A Chimera method for high-fidelity simulation of turbulent flows

TL;DR

This paper introduces a Chimera method with a block-structured solver for high-fidelity turbulent flow simulations in complex geometries, ensuring accuracy and minimal diffusion through advanced discretization and filtering techniques.

Contribution

It presents a novel Chimera approach combining dissipation-free discretization and high-order filtering, maintaining accuracy across overlapping meshes in turbulent flow simulations.

Findings

Uniform accuracy achieved on distorted, overlapping meshes.

Effective for turbulent pipe flow with no interface issues.

Accurately models flow past complex geometries like ship propellers.

Abstract

We develop a block-structured solver for high-fidelity simulation of flows in complex geometries, based on overlapping (Chimera) meshes. The key components of the algorithm are a baseline dissipation-free central discretization and selective high-order filtering, which ensure uniform accuracy and minimal numerical diffusion. These favorable properties are preserved through efficient interpolation across overlapping blocks. Numerical tests demonstrate that the method guarantees a uniform order of accuracy even for distorted, overlapping meshes. Tests conducted for turbulent flow in a pipe show no significant issues at the interfaces or overlapping blocks, highlighting the method's potential for direct numerical simulation (DNS). Finally, we show that the method performs satisfactorily for geometrically complex problems, such as flow past a ship propeller, where it accurately replicates experimental data.