nSharma: Numerical Simulation Heterogeneity Aware Runtime Manager for OpenFOAM

CFD simulations are a fundamental engineering application,implying huge workloads, often with dynamic behaviour due to run-time mesh refinement. Parallel processing over heterogeneous distributedmemory clusters is often used to process such workloads. The executionof dynamic workloads over a set of heterogeneous resources leads to loadimbalances that severely impacts execution time, when static uniformload distribution is used. This paper proposes applying dynamic, het-erogeneity aware, load balancing techniques within CFD simulations.nSharma, a software package that fully integrates with OpenFOAM, ispresented and assessed. Performance gains are demonstrated, achievedby reducing busy times standard deviation among resources, i.e. hetero-geneous computing resources are kept busy with useful work due to aneffective workload distribution. To best of authors’ knowledge, nSharmais the first implementation and integration of heterogeneity aware loadbalancing in OpenFOAM and will be made publicly available in order tofoster its adoption by the large community of OpenFOAM users.The authors would like to thank the financial funding by FEDER through the COMPETE 2020 Program, the National Funds through FCT under the projects UID/CTM/50025/2013. The first author was partially funded by the PT-FLAD Chair on Smart Cities & Smart Governance and also by the School of Engineering, University of Minho within project Performance Portability on Scalable Heterogeneous Computing Systems. The authors also wish to thank Kyle Mooney for making available his code supporting migration of dynamically refined meshes, as well as acknowledge the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) at The University of Texas at Austin for providing HPC resources

An upwind cell centred finite volume method for large strain explicit solid dynamics in OpenFOAM

