Computational Fluid Dynamics Analysis of Two Parallel Rectangular Jets Using OpenFOAM

Abstract

Two or multiple parallel jets are an important shear flow that widely existing in many industrial applications. The interaction between turbulence jets enables fast and thorough mixing of two fluids. The mixing feature of parallel jets has many engineering applications, such as, in Generation IV conceptual nuclear reactors, the coolants merge in upper or lower plenum after passing through the reactor core. While study of parallel jets mixing phenomenon, numerical experiments such as Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations are extensively incorporated. Validation of varied turbulent models is of importance to make sure that the numerical results could be trusted and served as a guideline further design purpose. Many commercial CFD packages in the market such as FLUENT and Star CCM+ can provide the ability to simulate turbulent flow with predefined turbulence model, however, such commercial solvers may lack the flexibility that allow users build their own models for R&D purpose. The existing solvers in OpenFOAM are developed to fulfill both academic and industrial needs by achieving large-scale computational capability with a variety of physical models. Moreover, as an open source CFD toolbox, OpenFOAM grants users full control of the source code with complete freedom of customization. The purpose of this study is to perform CFD simulation using OpenFOAM for two submerged parallel jets issuing from two rectangular channels. Fully hexahedron multi-density mesh is generated using blockMesh utility to ensure velocity gradients are properly evaluated. A generalized-multi-grid solver is used to enhance convergence. Based on Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes Equations (RANS), the realizable k-ε and k-ε shear stress transport (SST) are selected to model turbulent flow. Steady state Finite Volume solver simpleFoam is used to perform the simulation. In addition, data from experiments run in Thermal-Hydraulic Lab at Texas A&M University using particle image velocity (PIV) and Laser Doppler Anemometry (LDA) methods are considered in order to compare and validate simulation results. A number of turbulence characteristic such as mean velocities, turbulent intensities, z-component vorticity were compared with experiments. It was found that for stream-wise mean velocity profile as well as shear stresses, the realizable k-ε model exhibits a good agreement with experimental data. However, velocity fluctuation and turbulence intensities, simulation results showed a certain discrepancy.