CFD workstation with a limited budget

hami11 · May 13, 2021, 21:36

Hi all

I am looking to buy/build a CFD workstation for ANSYS fluent & star ccm+. The projects I would be working on is modelling combustion in a rotary engine (to determine fuel efficiency, sealing effectiveness, exhaust gas temperature, etc.), airflow over an FSAE car (to determine drag, downforce,etc.), and airflow in a model jet engine. The trouble is, these softwares are particularly demanding in terms of computing power and as such require expensive workstations, whereas I have a maximum budget of ~1200$ CAD. So would anyone know a way to buy/build a workstation which could handle the projects I have in mind but stay within my budget?

Thanks

danbence · May 14, 2021, 16:58

~1200$ CAD is one of the tightest budgets that I have seen in this forum. Some thought is required to see if the Venn diagram of budget and modelling goals has any overlap.

At that budget, just getting enough ram could blow your budget, so I think you should do some cell count estimates. If you can pass the hurdle of squeezing your design into a small amount of ram, the second hurdle is whether your sims can run in an acceptable length of time. You can estimate this with an estimate of the timestep required and the length of simulated time.

wkernkamp · May 17, 2021, 23:07

You can start with this 1U server Gigabyte R180-F34.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/18467066634...IAAOSwoW5gLssW

Buy two cheap Xeon v3 CPU's E5-2678v3 for example, add memory (at least eight sticks), buy a nvme ssd and a pcie adapter card for it, and you are in business below your budget.

May 13, 2021, 21:36	CFD workstation with a limited budget	#1
hami11 New Member Prince Edward Island Join Date: May 2021 Posts: 26 Rep Power: 4	Hi all I am looking to buy/build a CFD workstation for ANSYS fluent & star ccm+. The projects I would be working on is modelling combustion in a rotary engine (to determine fuel efficiency, sealing effectiveness, exhaust gas temperature, etc.), airflow over an FSAE car (to determine drag, downforce,etc.), and airflow in a model jet engine. The trouble is, these softwares are particularly demanding in terms of computing power and as such require expensive workstations, whereas I have a maximum budget of ~1200$ CAD. So would anyone know a way to buy/build a workstation which could handle the projects I have in mind but stay within my budget? Thanks

May 14, 2021, 16:58		#2
danbence Member dab bence Join Date: Mar 2013 Posts: 47 Rep Power: 13	~1200$ CAD is one of the tightest budgets that I have seen in this forum. Some thought is required to see if the Venn diagram of budget and modelling goals has any overlap. At that budget, just getting enough ram could blow your budget, so I think you should do some cell count estimates. If you can pass the hurdle of squeezing your design into a small amount of ram, the second hurdle is whether your sims can run in an acceptable length of time. You can estimate this with an estimate of the timestep required and the length of simulated time. Chris2337 likes this.

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May 17, 2021, 23:07		#3
wkernkamp Senior Member Will Kernkamp Join Date: Jun 2014 Posts: 316 Rep Power: 12	You can start with this 1U server Gigabyte R180-F34. https://www.ebay.com/itm/18467066634...IAAOSwoW5gLssW Buy two cheap Xeon v3 CPU's E5-2678v3 for example, add memory (at least eight sticks), buy a nvme ssd and a pcie adapter card for it, and you are in business below your budget.