In practical engineering applications involving extremely complex geometries, meshing typically constitutes a large portion of the overall design and analysis time. In the computational mechanics community, the ability to perform calculations on tetrahedral meshes has become increasingly important. For these reasons, automated tetrahedral mesh generation by means of Delaunay and advancing front techniques have recently received increasing attention in a number of applications, namely: crash impact simulations, cardiovascular modelling, blast and fracture modelling. Unfortunately, modern industry codes in solid mechanics typically rely on the use of traditional displacement based Finite Element formulations which possess several distinct disadvantages, namely: (1) reduced order of convergence for strains and stresses in comparison with displacements; (2) high frequency noise in the vicinity of shocks; and (3) numerical instabilities associated with shear locking, volumetric locking and pressure checker-boarding. In order to address the above mentioned shortcomings, a new mixed-based set of equations for solid dynamics formulated in a system of first order hyperbolic conservation laws was introduced. Crucially, the new set of conservation laws has a similar structure to that of the well known Euler equations in the context of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). This enables us to borrow some of the available CFD technologies and to adapt the method in the context of solid dynamics. This thesis builds on the work carried out by Lee et al. 2013 by further developing the upwind cell centred finite volume framework for the numerical analysis of large strain explicit solid dynamics and its tailor-made implementation within the open source code OpenFOAM, extensively used in industrial and academic environments. The object oriented nature of OpenFOAM implementation provides a very efficient platform for future development. In this computational framework, the primary unknown variables are linear momentum and deformation gradient tensor of the system. Moreover, the formulation is further extended for an additional set of geometric strain measures comprising of the co-factor of deformation gradient tensor and the Jacobian of deformation, in order to simulate polyconvex constitutive models ensuring material stability. The domain is spatially discretised using a standard Godunov-type cell centred framework where second order accuracy is achieved by employing a linear reconstruction procedure in conjunction with a slope limiter. This leads to discontinuities in variables at the cell interface which motivate the use of a Riemann solver by introducing an upwind bias into the evaluation of numerical contact fluxes. The acoustic Riemann solver presented is further developed by applying preconditioned dissipation to improve its performance in the near incompressibility regime and extending its range to contact applications. Moreover, two evolutionary frameworks are proposed in this study to satisfy the underlying involutions (or compatibility conditions) of the system. Additionally, the spatial discretisation is alternatively represented through a nodal cell centred finite volume framework for comparison purposes. From a temporal discretisation point of view, a two stage Total Variation Diminishing Runge-Kutta time integrator is employed to ensure second order accuracy. Additionally, inclusion of a global posteriori angular momentum projection procedure enables preservation of angular momenta of the system. Finally, benchmark numerical examples are simulated to demonstrate various aspects of the formulation including mesh convergence, momentum preservation and the locking-free nature of the formulation on complex computational domains.En aplicaciones prácticas de ingeniería que implican geometrías extremadamente complejas, el mallado requiere típicamente una gran parte del tiempo total de diseño y análisis. En la comunidad de mecánica computacional, la capacidad de realizar cálculos sobre mallas tetraédricas está siendo cada vez más importante. Por estas razones, la generación automatizada de mallas tetraédricas por medio de técnicas de Delaunay y frente avanzado han recibido cada vez más atención en ciertas aplicaciones, a saber: simulaciones de impacto, modelado cardiovascular, modelado de explosión y fractura. Por desgracia, los códigos en la industria moderna para mecánica de sólidos se basan normalmente en el uso de formulaciones tradicionales de Elementos Finitos formulados en desplazamientos que poseen varias desventajas: (1) menor orden de convergencia para tensiones y deformaciones; (2) ruido de alta frecuencia cerca de las ondas de choque; y (3) inestabilidades numéricas asociadas con el bloqueo a cortante, el bloqueo volumétrico y oscilaciones de presión. Con el fin de abordar estas deficiencias, se introduce un nuevo conjunto de ecuaciones para mecánica del sólido formulada como un sistema de leyes de conservación de primer orden basada en una formulación mixta. Fundamentalmente, el nuevo sistema de leyes de conservación tiene una estructura similar a la de las famosas ecuaciones de Euler en el contexto de la Dinámica de Fluidos Computacional (CFD). Esto nos permite aprovechar algunas de las tecnologías CFD disponibles y adaptar el método en el contexto de la Mecánica de Sólidos. Esta tesis se basa en el trabajo realizado en Lee et al. 2013 mediante el desarrollo de la estructura de volúmenes finitos centrados en celdas upwind para el análisis numérico de dinámica del sólido explícita en grandes deformaciones y su implementación específicamente diseñada dentro del software de código abierto OpenFOAM, ampliamente utilizado ámbito académico e industrial. Además, la naturaleza orientada a objetos de su implementación proporciona una plataforma muy eficiente para su desarrollo posterior. En este marco computacional, las incógnitas básicas de este sistema son el momento lineal y el tensor gradiente de deformación. Asimismo, la formulación se extiende adicionalmente para un conjunto adicional de medidas de deformación que comprenden el cofactor del tensor gradiente de deformación y el jacobiano de deformación, con el fin de simular modelos constitutivos policonvexos que aseguran la estabilidad del material. El dominio se discretiza espacialmente usando un marco centrado en células de tipo Godunov estándar, donde se consigue la precisión de segundo orden empleando un procedimiento de reconstrucción lineal junto con un limitador de pendiente. Esto conduce a discontinuidades en las variables en la interfase de la célula que motivan el uso de un solucionador de Riemann mediante la introducción de un sesgo contra el viento en la evaluación de flujos de contacto numéricos. El presente solucionador acústico de Riemann es posteriormente desarrollado aplicando disipación pre-condicionada para mejorar su rendimiento en el cercano pero incompresibilidad régimen y extender su gama a aplicaciones de contacto. Además, se proponen dos marcos evolutivos en este estudio para satisfacer las involuciones subyacentes (o condiciones de compatibilidad) del sistema. Además, la discretización espacial se representa alternativamente a través de un marco de volumen finito centrado en células nodales para fines de comparación. Desde el punto de vista de la discretización temporal, se emplea un integrador temporal de Runge-Kutta de dos etapas con Disminución de Variación Total para asegurar segundo orden de precision. Finalmente, se simulan ejemplos numéricos de referencia para demostrar varios aspectos de la formulación que incluyen convergencia de malla, conservación de momento y la naturaleza libre de bloqueo de la formulación en dominios computacionales complejos

