approximations on the stencil and on the boundary enable the boundary values of the derivative to be exactly imposed, and the IRBF solution to be much more accurate and not influenced much by the RBF width. The error is reduced at a rate that is much greater than four. In fluid dynamics applications, the method is able to capture well the structure of steady highly non-linear fluid flows using relatively coarse grids.

Originality/value

The main contribution of this study lies in the development of an effective high-order five-point stencil based on IRBFs for solving the first biharmonic equation in a coupled set of two Poisson equations. A fast rate of convergence (up to 11) is achieved.

Details

International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat & Fluid Flow, vol. 33 no. 7
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0961-5539

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 17 September 2008

Mehdi Dehghan and Akbar Mohebbi

The purpose of this paper is to introduce efficient methods for solving the 2D biharmonic equation with Dirichlet boundary conditions of second kind. This equation describes the…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to introduce efficient methods for solving the 2D biharmonic equation with Dirichlet boundary conditions of second kind. This equation describes the deflection of loaded plate with boundary conditions of simply supported plate kind. Also it can be derived from the calculus of variations combined with the variational principle of minimum potential energy. Because of existing fourth derivatives in this equation, introducing high‐order accurate methods need to use artificial points. Also solving the resulted linear system of equations suffers from slow convergence when iterative methods are used. This paper aims to introduce efficient methods to overcome these problems.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper considers several compact finite difference approximations that are derived on a nine‐point compact stencil using the values of the solution and its second derivatives as the unknowns. In these approximations there is no need to define special formulas near the boundaries and boundary conditions can be incorporated with these techniques. Several iterative linear systems solvers such as Krylov subspace and multigrid methods and their combination (with suitable preconditioner) have been developed to compare the efficiency of each method and to design powerful solvers.

Findings

The paper finds that the combination of compact finite difference schemes with multigrid method and Krylov iteration methods preconditioned by multigrid have excellent results for the second biharmonic equation, and that Krylov iteration methods preconditioned by multigrid are the most efficient methods.

Originality/value

The paper is of value in presenting, via some tables and figures, some numerical experiments which resulted from applying new methods on several test problems, and making comparison with conventional methods.

Details

Kybernetes, vol. 37 no. 8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0368-492X

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 May 1998

W.F. Spotz

Considers the extension of a new class of higher‐order compact methods to nonuniform grids and examines the effect of pollution that arises with differencing the associated metric…

Abstract

Considers the extension of a new class of higher‐order compact methods to nonuniform grids and examines the effect of pollution that arises with differencing the associated metric coefficients. Numerical studies for the standard model convection diffusion equation in 1D and 2D are carried out to validate the convergence behaviour and demonstrate the high‐order accuracy.

Details

International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat & Fluid Flow, vol. 8 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0961-5539

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 14 October 2019

Nagesh Babu Balam and Akhilesh Gupta

Modelling accurately the transient behaviour of natural convection flow in enclosures been a challenging task because of a variety of numerical errors which have limited achieving…

Abstract

Purpose

Modelling accurately the transient behaviour of natural convection flow in enclosures been a challenging task because of a variety of numerical errors which have limited achieving the higher order temporal accuracy. A fourth-order accurate finite difference method in both space and time is proposed to overcome these numerical errors and accurately model the transient behaviour of natural convection flow in enclosures using vorticity–streamfunction formulation.

Design/methodology/approach

Fourth-order wide stencil formula with appropriate one-sided difference extrapolation technique near the boundary is used for spatial discretisation, and classical fourth-order Runge–Kutta scheme is applied for transient term discretisation. The proposed method is applied on two transient case studies, i.e. convection–diffusion of a Gaussian Pulse and Taylor Vortex flow having analytical solution.

Findings

Error magnitude comparison and rate of convergence analysis of the proposed method with these analytical solutions establish fourth-order accuracy and prove the ability of the proposed method to truly capture the transient behaviour of incompressible flow. Also, to test the transient natural convection flow behaviour, the algorithm is tested on differentially heated square cavity at high Rayleigh number in the range of 103-108, followed by studying the transient periodic behaviour in a differentially heated vertical cavity of aspect ratio 8:1. An excellent comparison is obtained with standard benchmark results.

