CFD - Computational Fluid Dynamics, Motorsport, Formula 1

[PNSD]

Well for a start if your learning CFD, start with basic models, maybe even 2d models. You need to get an understanding of the program at a basic level first. If you complicate your models you complicate your meshing process and that is perhaps the most crucial stage of CFD pre-processing.

What is your understanding of fluid flows like? Are you a student learning? If you have no understanding or even limited understanding then it is most likley all you will be doing is producing pretty pictures.

EDIT - just read your other post. You are a final year student. With that in mind, stick to the advice of starting simple and working your way up. I started learning CFD last year. Having used (or tried) star CCM, openFOAM, and the newer ANSYS (dont know what their called), I muched prefered the older Fluent (5/6) and Gambit as a pre-processing program. Lots of tutorials about and easyish to pick up. What program is it you'll be using?

[pottsymouthy]

I think my University has a fluent liscence that the students can use.

I am taking a CFD course, but it is not till my second semester.

Which program would you suggest for creating the models?
All I have done upto now is a bit of Autocad, solidworks and a tiny bit of autodesk maya.

[PNSD]

Well that all depends which you feel most confortable. I find solidworks alot easier than say Catia. Ive never really tried Autocad, but im sure it will export to something recognizable for a pre-processing program.

In terms of pre-processing and meshing, what software is available to you?

[riker84]

Hello, I am just wondering would it be possible to get a copy of your rear wing model? I use solidworks ver.10, will i have compatibility issues? What sort of wing profiles did you use, were they NACA?

[Izzy410]

Hello,

So im kinda not a university student. just a high school boy 16 year old. im in a competition called F1 in School.

My team grabbed second on Malaysia's National Finals and we get to represent the country to World Championship. Therefore i need a few advice. and in this forum i found that (if i understand actually) someone can do the CFD for us. well at least check.

because i have designed a newer model for the World Level and it has shown promising result. actually 70% better than my national model. so i am skeptical of the result. even checked 3 times to confirm it.

I need therefore a third party confirmation. hope someone can give me a hand.

So what do you need to help? STL file? flow setting etc? gimme a reply and i'll gladly reply.

Thanks in advance

[jhthoh]

Still available here?

[jordangp]

I've got a model F1 car for someone to use if they so wish, it is quite a complex model, however it is made in Google Sketchup so I can only really get it in .skp or .xml unless someone knows a way of converting the format.

Thread for my model:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=9400

[PNSD]

It would need to be majoyly simplified because even a powerful desktop would be able to run CFD for that. I persume rather than pretty pictures you would want some pretty decent results. I suggest some simplification first.

[jordangp]

I can majorly simplify the car, and can also sent individual parts for example diffuser or rear wing for CFD, whatever you want just let me know.

[PNSD]

Sorry if I mislead you!! Im still learning the in's and out's of CFD, well meshing to the point!! Ive been at it for over a year and meshing is still a black art to get right for me :p. especially when considering a rotating wall/moving mesh in such close proximity to the ground plane.

I have access to pretty powerful 4 core'd systems so once I can further my meshing skills id be glad to help. until then im afraid i can off no practical assistance other than the previous advice.

If you can be patient for a few months, then im sure I'd be able to help, until then im sure one of the other wonder guys on here can maybe help.

[ringo]

Well the mesh settings take a while to tune. It's a black art indeed.

What i do is run half the car in CFD. This cuts the calculation in half and allows you to make the mesh finer as a result.
It's best to start with simple mesh and fast calculation times, then increase the detail and kind of feel out what level of detail you want with how much time you are willing to wait for it.

Areas that I'm not interested in have less cells. Area like the wishbones and wings, and the diffuser i use more cells.
It depends on what you are focusing at.

Jordan GP is the google sketch up car to scale?
I don't know about the format conversion though.

[raymondu999]

Question. Are there any commercial CFD apps around where you can run on your own computer? Processing power is not an issue. But can we run it on our own?

[PNSD]

You got Linux?

OpenFOAM is by far the best, and one of the best solvers anyway.

[n_anirudh]

Half models are good only for 1st approximation and are widely used.

I prefer to spend a bit longer trying to mesh the complete model so that I can get cross cross flow components as well. Although my models are relatively simple aero stuff.

[JGomezH]

Check this site

http://www.caelinux.com/CMS/

OpenFOAM is part of it.