I'm analyzing hot air flow (reentry conditions) through porous media. I've been trying to locate references (online or library sources) on the Darcy-Forscheimer Transport Equation but can't seem to find anything. (Part of the problem is that I'm not sure about the spelling.) I've seen "Forscheimer" spelled as "Forschheimer" (and also as "Forlzeimer" on this web site). I'd appreciate any help in locating some references or getting the correct spelling. Thanks.

The correct spelling is Forchheimer. If you try in online libraries with this spelling I think you would found a lot of refernces. Which code do you use? As far as I know both Fluent and CFD2000 have his equation in their manuals where they describe flow through porous media. Fluent's manual gives more information. An intersted book for your problem might be the: Convection in Porous Media. Donald A. Nield and Adrian Bejan. Springer - Verlag New York Berlin Heidelberg. ISBN: 0-387-97651-5. If you have a specific question I would be glad to help. Regards Tom

How does the Forchheimer equation relates to the Brinkman equation used by most commercial CFD codes?

From my experience, the latter is a complete junk except for very slow flows. Even though it corrects for inertial effect in the force term by adding a cV|V| resistance term, it completely omits the flow inertia and hence looses most of flow direction information.

Tom, thanks for your quick response. I used your spelling at Google and got a pretty good number of hits. I'm being forced to provide a 5-minute answer to a relatively complicated question so I'm not using any CFD codes right now. We do have ANSYS Flotran but I don't have enough time to do anything with it. I mainly wanted an understanding of what the Forchheimer modification to the Darcy equation entailed. It looks like (with your help on the spelling) I might be able to get there from here. Thanks again!