Mesh for Cyclones
 

Dear All,

I am currently simulating a hydrocyclone in starccm+, after reviewing various literature it seems that it is essential to use a structured hexehedral mesh in a polar grid. This mesh is not available in starccm+, only a cartesian grid system can be used with the trimmer hexahedral mesh. Has anyone managed to simulate a validated cyclone simulation on the meshing schemes available on star or is it the case that you generate your mesh on say Gambit and import it.......

Any help is much appreciated.

Rhodri

we have been involved in one cyclone project which successfully used both the trimmed and polyhedral mesh for a cyclone with air and water with the vof model - good correlation when a fine core mesh and small timestep used. i have heard that others have modelled 'normal' cyclones with trimmed mesh in the nuclear industry and got good correlation. keep in mind the publishers of work you read might not have access to the modern meshing tools in star-ccm+ - ie they can use either auto tetrahedrals which needs too many cells and create numerical diffusion or gambit's block meshing - lots more work but a nice mesh compared to tets.