[Marineboy]

I have basically a 2D problem to model. It's a somewhat irregularly-shaped pontoon sitting in a water flow. The shape has some relatively small sharp coners here and there and I am interested in seeing what their effects are. Once these effects are known, I wish to modify the model locally to improve or remove any undesirable features.

Up to now I have digitised several dozen points around the boundary of the existing shape and I have these as (x,y) positions in a .csv file.

I am using openFOAM v1.5 on a Windows platform as downloaded from sourceforge.net. OpenFoam is new to me.

I don't want to spend a lot of time generating the mesh by hand. The SnappyHexMesh tool is not operational in the version of the software I have downloaded.

Can anyone recommend a decent and simple way forward for me to create a mesh?

Do I need to go to the CAD route or is there something simpler out there?

I don't mind if this means me downloading or buying another piece of pre-processing software. In fact I don't mind starting with another CFD tool altogether. I just need to get the job done quickly and reasonably accurately.

Many thanks!

[Marineboy]

Ok. Never mind.

1) I have had difficulty modelling a very simple problem in OpenFOAM.

2) My post has been up for a few days. It has had several dozen views but no written response whatsoever. I conclude from this that OpenFOAM is not very good in the pre-processing department.

I will now abandon OpenFOAM altogether and I will move to use one of the commercial codes instead.

Any thoughts would still be appreciated.

[wyldckat]

Greetings Marineboy,

If you're in a hurry, then starting off with OpenFOAM may be the wrong direction, specially if you don't have much time to invest in learning on how to use it and what version you should use. And using it in Windows is currently still a bit difficult, specially because the original code requires a case sensitive file system.

Anyway, if you're in a hurry but would still want to use OpenFOAM, then for now I suggest using a Linux distribution, since most tools exist for it, and only some of them work in Windows.

As for meshing, if you had looked for it (I'm assuming you didn't), perhaps you would have found this thread: http://www.cfd-online.com/Forums/ope...h-program.html

If you want an all-in-one Linux distribution that comes with an OpenFOAM pre-installed, check this thread: http://www.cfd-online.com/Forums/ope...d-kubuntu.html

If you want to stick to Windows, some of the tools mentioned on the first thread have versions for Windows, but not all of them.
As for OpenFOAM, if you want a fully working version in Windows, you have a few choices:

• build it yourself following the available instructions;
• buy an already built version for Windows;
• stick with openfoam-mswin, if you can make use of the limited group of solvers it provides.

For the first two, you can find more information about it here: http://openfoamwiki.net/index.php/Ti...mportant_Links
There you will find a list of tutorials on how to build OpenFOAM for Windows, and also find already existing builds. The list is a bit outdated, but later this week it should be updated (I'm the one responsible for that page ).

Best regards,
Bruno

[jchawner]

Hello Marineboy:

Pointwise has a built-in interface to OpenFOAM. You might want to consider it for your analysis. Note: I work for Pointwise.

www.pointwise.com

[Marineboy]

wyldckat: thank you for your very interesting and informative message.
I am in a hurry only for one particular task and I will go for one of the commercial codes, at least as a trial for now. In the longer term, and based on your reply, it seems there is also mileage in me continuing to experiment with OpenFOAM and then a decision can be made as to whether to stick with the commercial code or not later. I had obviously not searched the forum very well for information on free mesh tools. I had got basically got bogged down with the ones that are supplied as standard with openFOAM, in particular snappyhexmesh, which I couldn't get to work. I will check the mesh tools you gave the link to.

Jchawner: many thanks for your reply too. I will download the pointwise trial software and give it a go.

Thank you!!!