Can icoFoam handle turbulent flow or not?
 

Dear foamers,

I know this may be a silly question and many people have asked similar questions, but I still want to make it clear whether icoFoam is able for turbulent flow or not?

In terms of DNS, both laminar and turbulent flow solve the same equation. Given that I have very fine mesh and reasonable Reynolds number, will I get turbulent flow or not?

Hope anyone can give me some hints.

Thanks and regards,
Tony

So if your mesh is fine enough for DNS, and you say at that level the governing equations for laminar flow apply to turbulent flow, and icoFoam is valid for laminar flow - what reason can you think of that icoFoam would not be valid for turbulent flow simulations?

Hi Anton,

Thank you very much for the reply.

I was just wondering whether my understanding is right or not. Since normally people say icoFoam is for laminar flow, I am not sure if it is worth trying to get turbulent flow using icoFoam.

Regards,
Tony

Greetings to all!

:confused: There shouldn't be much doubts about it, because it's in the description of the solver: http://www.openfoam.org/features/standard-solvers.php and https://github.com/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM...Foam/icoFoam.C
;)

Best regards,
Bruno

Thats because for most applications DNS is prohibitively expensive. To get around this users use RANS or LES which solve additional equations, and those are indeed not implemented in icoFoam.