Research limitations/implications

The developed method is applied on 2D enclosures; however, the present methodology can be extended to 3D enclosures using velocity–vorticity formulations which shall be explored in future.

Originality/value

The proposed methodology to achieve fourth-order accurate transient simulation of natural convection flows is novel, to the best of the authors’ knowledge. Stable fourth-order vorticity boundary conditions are derived for boundary and external boundary regions. The selected case studies for comparison demonstrate not only the fourth-order accuracy but also the considerable reduction in error magnitude by increasing the temporal accuracy. Also, this study provides novel benchmark results at five different locations within the differentially heated vertical cavity of aspect ratio 8:1 for future comparison studies.

Details

International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat & Fluid Flow, vol. 30 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0961-5539

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 19 September 2008

C.J. Visser, A.G. Malan and J.P. Meyer

The purpose of this paper is to focus on modeling buoyancy driven viscous flow and heat transfer through saturated packed pebble‐beds via a set of homogeneous volume‐averaged…

1778

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to focus on modeling buoyancy driven viscous flow and heat transfer through saturated packed pebble‐beds via a set of homogeneous volume‐averaged conservation equations in which local thermal disequilibrium is accounted for.

Design/methodology/approach

The local thermal disequilibrium accounted for refers to the solid and liquid phases differing in temperature in a volume‐averaged sense, which is modeled by describing each phase with its own governing equation. The partial differential equations are discretized and solved via a vertex‐centered edge‐based dual‐mesh finite volume algorithm. A compact stencil is used for viscous terms, as this offers improved accuracy compared to the standard finite volume formulation. A locally preconditioned artificial compressibility solution strategy is employed to deal with pressure incompressibility, whilst stabilisation is achieved via a scalar‐valued artificial dissipation scheme.

Findings

The developed technology is demonstrated via the solution of natural convective flow inside a heated porous axisymmetric cavity. Predicted results were in general within 10 per cent of experimental measurements.

Originality/value

This is the first instance in which both artificial compressibility and artificial dissipation is employed to model flow through saturated porous materials.

Details

International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat & Fluid Flow, vol. 18 no. 7/8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0961-5539

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 27 May 2014

Artur Tyliszczak

Variable density flows play an important role in many technological devices and natural phenomena. The purpose of this paper is to develop a robust and accurate method for low…

Abstract

Purpose

Variable density flows play an important role in many technological devices and natural phenomena. The purpose of this paper is to develop a robust and accurate method for low Mach number flows with large density and temperature variations.

Design/methodology/approach

Low Mach number approximation approach is used in the paper combined with a predictor-corrector method and accurate compact scheme of fourth and sixth order. A novel algorithm is formulated for the projection method in which the boundary conditions for the pressure are implemented in such a way that the continuity equation is fulfilled everywhere in the computational domain, including the boundary nodes.

Findings

It is shown that proposed implementation of the boundary conditions considerably improves a solution accuracy. Assessment of the accuracy was performed based on the constant density Burggraf flow and for two benchmark cases for the natural convection problems: steady flow in a square cavity and unsteady flow in a tall cavity. In all the cases the results agree very well with exemplary solutions.

Originality/value

A staggered or half-staggered grid arrangement is usually used for the projection method for both constant and low Mach number flows. The staggered approach ensures stability and strong pressure-velocity coupling. In the paper a high-order compact method has been implemented in the framework of low Mach number approximation on collocated meshes. The resulting algorithm is accurate, robust for large density variations and is almost free from the pressure oscillations.

Details

International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat & Fluid Flow, vol. 24 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0961-5539

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 3 January 2017

Vinicius Malatesta, Josuel Kruppa Rogenski and Leandro Franco de Souza

The centrifugal instability mechanism of boundary layers over concave surfaces is responsible for the development of quasi-periodic, counter-rotating vortices aligned in a…

Abstract

Purpose

The centrifugal instability mechanism of boundary layers over concave surfaces is responsible for the development of quasi-periodic, counter-rotating vortices aligned in a streamwise direction known as Görtler vortices. By distorting the boundary layer structure in both the spanwise and the wall-normal directions, Görtler vortices may modify heat transfer rates. The purpose of this study is to conduct spatial numerical simulation experiments based on a vorticity–velocity formulation of the incompressible Navier–Stokes system of equations to quantify the role of the transition in the heat transfer process.

