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Analysis of preconditioned iterative solvers for incompressible flow problems
Author(s) -
Melchior S. A.,
Legat V.,
Van Dooren P.,
Wathen A. J.
Publication year - 2011
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.2505
Subject(s) - preconditioner , solver , generalized minimal residual method , mathematics , incompressible flow , navier–stokes equations , wedge (geometry) , iterative method , polygon mesh , convergence (economics) , rate of convergence , krylov subspace , domain decomposition methods , numerical analysis , block (permutation group theory) , finite element method , compressibility , mathematical optimization , flow (mathematics) , computer science , mathematical analysis , geometry , physics , mechanics , computer network , channel (broadcasting) , economics , thermodynamics , economic growth
Solving efficiently the incompressible Navier–Stokes equations is a major challenge, especially in the three‐dimensional case. The approach investigated by Elman et al. ( Finite Elements and Fast Iterative Solvers . Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2005) consists in applying a preconditioned GMRES method to the linearized problem at each iteration of a nonlinear scheme. The preconditioner is built as an approximation of an ideal block‐preconditioner that guarantees convergence in 2 or 3 iterations. In this paper, we investigate the numerical behavior for the three‐dimensional lid‐driven cavity problem with wedge elements; the ultimate motivation of this analysis is indeed the development of a preconditioned Krylov solver for stratified oceanic flows which can be efficiently tackled using such meshes. Numerical results for steady‐state solutions of both the Stokes and the Navier–Stokes problems are presented. Theoretical bounds on the spectrum and the rate of convergence appear to be in agreement with the numerical experiments. Sensitivity analysis on different aspects of the structure of the preconditioner and the block decomposition strategies are also discussed. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.