[m.kurjata]

Hello everyone,

I have a problem regarding the calculation of mass flow rate through a slice of my geometry (a combustion chamber). What I need to examine is recirculation in the inlet area. I won't upload any image of the chamber since the geometry doesn't matter here - the question is general.

I know how to do it in paraview, but this method is too slow for me and I'd like to automatize the whole process.

A different idea was to use a function added to controlDict (it would write data to a file for one slice):


sliceX
{
type surfaces;
writeControl timeStep;
writeInterval 100;
surfaceFormat vtk;
interpolationScheme cellPoint;
fields (rhoUxMean );

surfaces
(
interpolatedPlane
{
type cuttingPlane;
planeType pointAndNormal;
pointAndNormalDict
{
point (0.0 0.0 0.0);
normal (1 0 0);
}
triangulate true;
interpolate true;
}
);
}

where rhoUxMean is, of course, a product of the mean density and one component of the Velocity. The data file that's saved in the postProcessing Directory contains Point coordinates (one Point for each cell) and the rhoUxMean value for each point. Unfortunatelly, I can't integrate the mass flow using this data, since I don't know the area of each cell-slice and I can't assume that the area is constant for each of them

Is there any way to solve this problem by modifying the above solution or any other way to efficiently and quickly calculate the mass flow?

I hope my description of the problem isn't too vague.

[HPE]

use flowRatePatch functionObject or something similar.