Numerical investigation of the Taylor-Couette and Batchelor flows with heat transfer: physics and numerical modelling

Abstract

In the paper the authors present the results obtained during a numerical investigation (Direct Numerical Simulation/Spectral Vanishing Viscosity method – DNS/SVV) of a flow with heat transfer in rotating cavities (i.e. the flow between two concentric disks and two concentric cylinders). These model flows are useful from numerical and experimental point of view among others because of the simplicity of their geometry. Simultaneously, the flows in rotating cavities appear in numerous industrial installations and machines in the field of mechanics and chemistry, e.g., in ventilation installations, desalination tanks and waste water tanks, in cooling system, in gas turbines and axial compressors. In the paper attention is focused on the laminar-turbulent region in the configuration of the large aspect ratio i.e. Taylor-Couette flow (a Batchelor flow case of small aspect ratio Γ = 0.04 is also presented for comparison). The main purpose of computations is to investigate the influence of different parameters (the aspect ratio, the end-wall boundary conditions and temperature gradient) on the flow structure and flow characteristics. For the non-isothermal flow cases the Nusselt number distributions along cylinders are presented and are correlated with the flow structures. The λ2 method has been used for visualization.