[jkampman]

Hello,


I've recently started in OpenFOAM to generate via blockMesh a mesh surrounding an airfoil (or airfoil-like shape, since it is a windturbine blade crosssection in fact). In my opinion there are three ways in which in blockMeshDict an airfoil shape can be defined

1. full spline


When defining the edges of an airfoil in OpenFOAM v6, I was thinking about using a 'spline' edge type. The airfoil is defined by 51 xy-points, and thus a spline can be created nicely. I can thus create the entire airfoil with a single spline edge (starting and ending at the trailing edge)


However, I would like the airfoil edge to be broken into section so I can create nice blocks defined by vertices. In case of a single spline edge, only the trailing edge is (maybe twice, I do not know) defined.


2. set of section splines


I can also split the airfoil in N (7 or 8) sections/parts, and make N splines. However, if one of the sections starts/ends at the leading edge. The spline will probably not model the curvature of this edge very nicely. Thus I could ensure that the leading edge is no spline 'knot', but this sounds like a work-around, and not a proper solution.


3. a lot of points



A third option would be to define all interpolated vertices after having created them with matlab or python and make straight line edges between those interpolation vertices. However, this appear tricky mathwise and is by definition sub-optimal.




My question is the following:



Q1: which option is the best in your opinion and why?
Q2: Is is possible to use method 1 and add vertices separately? (I think this would be the preferred option if possible)


kind regards