Design/methodology/approach

Experiments are conducted using an in-house, parallel, message-passing code. Compact finite difference approximations and a spectral method are used to approximate spatial derivatives. A fourth-order Runge–Kutta method is adopted for time integration. The Poisson equation is solved using a geometric multigrid method.

Findings

Results show that the numerical method can capture the physics of transitional flows over concave geometries. They also show that the heat transfer rates in the late stages of the transition may be greater than those for either laminar or turbulent ones.

Originality/value

The numerical method can be considered as a robust alternative to investigate heat transfer properties in transitional boundary layer flows over concave surfaces.

Details

International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat & Fluid Flow, vol. 27 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0961-5539

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 15 June 2018

Ali Karakus, Tim Warburton, Mehmet Haluk Aksel and Cuneyt Sert

This study aims to focus on the development of a high-order discontinuous Galerkin method for the solution of unsteady, incompressible, multiphase flows with level set interface…

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to focus on the development of a high-order discontinuous Galerkin method for the solution of unsteady, incompressible, multiphase flows with level set interface formulation.

Design/methodology/approach

Nodal discontinuous Galerkin discretization is used for incompressible Navier–Stokes, level set advection and reinitialization equations on adaptive unstructured elements. Implicit systems arising from the semi-explicit time discretization of the flow equations are solved with a p-multigrid preconditioned conjugate gradient method, which minimizes the memory requirements and increases overall run-time performance. Computations are localized mostly near the interface location to reduce computational cost without sacrificing the accuracy.

Findings

The proposed method allows to capture interface topology accurately in simulating wide range of flow regimes with high density/viscosity ratios and offers good mass conservation even in relatively coarse grids, while keeping the simplicity of the level set interface modeling. Efficiency, local high-order accuracy and mass conservation of the method are confirmed through distinct numerical test cases of sloshing, dam break and Rayleigh–Taylor instability.

Originality/value

A fully discontinuous Galerkin, high-order, adaptive method on unstructured grids is introduced where flow and interface equations are solved in discontinuous space.

Details

International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat & Fluid Flow, vol. 28 no. 6
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0961-5539

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 14 June 2011

Antonio Fabio Di Rienzo, Pietro Asinari, Romano Borchiellini and Sunhash C. Mishra

The purpose of this paper is to present and validate some improvements to the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) for solving radiative heat transfer in a participating medium…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to present and validate some improvements to the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) for solving radiative heat transfer in a participating medium. Validation of the model is performed by investigating the effects of spatial and angular discretizations and extinction coefficient on the solution. The error analysis and the order of convergence of the scheme are also reported.

Design/methodology/approach

LB scheme is derived from the radiative transfer equation, where isotropic scattering and radiative equilibrium condition are assumed. Azimuthal angle is discretized according to the lattice velocities on the computational plane, while, concerning the polar angle, an additional component of the discrete velocity normal to the plane is introduced. Radiative LB scheme is used to solve a 2‐D square enclosure benchmark problem. In order to validate the model, results of LB scheme are compared with a reference solution obtained through a Richardson extrapolation of the results of a standard finite volume method.

Findings

The proposed improvements drastically increase the accuracy of the previous method. Radiative LB scheme is found to be (at most) first order accurate. Numerical results show that solution gets more accurate when spatial and azimuthal angle discretizations are improved, but a saturation threshold exists. With regard to polar angle, minimum error occurs when a particular subdivision is considered.

Originality/value

The paper provides simple but effective improvements to the recently proposed lattice Boltzmann method for solving radiative heat transfer in a participating medium.

Details

International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat & Fluid Flow, vol. 21 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0961-5539

Keywords

1 – 10 of 241