Nodeless variable finite element method for heat transfer analysis by means of flux-based formulation and mesh adaptation

Based on flux-based formulation, a nodeless variable element method is developed to analyze two-dimensional steady-state and transient heat transfer problems. The nodeless variable element employs quadratic interpolation functions to provide higher solution accuracy without necessity to actually generate additional nodes. The flux-based formulation is applied to reduce the complexity in deriving the finite element equations as compared to the conventional finite element method, The solution accuracy is further improved by implementing an adaptive meshing technique to generaie finite element mesh that can adapt and move along corresponding to the solution behavior. The technique generates small elements in the regions of steep solution gradients to provide accurate solution, and meanwhile it generates larger elements in the other regions where the solution gradients are slight to reduce the computational time and the computer memory. The effectiveness of the combined procedure is demonstrated by heat transfer problems that have exact solutions. These problems tire： （a） a steady-state heat conduction analysis in a square plate subjected to a highly localized surface heating, and （b） a transient heat conduction analysis in a long plate subjected to moving heat source.

A mesh optimization method using machine learning technique and variational mesh adaptation

Computational mesh is an important ingredient that affects the accuracy and efficiency of CFD numerical simulation.In light of the introduced large amount of computational costs for many adaptive mesh methods,moving mesh methods keep the number of nodes and topology of a mesh unchanged and do not increase CFD computational expense.As the state-of-the-art moving mesh method,the variational mesh adaptation approach has been introduced to CFD calculation.However,quickly estimating the flow field on the updated meshes during the iterative algorithm is challenging.A mesh optimization method,which embeds a machine learning regression model into the variational mesh adaptation,is proposed.The regression model captures the mapping between the initial mesh nodes and the flow field,so that the variational method could move mesh nodes iteratively by solving the mesh functional which is built from the estimated flow field on the updated mesh via the regression model.After the optimization,the density of the nodes in the high gradient area increases while the density in the low gradient area decreases.Benchmark examples are first used to verify the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed method.And then we use the steady subsonic and transonic flows over cylinder and NACA0012 airfoil on unstructured triangular meshes to test our method.Results show that the proposed method significantly improves the accuracy of the local flow features on the adaptive meshes.Our work indicates that the proposed mesh optimization approach is promising for improving the accuracy and efficiency of CFD computation.

Mesh Adaptation for Curing the Pathological Behaviors of an Upwind Scheme

In present paper,mesh adaptation is applied for curing the pathological behaviors of the enhanced time-accurate upwind scheme(Loh&Jorgenson,AIAAJ 2016).In the original ETAU(enhanced time-accurate upwind)scheme,a multidimensional dissipation model is required to cure the pathological behaviors.The multi-dimensional dissipation model will increase the global dissipation level reducing numerical resolution.In present work,the metric-based mesh adaptation strategy provides an alternative way to cure the pathological behaviors of the shock capturing.The Hessian matrix of flow variables is applied to construct the metric,which represents the curvature of the physical solution.The adapting operation can well refine the anisotropic meshes at the location with large gradients.The numerical results show that the adaptation of mesh provides a possible way to cure the pathological behaviors of upwind schemes.

Simulation of Vortex Convection in a Compressible Viscous Flow with Dynamic Mesh Adaptation

In this work,vortex convection is simulated using a dynamic mesh adaptation procedure.In each adaptation period,the mesh is refined in the regions where the phenomena evolve and is coarsened in the regions where the phenomena deviate since the last adaptation.A simple indicator of mesh adaptation that accounts for the solution progression is defined.The generation of dynamic adaptive meshes is based on multilevel refinement/coarsening.The efficiency and accuracy of the present procedure are validated by simulating vortex convection in a uniform flow.Two unsteady compressible turbulent flows involving blade-vortex interactions are investigated to demonstrate further the applicability of the procedure.Computed results agree well with the published experimental data or numerical results.

Mathematical Principles of Anisotropic Mesh Adaptation

Mesh adaptation is studied from the mesh control point of view.Two principles,equidistribution and alignment,are obtained and found to be necessary and sufficient for a complete control of the size,shape,and orientation of mesh elements.A key component in these principles is the monitor function,a symmetric and positive definite matrix used for specifying the mesh information.A monitor function is defined based on interpolation error in a way with which an error bound is minimized on a mesh satisfying the equidistribution and alignment conditions.Algorithms for generating meshes satisfying the conditions are developed and two-dimensional numerical results are presented.