Numerical simulation of multiphase immiscible flow on unstructured meshes

The present thesis aims at developing a basis for the numerical simulation of multiphase flows of immiscible fluids. This approach, although limited by the computational power of the present computers, is potentially very important, since most of the physical phenomena of these flows often happen on space and time scales where experimental techniques are impossible to be utilized in practice. In particular, this research is focused on developing numerical discretizations suitable for three-dimensional (3-D) unstructured meshes. In detail, the first chapter delimits the considered multiphase flows to the case in which the components are immiscible fluids. In particular, the focus is placed on those cases where two or more continuous streams of different fluids are separated by interfaces, and hence, correspondingly named separated flows. Additionally, once the type of flow is determined, the chapter introduces the physical characteristics and the models available to predict its behavior, as well as the mathematical formulation that sustains the numerical techniques developed within this thesis. The second chapter introduces and analyzes a new geometrical Volume-of-Fluid (VOF) method for capturing interfaces on 3-D Cartesian and unstructured meshes. The method reconstructs interfaces as first- and second-order piecewise planar approximations (PLIC), and advects volumes in a single unsplit Lagrangian-Eulerian (LE) geometrical algorithm based on constructing flux polyhedrons by tracing back the Lagrangian trajectories of the cell-vertex velocities. In this way, the situations of overlapping between flux polyhedrons are minimized. Complementing the previous chapter, the third one proposes a parallelization strategy for the VOF method. The main obstacle is that the computing costs are concentrated in the interface between fluids. Consequently, if the interface is not homogeneously distributed, standard domain decomposition (DD) strategies lead to imbalanced workload distributions. Hence, the new strategy is based on a load balancing process complementary to the underlying domain decomposition. Its parallel efficiency has been analyzed using up to 1024 CPU-cores, and the results obtained show a gain with respect to the standard DD strategy up to 12x, depending on the size of the interface and the initial distribution. The fourth chapter describes the discretization of the single-phase Navier-Stokes equations to later extend it to the case of multiphase immiscible flow. One of the most important characteristics of the discretization schemes, aside from accuracy, is their capacity to discretely conserve kinetic energy, specially when solving turbulent flow. Hence, this chapter analyzes the accuracy and conservation properties of two particular collocated and staggered mesh schemes. The extension of the numerical schemes suitable for the single-phase Navier-Stokes equations to the case of multiphase immiscible flow is developed in the fifth chapter. Particularly, while the numerical techniques for the simulation of turbulent flow have evolved to discretely preserve mass, momentum and, specially, kinetic energy, the mesh schemes for the discretization of multiphase immiscible flow have evolved to improve their stability and robustness. Therefore, this chapter presents and analyzes two particular collocated and staggered mesh discretizations, able to simulate multiphase immiscible flow, which favor the discrete conservation of mass, momentum and kinetic energy. Finally, the sixth chapter numerically simulates the Richtmyer-Meshkov (RM) instability of two incompressible immiscible liquids. This chapter is a general assessment of the numerical methods developed along this thesis. In particular, the instability has been simulated by means of a VOF method and a staggered mesh scheme. The corresponding numerical results have shown the capacity of the discrete system to obtain accurate results for the RM instability.Aquesta tesi té com a objectiu desenvolupar una base per a la simulació numèrica de fluids multi-fase immiscibles. Aquesta estratègia, encara que limitada per la potència computacional dels computadors actuals, és potencialment molt important, ja que la majoria de la fenomenologia d'aquests fluids sovint passa en escales temporals i especials on les tècniques experimentals no poden ser utilitzades. En particular, aquest treball es centra en desenvolupar discretitzacions numèriques aptes per a malles no-estructurades en tres dimensions (3-D). En detall, el primer capítol delimita els casos multifásics considerats al cas en que els components són fluids immiscibles. En particular, la tesi es centra en aquells casos en que dos o més fluids diferents són separats per interfases, i per tant, corresponentment anomenats fluxos separats. A més a més, un cop el tipus de flux es determinat, el capítol introdueix les característiques físiques i els models disponibles per predir el seu comportament, així com també la formulació matemàtica i les tècniques numèriques desenvolupades en aquesta tesi. El segon capítol introdueix i analitza un nou mètode "Volume-of-Fluid" (VOF) apte per a capturar interfases en malles Cartesianes i no-estructurades 3-D. El mètode reconstrueix les interfases com aproximacions "piecewise planar approximations" (PLIC) de primer i segon ordre, i advecciona els volums amb un algoritme geomètric "unsplit Lagrangian-Eulerian" (LE) basat en construïr els poliedres a partir de les velocitats dels vèrtexs de les celdes. D'aquesta manera, les situacions de sobre-solapament entre poliedres són minimitzades. Complementant el capítol anterior, el tercer proposa una estratègia de paral·lelització pel mètode VOF. L'obstacle principal és que els costos computacionals estan concentrats en les celdes de l'interfase entre fluids. En conseqüència, si la interfase no està ben distribuïda, les estratègies de "domain decomposition" (DD) resulten en distribucions de càrrega desequilibrades. Per tant, la nova estratègia està basada en un procés de balanceig de càrrega complementària a la DD. La seva eficiència en paral·lel ha sigut analitzada utilitzant fins a 1024 CPU-cores, i els resultats obtinguts mostren uns guanys respecte l'estratègia DD de fins a 12x, depenent del tamany de la interfase i de la distribució inicial. El quart capítol descriu la discretització de les equacions de Navier-Stokes per a una sola fase, per després estendre-ho al cas multi-fase. Una de les característiques més importants dels esquemes de discretització, a part de la precisió, és la seva capacitat per conservar discretament l'energia cinètica, específicament en el cas de fluxos turbulents. Per tant, aquest capítol analitza la precisió i propietats de conservació de dos esquemes de malla diferents: "collocated" i "staggered". L'extensió dels esquemes de malla aptes per els casos de una sola fase als casos multi-fase es desenvolupa en el cinquè capítol. En particular, així com en el cas de la simulació de la turbulència les tècniques numèriques han evolucionat per a preservar discretament massa, moment i energia cinètica, els esquemes de malla per a la discretització de fluxos multi-fase han evolucionat per millorar la seva estabilitat i robustesa. Per lo tant, aquest capítol presenta i analitza dos discretitzacions de malla "collocated" i "staggered" particulars, aptes per simular fluxos multi-fase, que afavoreixen la conservació discreta de massa, moment i energia cinètica. Finalment, el capítol sis simula numèricament la inestabilitat de Richtmyer-Meshkov (RM) de dos fluids immiscibles i incompressibles. Aquest capítol es una prova general dels mètodes numèrics desenvolupats al llarg de la tesi. En particular, la inestabilitat ha sigut simulada mitjançant un mètode VOF i un esquema de malla "staggered". Els resultats numèrics corresponents han demostrat la capacitat del sistema discret en obtenir bons resultats per la inestabilitat RM

