MMME4108

University of Nottingham
Malaysia
DEPARTMENT OF MECHANICAL, MATERIALS AND MANUFACTURING ENGINEERING

A LEVEL 4 MODULE, SPRING SEMESTER 2020-2021

COMPUTATIONAL FLUID DYNAMICS

Time allowed TWO Hours

No Shout Out Policy

This examination will be conducted with the above policy in place. If there is a suspected
mistake with the paper, please do not highlight to the invigilator during the examination.
Please note down and contact the convenor at the next convenient time after the
examination.

INSTRUCTIONS:

Answer ALL questions in Sections A & B.

Note that plagiarism and late submission will be penalised accordingly.

Read and adhere to the following instructions:

1. Download the question paper from the Moodle site of the Module before the
examination commences. The softcopy of the question paper is password-protected.
The password will be available 5 minutes before the start time of the examination.

2. The examination starts at 1530 (Malaysia time). Stop writing or answering at 1730
(Malaysian time).

3. Use the CamScanner App to scan the answer scripts to a single PDF file. The
maximum allowable file size is 10 MB. Rename the PDF file to YourName-StudentID-
MMME4108.pdf. For example, ChinCheeSeong-20012345-MMME4108.pdf.

4. Ensure to indicate your name and student ID on the top of every page of your
answer scripts.

5. Upload the PDF file to the submission box in Moodle site of the Module not later than
1800 (Malaysian time) on the same day of the assessment.

6. If you face difficulty uploading to Moodle, send the PDF files to

khaiching.ng@nottingham.edu.my. Else contact the module convenor.

7. It is your responsibility to ensure the clarity and readability of your work.

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SECTION A
(60 marks, Answer ALL questions)

1. (a) Estimate the time required (in sec.) to solve a CFD problem requiring 1000
iterations with the total number of mesh elements N = 10,000. The number of
floating point operations required by this CFD method is 3Nlog10(N) per iteration.
The employed CPU has 8 cores and the clock speed is 2.5 GHz.
[5 marks]

(b) You are given a task to simulate the fluid-structure interaction problem consisting
of fluid and complex moving rigid solid body. Describe ONE (1) challenge in terms
of meshing and identify TWO (2) strategies to overcome this challenge.
[5 marks]

2. (a) For the general 2nd order PDE given below, determine the values of 𝛼 and 𝛽 so
that the equation is parabolic.

𝜕2𝜃 𝜕2𝜃
(𝛼 + 3) +𝛽 2 = 0
𝜕𝑥 2 𝜕𝑦
[5 marks]

(b) Compare the characteristics of implicit and explicit methods in CFD. Which method
is easier for numerical implementation in CFD? Explain.
[5 marks]

3. (a) If you are asked to perform a multiphase simulation involving combustion of a

droplet of liquid fuel, would you consider one-way or two-way coupling? Explain
why.
[5 marks]

(b) Given the matrix below, formulate the necessary criteria for ensuring the
convergence of an iterative method used to solve the following system, by
assuming that a, b and c are positive numbers.

 a b − 1  x1  a 
− 18 b 2  x  =  c 
   2  
 3 b 2c  x 3  b 
[5 marks]

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4. (a) Differentiate between Direct Numerical Simulation (DNS), Large Eddy Simulation
(LES) and Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) approaches in terms of how
the motions of small-scale eddies are captured.
[5 marks]

(b) You are required to simulate the motion of the translating & rotating cylinder (see
Figure 1(a)) within the fluid driven by the shearing actions at the top and bottom
walls. The measured velocity profile for the moving cylinder is shown in Figure
1(b). If the radius R is equal to 0.125 cm and the fluid has a kinematic viscosity
of 5 × 10-6 m2/s, identify which viscous model in ANSYS FLUENT you would use to
run the simulation.

(a)

0.0002
0.0000
-0.0002
u [m/s]

-0.0004
-0.0006
-0.0008
-0.0010
-0.0012
0 10 20 30 40 50
time [s]
(b)

Figure 1
[5 marks]

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5. (a) The standard Central Difference Scheme (CDS) is second-order accurate;

however, it is not implemented in ANSYS FLUENT for convective discretization.
Instead, the First-order Upwind Scheme (FUS) is implemented. Explain the
possible reason and point out how ANSYS FLUENT addresses the accuracy issue
of FUS.
[5 marks]

(b) Express the discretised form of unsteady differential equation below using the
implicit Euler method. Also indicate the order of accuracy of the method. F(.) is a
general mathematical function.

𝑑𝑢
= 𝐹(𝑢)
𝑑𝑡
[2 marks]

6. (a) The general X-momentum equation for a compressible fluid is:

Create a simplified X-momentum equation if the fluid is treated as incompressible

and of constant viscosity.
[6 marks]

(b) From a simple rectangular mesh shown in Figure 2, verify that the discretization
forms of differential term (div(𝑢
⃗ )) using the finite volume method and the finite
difference method (i.e. central differencing scheme evaluated at cell center i) are
essentially the same. Note, the velocity components u and v are stored at the cell
vertices 1, 2, 3 and 4.

Figure 2
[7 marks]
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SECTION B
(40 marks, Answer ALL question)

7. Figure 3 shows the schematic diagram of a city layout (consisting of Buildings A, B, C

and D). The wind velocity Uwind is 1.5 m/s. The main aim is to study the airflow pattern
in the vicinities of these scaled-down buildings using minimum computing resources.

Figure 3

(a) Based on the diagram in Figure 3, sketch the CFD domain.

[5 marks]

(b) State a meshing method for the above problem and give TWO (2) reasons for
choosing this method.
[5 marks]

(c) Provide a criterion for the suitable mesh size for this problem to be solved using
RANS and explain.
[5 marks]

(d) From the sketch in (a), prescribe the boundary conditions at all boundaries.
[5 marks]

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8. The Bunsen burner shown in Figure 4 is used to burn oxygen and propane in
stoichiometric condition. Nitrogen is flowing externally to the Bunsen burner. The burner
diameter D is 7.5 mm, the velocity U of the mixture of air and propane is 0.6 m/s and
the kinematic viscosity is 1  10-5 m2/s. The chemical reaction can be represented by the
following equation:

C3H8 + 5 O2 -> 3 CO2 + 4 H2O

Figure 4

(a) The simulation can be performed in 2-dimensional (2D) or 3-dimensional (3D)

manner. Explain your choice and sketch the possible calculation domain.
[5 marks]

(b) Indicate if the flow is laminar or turbulent. In case the flow is turbulent which
turbulence model is more suitable?
[4 marks]

(c) Name the equations to be used for solving this problem.

[7 marks]

(d) Explain if the Boussinesq approximation of density is suitable for this simulation.
[4 marks]

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