Time Step Size-Unsteady Flow
 

Hello,
I using unsteady flow option in fluent to solve a separated turbulent flow over a wavy wall.
The purpose of this test is to compare the predictions of FLUENT's Realizable k-e turbulence model, against the DNS results of Maaß and Schumann.
For more detail, you can consult this link:
http://cfd.me.umist.ac.uk/ercofold/d...77/test77.html
I chose the computational domain to cover only one period of the wavy channel. The length of the periodic domain is 1 m. An 64x96 quadrilateral mesh was generated and the velocity is 0,103 m/s.
I need to define the number of steps and the steps size.
Please anyone could tell me what should be the number of steps and the step size, and also the max. number of iteration. How should I calculate them?
Thank you very much.

Hi,

As a first thought, I can recommend you to make a time-step refinement study. To have time-step independent solution you can run the case for different step-sizes and the highest step size, where the change in any reference property is small enough, can be your time-step size.

Hi,

If you were solving a DNS problem I suppose the way you would calculate the required time-step is by calculating the kolmogorov timescale, but since you are doing k-epsilon which is a RANS model, you arent going to resolve the kolmogorov scales, if you know (approximately) how much energy is going into the system, equate this to the turbulent dissipation (epsilon) and calculate the kolmogorov timescale (formula is on wikipedia), you should know your integral timescale (based on the largest domain or eddy size divided by some characteristic large scale velocity, use what you are using to calculate your reynolds number), your timestep should be somesort of average of the two...as a ball park figure (closer to the kolmogorov scale to be conservative). As far as how many iterations per timestep...this is hard to say, it depends on what residuals you use, something like 1e-4 for momentum and continuity should be ok...set the iterations really high for ONE timestep (set them to 500) and then look at how many timesteps it takes for the solution converges on the first timestep, will give you a good indication of how many you will need. Hope that helps

akour

Thank you (erkan and ak6g08) for your answer.
Dear akour, Give me your e-mail to send you the artical of Maass and Schumann for more details.