Looking to self teach myself ANSYS Fluent.
 

Hello everyone. This would be my first post here. I am looking for guidance on how to best self teach myself ANSYS Fluent. I am coming from self teaching myself the basics of Fusion 360 and Autodesk CFD for a research project involving VAWTs. I am tasked for creating an array of turbines to calculate the torque, drag force, lift, etc. for a model from a start up company (normally there are more than 1 blade pairs since the original model has many in a helical pattern but I figure a simple approach would be to do this). I see so many resources online and just opening ANSYS seems like playing 5D chess to me. Can someone point to me where to even start (besides reading the manual which I just started) getting this type of simulation up and running?

Also would someone be able to confirm if this is even possible. I heard from another student that doing this type of simulation in ANSYS won't work as most studies are done with the drawing of the would be cylinder then the airfoils and extruding the drawing so the empty spaces in the cylinder would be the airfoils and that isn't doable with the picture attached.

The picture isn't attached, but I have no doubts it would be possible. Nothing about the Fluent solver itself will limit the ability to simulate a VAWT.

As far as learning (from someone who was initially self taught)...

1) Ansys learning hub/innovation center - Ansys has a ton of free tutorials on Fluent that go step by step through setting up different problems: https://courses.ansys.com/index.php/...xoClVkQAvD_BwE
These are great for learning the interface and how to set-up different problems. If you are willing to spend a bit of money you can also sign up for the Ansys Learning Hub. You can take week long online courses that are either self paced, or taught by a teacher in a small group. These are super helpful for learning how to set up problems and learning a bit about the solver.

2) Textbooks - Textbooks can be hit or miss as they can often focus way too much into solver theory, which can be difficult for someone just starting out. I personally really like "Computational Fluid Dynamics: A Practical Approach" by Jiyuan Tu. It provides a great introduction into the solver mathematics well also giving great practical advice and guidelines on meshing, solving, etc. It also references Fluent throughout, so all the naming conventions, units, etc. are the same that you will see in Fluent.

3) YouTube - There are a ton of videos on YouTube that provide tutorials on how to set-up specific problems. A personal favorite is https://www.youtube.com/@fluidmechanics101 which gives the absolute best lectures on how the solver works. There are a ton of other channels of varying quality that go step by step through specific problems.

My personal recommendation is to start by completely disregarding the theory and just learn how to get around the Fluent UI, set-up some basic problems, and obtain some pretty rainbow contours. Once you are comfortable in the software then start drilling down into the theory and learn why you are changing certain settings and how they are affecting the solver.