[teleguy]

Hello everyone

Recently, I have grown some interest in CAD softwares and their simulation capabilities and the possibility of incorporating it into my work. For my quest, I chose Solidworks 2018 (with flow simulation add-in) because of its user-friendly GUI and relatively easy to learn compared to other CAD softwares.

Given my little experience with CAD softwares in general, I have taken the liberty of exploring various sources to get a hold of some drawing and simulation basics in addition to familiarizing myself with some terminologies.

I’ve managed to draw basic shapes (such as a cylinder/cube with an air inlet pipe) and conducted some airflow analysis without validations. Unfortunately, that is the maximum I can achieve within a reasonable time, and any further attempts to figure out the meaning/inclusions of additional parameters on my own may be time-consuming.

So, what am I trying to achieve?

I am trying to create a simple scaled-down, lab-controlled sand-dust storm phenomenon, with the following initial specifications in mind:

1. A chamber of a particular shape: such as cubical, cylindrical or spherical.
2. The shape has an air inlet (an opening connected to a fan).
3. The air is to blow a certain quantity of solid particles (of a specific diameter) positioned at the chamber’s bottom.

Using flow simulation addresses my need to simulate solid particles’ suspension, and provide me with their distribution in the chamber.

Questions

Design:

• Is it possible to only have inlets (air and/or particles inputs) with no outlets in the chamber?

Boundary conditions:

• I am assigning Environment Pressure to the chamber and pipe’s inner walls; are there any additional boundary conditions supposed to be included?

• Do I need to enable/set the Gravity parameter in the wizard? Though whenever I enable it, flow simulation seems to be inaccurate, e.g. air flows from one point to another in a straight line.

Particles:

• Is it possible to set/create a number of particles with specific diameter? I am aware of the “particle studies” feature. However, the feature offers a steady stream of particles while I am interested in injecting/placing a specific number of particles inside the chamber.

Please accept my sincere apologies for the long post. I would appreciate any comments/feedback/guidance that could steer me in the right direction.

Looking forward to your kind replies

Stay safe