Cavitation Evolution Around a Twist Hydrofoil by Large Eddy Simulation(LES)with Mesh Adaption

The cavitating flow around a Delft Twist-11 hydrofoil is simulated using the large eddy simulation approach.The volume-of-fluid method incorporated with the Schnerr-Sauer cavitation model is utilized to track the water-vapor interface.Adaptive mesh refinement(AMR)is also applied to improve the simulation accuracy automatically.Two refinement levels are conducted to verify the dominance of AMR in predicting cavitating flows.Results show that cavitation features,including the U-type structure of shedding clouds,are consistent with experimental observations.Even a coarse mesh can precisely capture the phase field without increasing the total cell number significantly using mesh adaption.The predicted shedding frequency agrees fairly well with the experimental data under refinement level 2.This study illustrates that AMR is a promising approach to achieve accurate simulations for multiscale cavitating flows within limited computational costs.Finally,the force element method is currently adopted to investigate the lift and drag fluctuations during the evolution of cavitation structure.The mechanisms of lift and drag fluctuations due to cavitation and the interaction between vorticity forces and cavitation are explicitly revealed.

Phase-field simulation of dendritic solidification using a full threaded tree with adaptive meshing

Simulation of the microstructure evolution during solidifi cation is greatly benefi cial to the control of solidifi cation microstructures. A phase-fi eld method based on the full threaded tree(FTT) for the simulation of casting solidifi cation microstructure was proposed in this paper, and the structure of the full threaded tree and the mesh refi nement method was discussed. During dendritic growth in solidifi cation, the mesh for simulation is adaptively refi ned at the liquid-solid interface, and coarsened in other areas. The numerical results of a threedimension dendrite growth indicate that the phase-fi eld method based on FTT is suitable for microstructure simulation. Most importantly, the FTT method can increase the spatial and temporal resolutions beyond the limits imposed by the available hardware compared with the conventional uniform mesh. At the simulation time of 0.03 s in this study, the computer memory used for computation is no more than 10 MB with the FTT method, while it is about 50 MB with the uniform mesh method. In addition, the proposed FTT method is more effi cient in computation time when compared with the uniform mesh method. It would take about 20 h for the uniform mesh method, while only 2 h for the FTT method for computation when the solidifi cation time is 0.17 s in this study.

Combined adaptive meshing technique and characteristic-based split algorithm for viscous incompressible flow analysis

A combined characteristic-based split algorithm and all adaptive meshing technique for analyzing two-dimensional viscous incompressible flow are presented. Tile method uses the three-node triangular element with equal-order interpolation functions for all variables of tile velocity components and pressure. The main advantage of the combined nlethod is that it inlproves the sohltion accuracy by coupling an error estinla- tion procedure to an adaptive meshing technique that generates small elements in regions with a large change ill sohmtion gradients, mid at the same time, larger elements in the other regions. The performance of the combined procedure is evaluated by analyzing one test case of the flow past a cylinder, for their transient and steady-state flow behaviors.

High-order schemes for predicting computational aeroacoustic propagation with adaptive mesh refinement

High-order schemes based on block-structured adaptive mesh refinement method are prepared to solve computational aeroacoustic （CAA） problems with an aim at improving computational efficiency. A number of numerical issues associated with high-order schemes on an adaptively refined mesh, such as stability and accuracy are addressed. Several CAA benchmark problems are used to demonstrate the feasibility and efficiency of the approach.

Two-Dimensional Euler Adaptive Mesh Method on Detonation

The adaptive mesh refinement （AMR） method is applied in the 2-D Euler multi-component elasticplastic hydrodynamics code （MEPH2Y）. It is applied on detonation. Firstly, the AMR method is described, including a conservative spatial interpolation, the time integration methodology with the adapitve time increment and an adaptive computational region method. The advantage of AMR technique is exhibited by numerical examples, including the 1-D C-J detonation and the 2-D implosion ignited from a single point. Results show that AMR can promote the computational efficiency, keeping the accuracy in interesting regions.

