Continuous, Semi-discrete, and Fully Discretized Navier-Stokes Equations

The Navier--Stokes equations are commonly used to model and to simulate flow phenomena. We introduce the basic equations and discuss the standard methods for the spatial and temporal discretization. We analyse the semi-discrete equations -- a semi-explicit nonlinear DAE -- in terms of the strangeness index and quantify the numerical difficulties in the fully discrete schemes, that are induced by the strangeness of the system. By analyzing the Kronecker index of the difference-algebraic equations, that represent commonly and successfully used time stepping schemes for the Navier--Stokes equations, we show that those time-integration schemes factually remove the strangeness. The theoretical considerations are backed and illustrated by numerical examples.Comment: 28 pages, 2 figure, code available under DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.998909, https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.99890

LES-based Study of the Roughness Effects on the Wake of a Circular Cylinder from Subcritical to Transcritical Reynolds Numbers

This paper investigates the effects of surface roughness on the flow past a circular cylinder at subcritical to transcritical Reynolds numbers. Large eddy simulations of the flow for sand grain roughness of size k/D = 0.02 are performed (D is the cylinder diameter). Results show that surface roughness triggers the transition to turbulence in the boundary layer at all Reynolds numbers, thus leading to an early separation caused by the increased momentum deficit, especially at transcritical Reynolds numbers. Even at subcritical Reynolds numbers, boundary layer instabilities are triggered in the roughness sublayer and eventually lead to the transition to turbulence. The early separation at transcritical Reynolds numbers leads to a wake topology similar to that of the subcritical regime, resulting in an increased drag coefficient and lower Strouhal number. Turbulent statistics in the wake are also affected by roughness; the Reynolds stresses are larger due to the increased turbulent kinetic energy production in the boundary layer and separated shear layers close to the cylinder shoulders.We acknowledge “Red Española de Surpercomputación” (RES) for awarding us access to the MareNostrum III machine based in Barcelona, Spain (Ref. FI-2015-2-0026 and FI-2015-3-0011). We also acknowledge PRACE for awarding us access to Fermi and Marconi Supercomputers at Cineca, Italy (Ref. 2015133120). Oriol Lehmkuhl acknowledges a PDJ 2014 Grant by AGAUR (Generalitat de Catalunya). Ugo Piomelli acknowledges the support of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) of Canada under the Discovery Grant Programme (Grant No. RGPIN-2016-04391). Ricard Borrell acknowledges a Juan de la Cierva postdoctoral grant (IJCI-2014-21034). Ivette Rodriguez, Oriol Lehmkuhl, Ricard Borrell and Assensi Oliva acknowledge Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad, Secretaría de Estado de Investigación, Desarrollo e Innovación, Spain (ref. ENE2014-60577-R).Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Vortex-induced vibrations

This review summarizes fundamental results and discoveries concerning vortex-induced vibration (VIV), that have been made over the last two decades, many of which are related to the push to explore very low mass and damping, and to new computational and experimental techniques that were hitherto not available. We bring together new concepts and phenomena generic to VIV systems, and pay special attention to the vortex dynamics and energy transfer that give rise to modes of vibration, the importance of mass and damping, the concept of a critical mass, the relationship between force and vorticity, and the concept of "effective elasticity," among other points. We present new vortex wake modes, generally in the framework of a map of vortex modes compiled from forced vibration studies, some of which cause free vibration. Some discussion focuses on topics of current debate, such as the decomposition of force, the relevance of the paradigm flow of an elastically mounted cylinder to more complex systems, and the relationship between forced and free vibration

A brief review of recent results in vortex-induced vibrations

In this brief review, we shall summarize fundamental results and discoveries concerning vortexinduced vibration, that have been made over the last two decades, many of which are related to the push to very low mass and damping, and to new computational and experimental techniques that were hitherto not available. We bring together new concepts and phenomena generic to vortexinduced vibration (VIV) systems, and pay special attention to the vortex dynamics and energy transfer that give rise to modes of vibration, the importance of mass and damping, the concept of a critical mass, the relationship between force and vorticity, and the concept of "effective elasticity", among other points. We present new vortex wake modes, generally in the framework of a map of vortex modes compiled from forced vibration studies, some of which cause free vibration. Some discussion focuses on topics of current debate, such as the decomposition of force, the relevance of the paradigm flow of an elastically mounted cylinder to more complex systems, and the relationship between forced or free vibration

