A new surface tension VOF evaluation by using variational representation and Galerkin interpolation projection

Abstract

In this work we propose a new algorithm for studying two-phase interface advection problems dominated by surface tension. We use a Volume Of Fluid (VOF) algorithm for studying the evolution of the two-phase interface on a Cartesian grid and a finite element numerical scheme for the velocity-pressure state. The velocity field that drives the evolution of this interface is obtained by solving the weak form of the Navier-Stokes equation where the surface tension force is not defined in a singular way. With standard numerical approaches that solve the strong form of the Navier-Stokes equations the surface force is determined by taking the divergence of the surface tension tensor. The computation of the divergence term results in a force which is non-convergent when the grid is refined since the tensor is computed in a discontinuous cell-by-cell way. In the past this approach was proposed with artificial different smoothing schemes in order to compute such a singular force. In this work we use the variational formulation of the Navier-Stokes equation and avoid differentiation. The tensor which is a function of the unit normal is evaluated by a Galerkin projection over regular Sobolev spaces. This allows the piece-wise continuous representation of the surface tensor and the unit normal based on the VOF reconstruction. Tests on convergence for two and three-dimension in the static and dynamical cases are reported to show the correct representation in the desired spaces. This method is also natural for coupling non uniform grid computation of the fluid with Cartesian grid of the VOF algorithm.