DEVELOPMENT AND APPLICATION OF ADAPTIVE MESH TECHNIQUE IN THREE DIMENSIONAL NUMERICAL SIMULATION OF WELDING PROCESS

The adaptive mesh mesh technique is developed and applied in three dimensional numerical simulation of welding process on the base of the commercial software. Special user subroutine is worked out to accom- plish this function.This technique can make the dense mesh moving simultaneously with the heat source while the other area of the structure with much coarser mesh, greatly reducing the number of nodes and elements in the analysis.Temperature field,displacement and stress distributions during welding pro- cess me analyzed by FEM method with adaptive mesh and the analysis is also conducted with normal FEM method. The temperature field,displacement and stress distributions obtained with both methods are shown in contrast. The results show that the temperature fields and the displacement distributions of simulation on adaptive mesh correspond wery well with that of without adaptive mesh. Though the stress distributions have some difference,but the trends of the stress distribution are corresponding.The com- parison of the computing time of the two meshes indicates that the adaptive that the adaptive mesh can greatly reduce the calculation time when used for welding process.

METHOD FOR ADAPTIVE MESH GENERATION BASED ON GEOMETRICAL FEATURES OF 3D SOLID

In order to provide a guidance to specify the element size dynamically during adaptive finite element mesh generation, adaptive criteria are firstly defined according to the relationships between the geometrical features and the elements of 3D solid. Various modes based on different datum geometrical elements, such as vertex, curve, surface, and so on, are then designed for generating local refined mesh. With the guidance of the defmed criteria, different modes are automatically selected to apply on the appropriate datum objects to program the element size in the local special areas. As a result, the control information of element size is successfully programmed covering the entire domain based on the geometrical features of 3D solid. A new algorithm based on Delatmay triangulation is then developed for generating 3D adaptive finite element mesh, in which the element size is dynamically specified to catch the geometrical features and suitable tetrahedron facets are selected to locate interior nodes continuously. As a result, adaptive mesh with good-quality elements is generated. Examples show that the proposed method can be successfully applied to adaptive finite element mesh automatic generation based on the geometrical features of 3D solid.

A three-dimensional robust volume-of-fluid solver based on the adaptive mesh refinement

The present study provides a three-dimensional volume-of-fluid method based on the adaptive mesh refinement technique.The projection method on the adaptive mesh is introduced for solving the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations.The octree structure mesh is employed to solve the flow velocities and the pressure.The developed solver is applied to simulate the deformation of the cubic droplet driven by the surface tension without the effect of the gravity.The numerical results well predict the shape evolution of the droplet.

DISCONTINUITY-CAPTURING FINITE ELEMENT COMPUTATION OF UNSTEADY FLOW WITH ADAPTIVE UNSTRUCTURED MESH

A discontinuity-capturing scheme of finite element method(FEM)is proposed.The unstructured-grid technique combined with a new type of adaptive mesh approach is developed for both compressible and incompressible unsteady flows,which exhibits the capability of capturing the shock waves and/or thin shear layers accurately in an unsteady viscous flow at high Reynolds number. In particular,a new testing variable,i.e.,the disturbed kinetic energy E,is suggested and used in the adaptive mesh computation,which is universally applicable to the capturing of both shock waves and shear layers in the inviscid flow and viscous flow at high Reynolds number.Based on several calculated examples,this approach has been proved to be effective and efficient for the calculations of compressible and incompressible flows.

A Numerical Model for Simulating Two-Phase Flow with Adaptive Mesh Refinement

In this study,a numerical model for simulating two-phase flow is developed.The Cartesian grid with Adaptive Mesh Refinement(AMR)is adopted to reduce the computational cost.An explicit projection method is used for the time integration and the Finite Difference Method(FDM)is applied on a staggered grid for the discretization of spatial derivatives.The Volume of Fluid(VOF)method with Piecewise-Linear Interface Calculation(PLIC)is extended to the AMR grid to capture the gas-water interface accurately.A coarse-fine interface treatment method is developed to preserve the flux conservation at the interfaces.Several two-dimensional(2D)and three-dimensional(3D)benchmark cases are carried out for the validation of the model.2D and 3D shear flow tests are conducted to validate the extension of the VOF method to the AMR grid.A 2D linear sloshing case is considered in which the model is proved to have 2nd-order accuracy in space.The efficiency of applying the AMR grid is discussed with a nonlinear sloshing problem.Finally,2D solitary wave past stage and 2D/3D dam break are simulated to demonstrate that the model is able to simulate violent interface problems.

