Wall-Modeled Large-Eddy Simulation of Turbulent Boundary Layer with Spatially Varying Pressure Gradients

Abstract

Wall-modeled large-eddy simulations of turbulent boundary layers subjected to spatially varying streamwise pressure gradients are conducted to assess the predictive performance of three wall models: ordinary differential equation equilibrium, integral nonequilibrium, and partial differential equation (PDE) nonequilibrium models. The test case is based on experiments conducted by Volino (Journal of Fluid Mechanics, Vol. 897, Aug. 2020, p. A2), where the flow is subjected successively to zero pressure gradient (ZPG), favorable pressure gradient (FPG), recovery ZPG, and adverse pressure gradient (APG) regions. Skin friction is overpredicted in FPG by all the wall models. For equilibrium and integral models, this overprediction is attributed to the strong deviation of mean velocity profiles within FPG from the log law, used explicitly in the equilibrium and implicitly in the integral model. The overprediction is more pronounced for the PDE model, which is attributed to dynamic correction of wall-model eddy viscosity for resolved stresses and a lack of correction for pressure gradient. Potential remedies to mitigate this problem are proposed. Grid refinement improves wall-stress predictions in both FPG and APG but only affects the outer profiles in APG, revealing that accurate wall-flux modeling is more critical for APG. Anisotropic grid analysis shows streamwise grid refinement to be more crucial than spanwise for the convergence of skin-friction, outer velocity, and Reynolds stress profiles.