Free Surface Flow

Dr. Alan D. Burns

Senior Software Developer
ANSYS Europe Ltd.

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 1 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Free Surface Flow: Outline

• Introduction to Free Surface Flow

• Homogeneous Multiphase
• Implementation and Examples
• Surface Tension
• Advanced Topics
– Inhomogeneous Free Surface Flow
• Validation Examples

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 2 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 What is Free Surface Flow

• Free surface flow

– separated multiphase flow
– fluids separated by distinct resolvable interface
– examples: open channel flow, flow around ship hulls, water
jet in air (Pelton wheel), tank filling, etc.

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 3 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Dimensionless Groups (1)

V convective speed
• Froude number Fr  
gL wave speed
– L=h (water depth) for shallow water flow
– L=/2 (wavelength) for sinusoidal wave train in deep water
– for flow around ship hulls, there is not a single wave velocity,
but we can still define a Froude number based on the ship
geometry
• Analogies with Mach number
– flow can be subcritical, transcritical, or supercritical
– hydraulic jump is a ‘shock’
– ‘Supercritical outlet’ analogous to ‘Supersonic outlet’

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 4 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Dimensionless Groups (2)

• Eotvos (Bond) number: gL2 gravity force

Eo  
 surface tension force
– Affects shapes of drops and bubbles.

• Weber number U 2 L Inertial force

We  
 Surface tension force
– Affects breakup of drops and bubbles.

• Capillary number: U We Viscous force

  Ca 
 Re Surface tension force
• Marangoni number: Ma    T L
T  K CP
– Marangoni effect = convection on a free surface due to surface tension
differences.

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 5 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Homogeneous MPF (1)

• Homogeneous MPF model

– Air and water are separated by a distinct free surface interface (may be
smeared by numerics)
– Only one velocity at each point in space: bulk velocity

Ui  U i   rUi  U i


– Sufficient to solve for this bulk velocity field

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 6 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Homogeneous MPF (2)

• Other Applications
– U i  U i in the limit of infinite interphase drag.
 

• Hence also valid when:

– interphase drag is very large, and
– body forces are neglible.

• E.g. Cavitation Bubbles:

– Cavitation bubbles are very small
– Cavitation usually occurs in high speed flow situations,
where bubble drift velocity due to gravity is negligible.

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 7 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Homogeneous MPF: Momentum

• Phasic momentum equations:

 (r U i )  (r U jU i ) p  (r ji )
  r i  r  g 
i
 M
t x j
x x j

• Sum over phases, and assume U i  U i 

 ( U i )  ( U jU i ) p  ji
     g i
 j
t x j
x i
x
   r   ji   r ji
 

• Essentially a single-phase momentum equation

with mixture density and viscosity
© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 8 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary
 Homogeneous MPF: Continuity

• Phasic continuity:  (r  )  (r U j )

 0
t x j

• If homogeneous:  (r  )  (r U j )

 0
t x j

– Still need to solve for separate volume fraction fields.



r  1
• Volume continuity:
U j
• Incompressible case implies: 0
x j

• Solve for (N-1) volume fractions and treat the other as a ballast

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 9 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Homogeneous MPF: Other equations

• Bulk equations solved for other homogeneous

field variables also
– turbulence
– additional variables
• Homogeneous Heat Transfer is a special case
– temperature is homogeneous
– enthalpy is a principal variable (not shared among fluids)
– solution: solve two phasic equations with a large interphase
heat transfer term to force temperatures to be the same
• Inhomogeneous Heat Transfer
– May be combined with homogeneous momentum transfer.
– E.g. to model evaporation at a free surface.

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 10 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Free Surface Flow: Discretisation

• MPF Model
– usually homogeneous MPF model
• Advection and transient terms
– High resolution scheme is too diffusive for free surface flow
– Hence use Compressive discretization
– interface typically smeared over 2-3 elements
• Pressure-velocity coupling (Rhie-Chow)
– special treatment of buoyancy force to keep flow well-behaved at
interface

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 11 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Transcritical Bump

Laboratory photo (Forbes, 1988)

Fr=0.32 Fr = 2.5

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 12 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Bump (Mesh)

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 13 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Bump (Upwind)

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 14 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Bump (High Res)

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 15 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Bump (Compressive)

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 16 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Maxwell’s Experiment

• 2-D transient problem

• Solved with hex and prismatic meshes
• Hex mesh (~10000 nodes on plane)

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 17 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Maxwell’s Experiment

• Upwind • Compressive

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 18 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Free Surface Flow: Jet with Adaption

No adaption One step Two steps

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 19 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Free Surface Flow: Gear Box

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 20 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Sink & Trim Problem

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 21 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Free Surface Flow: Solution Method

• SVF = Segregated Volume Fractions

– CFX-10.0 and earlier releases.
– Volume fraction coefficients frozen in continuity and gravitational
terms.
– Solve 4x4 Momentum-Volume system simultaneously for U, V, W, P
– Solve phasic mass equations afterwards, for volume fractions, r,
treating one as balast.
• Time Step Restriction
– Lagging of gravitational term implies a stability restriction on
physical time scale.
– Must be less than period of internal gravity waves.

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 22 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Free Surface Flow: Solution Method

• CVF = Coupled Volume Fractions

– New option in CFX-11.0.
– Volume fraction coefficients active in continuity due to Newton
linearisation of mass fluxes.
– Volume fraction also active in gravitational term.
– Solve (4+N)x(4+N) Momentum-Volume system simultaneously for U, V,
W, P, r1, r1, …, rN.
– Removes time step restriction on stability.