Adaptive Moving Mesh Central-Upwind Schemes for Hyperbolic System of PDEs:Applications to Compressible Euler Equations and Granular Hydrodynamics

We introduce adaptive moving mesh central-upwind schemes for one-and two-dimensional hyperbolic systems of conservation and balance laws.The proposed methods consist of three steps.First,the solution is evolved by solving the studied system by the second-order semi-discrete central-upwind scheme on either the one-dimensional nonuniform grid or the two-dimensional structured quadrilateral mesh.When the evolution step is complete,the grid points are redistributed according to the moving mesh differential equation.Finally,the evolved solution is projected onto the new mesh in a conservative manner.The resulting adaptive moving mesh methods are applied to the one-and two-dimensional Euler equations of gas dynamics and granular hydrodynamics systems.Our numerical results demonstrate that in both cases,the adaptive moving mesh central-upwind schemes outperform their uniform mesh counterparts.

A local pseudo arc-length method for hyperbolic conservation laws

A local pseudo arc-length method（LPALM）for solving hyperbolic conservation laws is presented in this paper.The key idea of this method comes from the original arc-length method,through which the critical points are bypassed by transforming the computational space.The method is based on local changes of physical variables to choose the discontinuous stencil and introduce the pseudo arc-length parameter,and then transform the governing equations from physical space to arc-length space.In order to solve these equations in arc-length coordinate,it is necessary to combine the velocity of mesh points in the moving mesh method,and then convert the physical variable in arclength space back to physical space.Numerical examples have proved the effectiveness and generality of the new approach for linear equation,nonlinear equation and system of equations with discontinuous initial values.Non-oscillation solution can be obtained by adjusting the parameter and the mesh refinement number for problems containing both shock and rarefaction waves.

Model Adaptation Enriched with an Anisotropic Mesh Spacing for Nonlinear Equations: Application to Environmental and CFD Problems

Goal of this paper is to suitably combine a model with an anisotropic mesh adaptation for the numerical simulation of nonlinear advection-diffusion-reaction systems and incompressible flows in ecological and environmental applications.Using the reduced-basis method terminology,the proposed approach leads to a noticeable computational saving of the online phase with respect to the resolution of the reference model on nonadapted grids.The search of a suitable adapted model/mesh pair is to be meant,instead,in an offline fashion.

Three dimensional numerical simulation of welding temperature fields in stainless steel

Three kinds of mathematical models representing welding heat sources are presented. Among them, Gaussian model and double ellipsoidal model are used to analyze the thermal distributions with finite element method. At the same time, this paper analyzed the influences of the heat source models, the latent heat and the welding parameters on the temperature distributions. The comparisons between the simulated results and the experiments show double ellipsoidal model is good for three-dimensional numerical simulations. Furthermore, the adaptive mesh technique is applied in the three-dimensional model which greatly reduces the number of nodes and elements in the simulation.

Finite element analyses of slope stability problems using non-associated plasticity

In recent years, finite element analyses have increasingly been utilized for slope stability problems. In comparison to limit equilibrium methods, numerical analyses do not require any definition of the failure mechanism a priori and enable the determination of the safety level more accurately. The paper compares the performances of strength reduction finite element analysis(SRFEA) with finite element limit analysis(FELA), whereby the focus is related to non-associated plasticity. Displacement-based finite element analyses using a strength reduction technique suffer from numerical instabilities when using non-associated plasticity, especially when dealing with high friction angles but moderate dilatancy angles. The FELA on the other hand provides rigorous upper and lower bounds of the factor of safety(FoS) but is restricted to associated flow rules. Suggestions to overcome this problem, proposed by Davis(1968), lead to conservative FoSs; therefore, an enhanced procedure has been investigated. When using the modified approach, both the SRFEA and the FELA provide very similar results. Further studies highlight the advantages of using an adaptive mesh refinement to determine FoSs. Additionally, it is shown that the initial stress field does not affect the FoS when using a Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion.