Numerical study of the pulsatile flow and aeroacoustics of straight and curved pipes

Abstract

From an engineering point of view pulsatile pipe flows, which include the hydrodynamic and acoustic fluctuations, can cause many problems such as vibration, noise and structural fatigue etc. Knowledge of the characteristics of hydrodynamic fluctuations (pseudo sound) and acoustic waves inside pipes particularly those with bends make is crucial to pipeline vibration and noise reduction. Numerical simulation of the pulsatile pipe flows shows challenges especially in curved pipes with different flow modes compounded, and predicting the acoustic fluctuations is even tougher. In this work, the unsteady flows of a straight and curved pipe with a 90° elbow induced by a pulsatile pressure inlet were calculated by Detached Eddy Simulations (DES). The pipe acoustic fields are solved through an acoustic perturbation equation, which takes the time derivative of hydrodynamic pressure as the aeroacoustic source. The characteristics of the flow and sound fields are discussed detailly, and special attention is paid to the influence of the 90° elbow on the curved pipe flow. The results show that the amplitude of hydrodynamic pressure fluctuations decrease almost linearly along the straight pipe, and the 90° elbow has obvious local influence on the flow pressure and velocity especially in the downstream side. The acoustic field is of 1-D standing wave pattern because of the fundamental pulsation frequency lower than the pipe cutoff frequency, and the 90° elbow has only negligible effect on the acoustic field in the flow frequency range.