Numerical study of forced convection lid-driven cavity flows using LES (Large Eddy Simulation)

Abstract

This study presents the LES (large eddy simulation) of forced convection in laminar and two dimensional turbulent flows when the flow reaches the steady state. The main purpose is the evaluation of a developed numerical methodology for the simulation of forced convection flows at various Reynolds numbers (100 ≤ ReH ≤ 10,000) and for a fixed Prandtl number (Pr = 1.0). The hexahedral eight-node FEM (finite element method) with an explicit Taylor-Galerkin scheme is used to obtain the numerical solutions of the conservation equations of mass, momentum and energy. The Smagorinsky model is employed for the sub-grid treatment. The time-averaged velocity and temperature profiles are compared with results of literature and a CFD (computational fluid dynamics) package based on finite volume method, leading to a highest deviation of nearly 6%. Moreover, characteristics of the forced convection flows are properly obtained, e.g., the effect of the Reynolds number over the multiplicity of scales.