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Numerical simulations of viscous flows using a meshless method
Author(s) -
You Changfu,
Qiu Yi,
Xu Xuchang,
Xu Delong
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
international journal for numerical methods in fluids
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.938
H-Index - 112
eISSN - 1097-0363
pISSN - 0271-2091
DOI - 10.1002/fld.1760
Subject(s) - finite element method , strouhal number , reynolds number , galerkin method , mechanics , drag , discretization , lift (data mining) , mathematics , computational fluid dynamics , pressure correction method , potential flow around a circular cylinder , classical mechanics , compressibility , turbulence , physics , mathematical analysis , computer science , data mining , thermodynamics
This paper uses the element‐free Galerkin (EFG) method to simulate 2D, viscous, incompressible flows. The control equations are discretized with the standard Galerkin method in space and a fractional step finite element scheme in time. Regular background cells are used for the quadrature. Several classical fluid mechanics problems were analyzed including flow in a pipe, flow past a step and flow in a driven cavity. The flow field computed with the EFG method compared well with those calculated using the finite element method (FEM) and finite difference method. The simulations show that although EFG is more expensive computationally than FEM, it is capable of dealing with cases where the nodes are poorly distributed or even overlap with each other; hence, it may be used to resolve remeshing problems in direct numerical simulations. Flows around a cylinder for different Reynolds numbers are also simulated to study the flow patterns for various conditions and the drag and lift forces exerted by the fluid on the cylinder. These forces are calculated by integrating the pressure and shear forces over the cylinder surface. The results show how the drag and lift forces oscillate for high Reynolds numbers. The calculated Strouhal number agrees well with previous results. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.