Hypersonic Flow
 

I am currently doing a final year project on hypersonic waveriders and I need to use a software to test my design. Can anyone suggest a software please? Can I use fluent? Or Can I use Openfoam?

My second hand knowledge of OpenFOAM says that it's not good with compressible flows.

CFD++ will predict good

Try SU2. It is good for compressible flows. SU2 team does lot of hypersonic problems so I would expect it to be good for that.

Hypersonic waverider? What's your Mach number? I would not use OpenFOAM for this. It probably will not converge for transonic/subsonic pockets. Which does not give one a warm and fuzzy feeling. SU2, Fluent, CFD++ (i.e. coupled methods) are all good. Given your conditions, you may need to worry about chemistry.

I am currently testing up to Mach 13 because I am using star CCM+ which was found to be very sensitive to Courant number and hard to stabilise especially at high Mach number.

However, my design point is predicted to be around 4<M<6. So do you think I have to worry about chemistry and real gas effects?

Thanks for the suggestion. Do you think they have a student version? I could not find one when I went to their website?