Convective & conductive heat transfer
 

Hi all,

I am currently working on a problem that involves fluid flow, and I am thinking on digging into OpenFOAM for this. But before that I want to ask whether it does the job.

My problem is the following:
I have a hot solid piece of equipment (later maybe with internal heat source) and a flow of cold air around it. I need to simulate the flow of air around it, i.e. how the air flow behaves when the air gets warmer, and how the temperature distribution inside the solid changes when the air cools it. So it is a problem of convective heat transfer between the solid and the fluid and conductive heat transfer inside the solid.

Can OpenFOAM do this? And is there maybe even a tutorial for this? When I am new to OpenFOAM, what would be a good and effiecient approach to get there as quickly as possible?

Thank you!

Yes, it can, but I think you have to program your own solver from potentialFoam, icoFoam and scalarTransportFoam

Regards.

Hi,

the chtMultiRegionFoam solver is a good candidate for the job.

Although, IMHO, you have to get your hands dirty, there's only limited amount of information about case / boundary setup. But first of all, you need to advance step-by-step, so I would recommend you take a steady start with the simple solvers and cases, then proceed to the complex ones.

Hi,

Toorop is right.

The chtMultiRegionFoam solver should do what you want.
But I suggest you should start with simpleFoam to get familiar with the OpenFoam structure.

Hi,

Thank you, chtMultiRegionFoam looks like it does, what I want. And yes, my first run of OpenFOAM will definetly not be my real case. I will look into simpleFoam first, as val46 suggested.

Thank you!

Hello gimmetwofingers (nice nickname :)),
I have made some investigation on http://www.cfd-online.com/Forums/ope...tml#post290772. You really have to get your hand dirty, not only on setting up a case, but also on letting everything work properly...
Well... good luck!

mad

ooops... I thought in the meantime heat source is officially included in the multiregion solvers.

mad, have you ever got your solver running with heat source?

Hi val46,
I really do not know if heat source is included or not in the official solver version. It has been a while since I use OpenFOAM the last time. And I have not spent any more time on making investigation on the chtMultiRegionFoam + heat source. :( Hope to come back to it one day...

mad