An approach for permeable boundary conditions in SPH

Abstract

Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) has intrinsic advantages over the Finite Volume (FV) method for predicting multiphase flows, since the need for fluid phase interface reconstructions is avoided due to the natural advection of those interfaces based on the Lagrangian description of the control volumes. However, permeable boundary conditions are less straightforward to handle with SPH, even though domain inlets and outlets are needed in most engineering problems. In this work we propose a new framework for permeable boundary conditions for the Weakly Compressible SPH based on ghost particles. The major characteristics of our approach are the application of Navier Stokes Characteristic Boundary Conditions (NSCBC) and a particle mass generation and removal procedure at the boundary. This approach enables the application of non-reflective boundary conditions and redundantizes the need for advecting ghost particles from an external buffer zone to the internal domain. Additionally, the particle mass variation can exactly be balanced with the mass flux defined at the boundary. Furthermore, we are proposing a novel approach to set the ghost particle state based on an extrapolation of the state of particles located in the internal domain and on the domain boundary. We validate the proposed framework for permeable boundaries with one- and two-dimensional test cases. The major findings are as follows. Due to the particle mass generation and removal at the domain boundary, spurious oscillations are introduced due to a non-optimal particle distribution. Those oscillations are reduced in our work to an acceptable level (1×10−5 to 1×10−4 relative to the values of the fluid dynamics variables) using existing stabilization schemes as well as the aforementioned novel methods for setting ghost particle states and particle masses at the permeable boundaries. We observe a very good agreement between the solutions obtained with the presented approach and analytical as well as numerical solutions obtained with the FV method. The proposed approach for setting the ghost particle states is indispensable for achieving a perfect balance between particle mass variation and mass flux across the permeable interface as well as the steady state and the temporal accuracy of the solution. Additionally, the pressure reflectivity at the permeable boundary is found to be in a very good agreement with the theory of the NSCBC method. Furthermore, for a SPH-FV coupled simulation we could demonstrate an excellent agreement compared to the FV method as well as the capability of our approach to handle significant flow unsteadiness and gradients at the permeable coupling interfaces without the introduction of spurious flow behavior.