Survivability of Wave Energy Converter and Mooring Coupled System using CFD

Full version unavailable due to 3rd party copyright restrictions.This thesis discusses the development of a Numerical Wave Tank (NWT) capable of describing the coupled behaviour of Wave Energy Converters (WECs) and their moorings under extreme wave loading. The NWT utilises the open-source Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software OpenFOAM(R) to solve the fully nonlinear, incompressible, Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations for air and water using the Finite Volume Method (FVM) and a Volume of Fluid (VOF) treatment of the interface. A method for numerically generating extreme waves is devised, based on the dispersively-focused NewWave theory and using the additional toolbox waves2Foam. A parametric study of the required mesh resolution shows that steeper waves require finer grids for mesh independence. Surface elevation results for wave-only cases closely match those from experiments, although an improved definition of the flow properties is required to generate very steep focused waves. Predictions of extreme wave run-up and pressure on the front of a fixed truncated cylinder compare well with physical measurements; the numerical solution successfully predicts the secondary loading cycle associated with the nonlinear ringing effect and shows a nonlinear relationship between incident crest height and horizontal load. With near perfect agreement during an extreme wave event, the reproduction of the six degree of freedom (6DOF) motion and load in the linearly-elastic mooring of a hemispherical-bottomed buoy significantly improves on similar studies from the literature. Uniquely, this study compares simulations of two existing WEC designs with scale-model tank tests. For the Wavestar machine, a point-absorber constrained to pitch motion only, results show good agreement with physical measurements of pressure, force and float motion in regular waves, although the solution in the wake region requires improvement. Adding bespoke functionality, a point-absorber designed by Seabased AB, consisting of a moored float and Power Take-Off (PTO) with limited stroke length, translator and endstop, is modelled in large regular waves. This represents a level of complexity not previously attempted in CFD and the 6DOF float motion and load in the mooring compare well with experiments. In conclusion, the computational tool developed here is capable of reliably predicting the behaviour of WEC systems during extreme wave events and, with some additional parameterisation, could be used to assess the survivability of WEC systems at full-scale before going to the expense of deployment at sea.Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) via SuperGen UK Centre for Marine Energy Research (UKCMER