Critical mass in vortex-induced vibration of a cylinder

In this paper, we study the transverse vortex-induced vibrations of a cylinder at low mass-damping values. The response in this case consists of three distinct branches; namely the initial, upper and lower branches. For an elastically-mounted cylinder, the oscillation frequency can,be shown to be primarily dependent on the mass ratio (m* = mass/displaced fluid mass). For large mass ratios, m* = O(100), the vibration frequency for synchronization lies close to the natural frequency (f* = f/f(N) similar to 1.0), but as mass is reduced to m* = O(1), f* can reach remarkably large values. We deduce an expression for the frequency of the lower-branch vibration, at small mass-damping values, as follows

Vortex-induced vibrations of a sphere

There are many studies on the vortex-induced vibrations of a cylindrical body, but almost none concerned with such vibrations for a sphere, despite the fact that tethered bodies are a common configuration. In this paper, we study the dynamics of an elastically mounted or tethered sphere in a steady flow, employing displacement, force and vorticity measurements. Within a particular range of flow speeds, where the oscillation frequency (f) is of the order of the static-body vortex shedding frequency $f_{vo}$, there exist two modes of periodic large-amplitude oscillation, defined as modes I and II, separated by a transition regime exhibiting non-periodic vibration. The dominant wake structure for both modes is a chain of streamwise vortex loops on alternating sides of the wake. Further downstream, the heads of the vortex loops pinch off to form a sequence of vortex rings. We employ an analogy with the lift on an aircraft that is associated with its trailing vortex pair (of strength $\Gamma^*$ and spacing $b^*$), and thereby compute the rate of change of impulse for the streamwise vortex pair, yielding the vortex force coefficient $(C_{vortex})$ : $C_{vortex} = \frac{8}{\pi} {U^*_{v}}b^*( - \Gamma^*)$. This calculation yields predicted forces in reasonable agreement with direct measurements on the sphere. This is significant because it indicates that the principal vorticity dynamics giving rise to vortex-induced vibration for a sphere are the motions of these streamwise vortex pairs. The Griffin plot, showing peak amplitudes as a function of the mass–damping ($m^*\zeta$), exhibits a good collapse of data, indicating a maximum response of around 0.9 diameters. Following recent studies of cylinder vortex-induced vibration, we deduce the existence of a critical mass ratio, $m^*_{crit} {\approx} 0.6$, below which large-amplitude vibrations are predicted to persist to infinite normalized velocities. An unexpected large-amplitude and highly periodic mode (mode III) is found at distinctly higher flow velocities where the frequency of vibration (f) is far below the frequency of vortex shedding for a static body. We find that the low-frequency streamwise vortex pairs are able to impart lift (or transverse force) to the body, yielding a positive energy transfer per cycle

The effect of end conditions on the vortex-induced vibration of cylinders

In the present investigation we study the effect of end conditions on the vortex-induced vibration of an elastically mounted rigid cylinder. This work was triggered by some initial controlled vibration experiments which showed that spanwise end conditions can have a large effect on measured fluid forces on a cylinder, and this suggested that some of the disparity amongst previous free vibration studies may possibly be attributed to differences in end conditions. In the principal experiments here, we are concerned with a vertical cylinder piercing the clean free surface of a water channel, and attached to a carriage system mounted atop the channel. The upper end of the submerged cylinder is thus the free surface, while the lower end is manipulated to yield three different conditions, namely: an attached endplate; an unattached endplate fixed to the channel floor (with a variable gap between cylinder and plate); and a condition of no endplate at all. Interestingly, we find that the free vibration response for the attached and unattached endplate cases were nearly identical. One expectation was that the case without an endplate would lead to a flow around the end of the body, modifying the vortex dynamics, and thereby reducing the correlation of the induced fluid forces on the body. Surprisingly, over the entire response plot, the vibration amplitude is markedly higher in the absence of an endplate, with the exception of the peak amplitude, which remains nearly unchanged. Unexpectedly, the vibrations become much more steady at flow velocities in the vicinity of the peak response, if the endplate is removed. In a further set of experiments, we undertake controlled vibration, where we vary the gap between cylinder and endplate. We discover a large discontinuous jump in the magnitude of fluid excitation, when the gap exceeds 15% of a diameter. For larger gaps, the fluid excitation becomes independent of the gap size, effectively equivalent to having no plate at all. This study is consistent with some of the disparity between the character of vibration response plots in previous studies, if one takes into account the particular end conditions chosen in those studies