Advice on establishing multiple initial conditions

Ruben

I have set up a fairly straightforward problem but I would like some help with my logic because I don't think my methodology is correct. Could some of the CFD sages offer me a hand?

I have real measured temperatures at 18 different depths in an asphalt block that is about 14 cm deep and 10 meters long. I have created a 2d simulation in Fluent to assess the increase in temperature of water after flowing over the 10 meter pavement surface.

I'll put my questions upfront. They are: Can I run the steady state solver twice and develop the surface water flow profile then the heat profile, retaining both, or should I use a different method? MOST IMPORTANT: Will init/patch temperature at each wall allow the temperature in the pavement to change as if each wall was a passive conductor after the simulation begins or will it revert back to the temperature values that were added when defining the wall B.Cs before initialization?

Here is some more info about how I am trying to simulate it:

- I will define walls at the 18 different depths from the pavement surface down and one 3 feet above the surface to represent ambient air temp, as well as zero flux boundaries on the left and right of the asphalt and velocity inflow/outflow at the inlet and outlet walls above the pavement.

- I am using the VOF model to solve for evaporation of some of the water into air using a modified form of the liq.gas.source UDF that another user supplied here online. - My computational process is to:

1. Run a steady solver activating only the energy equation and allow temperature gradients to develop between the temperature values at each of the 18 depths.

2. Run another steady state solution with the energy equation and UDF deactivated to fully develop the flow field (I don't know if I can indeed do this and retain the heat profile I just developed)

3. Run an unsteady solver with all equations enabled (energy, UDF, and fluid), only patching the temperatures at each wall with the same values while allowing them to drop as heat is transfered to the water and air.

-------------------- Any responses are very much appreciated. Thank you for such an awesome user support network.

Ruben