Setting up a schedule in Ansys Fluent
 

Hey everyone,
I've done some work with Ansys Fluent and would not call myself a complete beginner anymore. Yet still I'm surely not a pro and have a question that is hard to find an answer for.

I have made a CFD-model for a rotary kiln, basically a long tube with a huge gas flame on one side. It is working quite fine, however I have to optimize the process.
I'm therefore supposed to alter some of the incoming streams. So if you imagine that the natural gas is entering the kiln, where it meets the oxidizing air, with about 50 m/s I should also figure out what the entire process looks like, when the gas speed is 40, 60 or 70 m/s.
I know I could simply change the Boundary Conditions every time and start the simulation again. That would however take lots of time and make it vulnerable to mistakes, as there are several parameters I have to alter for different cases.

My boss said that, although he didn't precisely know how, there is a way to set up a schedule and tell Ansys to calculate the same model with altered variables after one another, without having to do anything about it.

The essence is, you basically want to tell Ansys:
These are the variables for which I want to use these different values. Calculate every single case and save it. Then proceed with the next one. And the calculation stops, when all cases are calculated.

Is there a way to do this? Sorry, if this question was posted earlier and I didn't find it.


I'm glad for anyone who can help,
thanks Hjan

Are you using Workbench? This sort of thing is generally very easy in Workbench, but can be tricky otherwise, depending on exactly how you run Fluent. (e.g. from the GUI, command line, submitting batch jobs to a cluster, etc.)

Yes I am using Workbench :)

Most variables can be set to be an Input Parameter. In the options of a boundary condition, you can click 'constant' to open a drop down menu. From there, select 'New Input Parameter...'. Some other variables have a small 'p' icon that you can click to make into an Input Parameter. Once you've created a parameter, there will be a 'Parameters' component in the Workbench project page. There you can create a table of values you want to run. You'll probably also want to create Output Parameters (either in Fluent or CFD-Post) that will appear in the table as results.

Fluent User's Guide section 6.1.8 and Fluent in Workbench User's Guide chapter 2.13 will give you more detailed information.

Okay, I think I read through these pages already, but I guess I will have do it again then.

When I have successfully programmed these parameters, will Ansys automatically export the results before calculating with the next value?

It will automatically save the values of any output parameters you define, but it will not save all the results by default. If you want it to save a whole completed project with results, you can check the 'Export' box next to each design point you want to save. It will create a new project and save it in the same directory and name as the base project but appended with _dp1, _dp2, etc.