Computation of Attached Three-Dimensional Turbulent Boundary Layers

• Published in: Journal of computational physics Vol. 109; no. 2; pp. 202 - 214
• Main Authors: Degani, A.T., Walker, J.D.A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Amsterdam Elsevier Inc 1993; Elsevier
• Subjects: Classical and quantum physics: mechanics and fields; Classical mechanics of continuous media: general mathematical aspects; Computational methods in fluid dynamics; Exact sciences and technology; Fluid mechanics: general mathematical aspects; Physics; Numerical method; Turbulent flow; Boundary layers; Asymptotic behavior
• ISSN: 0021-9991; 1090-2716
• DOI: 10.1006/jcph.1993.1212

In conventional calculation schemes for turbulent flow near walls, a substantial number of mesh points are required to resolve the intense profile variations in the near-wall region. In the present method, the velocity distribution across the entire wall layer is represented by analytic embedded functions; the outer-layer flow is calculated subject to the condition that the numerical solution blends smoothly into the embedded wall-layer functions. As the computation proceeds downstream, the wall shear stress and the wall skew angle are obtained from algebraic formulae derived from a general asymptotic analysis. It is shown that on the order of a 50% reduction of mesh points may be realized without any degradation in the accuracy of the computed results. The present methodology is very robust and capable of calculating bi-directionally skewed cross-stream velocity profiles.