U  mom  * * \ \ U 
   
V  mom  * * \ \ V 
W 
W - mom  * * \ \  
 
Volume  \ \ P
r 
Mass 1  * * * * * 
  1
r 
Mass 2  * * * * *   2

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 23 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Wigley Hull

• Mesh
– Coarse mesh: 100 000 nodes
– Fine mesh: 500 000 nodes
• Boundary Conditions
– Inlet: Velocity-specified
– Top: Entrainment opening
– Far-field: slip walls
– Outlet: hydrostatic pressure
profile
• Scale information
– Hull length = 3 m
– Speed = 1.45 m/s
– (Froude number=0.267)
– Flow timescale (L/V) = 2 s

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 24 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Wigley Hull (1) – SVF
• Physical Timescale
– 0.05 s for momentum
– 0.01 s for volume fraction
– small relative to L/V
timescale
– Required for SVF stability
– False Timestep
Linearisation On

• Observations
– Residuals do not
converge
– Drag never settles down

Coarse Fine

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 25 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Wigley Hull (1) – Coarse, CVF

• Physical Timescale
– 0.05 s for momentum
– 0.01 s for volume fraction
– Same as for SVF
• Observations
– Residuals converge slowly
– Drag converges slowly

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 26 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Wigley Hull (2)

• Physical Timescale
– 0.1 s for first 20 timesteps
– 0.2 s thereafter
– 10% of dynamical timescale, hence more realistic

• False Timestep Linearisation

– On

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 27 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Wigley Hull (2)

Coarse mesh Fine mesh

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 28 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Wigley Hull (3)

• Physical Timescale
– 0.1 s for first 20 timesteps
– 0.2 s thereafter
• False Timestep Linearisation
– Off after 20 timesteps (uses following CCL):
BUOYANCY MODEL:
FALSE TIMESTEP LINEARISATION:
Option = On
FTL Momentum Factor = step(20-atstep)
FTL Volume Fraction Factor = step(20-atstep)
FTL Rhie Chow Factor = step(20-atstep)
END
END

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 29 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Wigley Hull (3)

Coarse mesh Fine mesh

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 30 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Wigley Hull – Solution

Surface Elevation

Coarse mesh

Fine mesh

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 31 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Surface Tension

• An attractive force at the free surface interface

F
F σ
L
• Normal component
– smooths regions of high curvature
– induces pressure rise within droplet:
• Tangential component p  
– moves fluid along interface toward region of high 
– often called Marangoni effect (decreases with temperature)

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 32 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Surface Tension: Wall Adhesion

Non-wetting Wetting

  90 o   90o

• Wall adhesion is responsible for capillary rise in

tubes

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 33 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Surface Tension: Modelling

• Conceptually a surface force at interface


f s  nˆ   s
– awkward to deal with interface topology
• Reformulate as a continuum force
– Brackbill, Kothe, Zemach 1992

 
Fs  f s s
 s  r
    nˆ
nˆ specifies
• Wall contact angle r / r direction of normal at wall

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 34 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Surface Tension: Extreme angle

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 35 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Surface Tension: Colliding drops

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 36 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Surface Tension: Colliding drops

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 37 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Inhomogeneous Free Surface (1)

• Possible to use full inhomogeneous Eulerian

multiphase for free surface problems.
– Computationally more expensive than homogeneous model.

• Recommended for problems with unstable

overturning waves (Splashing).
– Homogeneous model may develop smeared interfaces over
several cells which persist in the solution.
– Inhomogeneous model allows light and heavy phases to
separate due to non-zero slip velocities induced by gravity.

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 38 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Inhomogeneous Free Surface (2)

• Extreme Example: Rayleigh-Taylor Instability.

• Inhomogeneous Model:
Heavy Fluid Light Fluid

Light Fluid Heavy Fluid

• Homogeneous Model:

Heavy Fluid
Homogeneous
Mixture
Light Fluid

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 39 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Inhomogeneous Free Surface (3)

• Suggested Implementation
– Set Liquid Phase Morphology = Continuous.
– Set Gas Phase Morphology = Dispersed Bubbles.
– Set Drag Law = Grace.
– Hence, smeared region is modelled as entrained bubbles in
continuous liquid
• Alternative
– Set both Phases Morphologies = Continuous.
– Set Drag Law = Mixture Model.

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 40 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Weir overflow (1)

• Homogeneous
model fails when
splashing occurs

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 41 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Weir overflow (2)

• Inhomogeneous
model results
• Air ‘bubbles’ with
Grace drag law

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 42 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Slug Flow (1)

Experiments by Th. Lex et al,

TD, TU Munich.

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 43 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Example: Slug Flow (2)

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 44 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Slug Flow Simulation (1)

• Multiphase Model Details:

– Mixture Model.
– Drag Coefficient = 0.44
– Interfacial Length Scale = 0.00193 [m].
• Based upon pipe diameter / no. of grid cells across diameter.

• Turbulence Model Details:

– Inhomogeneous k- model.
– Additional sinks in k- equations to represent turbulence
damping at interface.

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 45 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Slug Flow Simulation (2)

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 46 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary

 Slug Flow Simulation (3)

© 2006 ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. 47 ANSYS, Inc. Proprietary