Agitation tank with AMI function

Update: July 18, 2017
OpenFOAM 4.x

Case directory

$FOAM_TUTORIALS/multiphase/interDyMFoam/ras/mixerVesselAMI

Summary

We calculate the fluid flow in a tank that is agitated with gas for 5 seconds. The rotation of the blades is modeled with the AMI function. The geometry of the tank is set up with (STL format) shape files under the directory "constant/triSurface".

Model geometry (entire) Model geometry (entire)
Model geometry (mixer blades and stator) Model geometry (mixer blades and stator)

The rotation speed of the mixer is specified in the file "constant/dynamicMeshDict" as follows. The blades rotate on Z axis at a speed of 5 rad/s.

dynamicFvMesh   solidBodyMotionFvMesh;
motionSolverLibs ( "libfvMotionSolvers.so" );
solidBodyMotionFvMeshCoeffs
{
    cellZone        rotating;

    solidBodyMotionFunction  rotatingMotion;
    rotatingMotionCoeffs
    {
        origin        (0 0 0);
        axis          (0 0 1);
        omega         -5; // 5 rad/s
    }
}

The meshes are as follows, and the number of mesh is 988680.

Mesh Meshes
Meshes (mixer blades and stator) Meshes (mixer blades and stator)

The calculation result is as follows.

In OpenFOAM 4.0, there is a bug in the configuration file constant/transportProperties that the names of the properties air and water are reversed. Note that this causes the air phase to be displayed as alpha.water.
Flow velocity (U)
Volume ratio of gas (alpha-phase1)
Meshes (zoomed) Flow velocity at final time (U)
Meshes (zoomed) Volume ratio of gas at final time (alpha-phase1)

Commands

cp -r $FOAM_TUTORIALS/multiphase/interDyMFoam/ras/mixerVesselAMI mixerVesselAMI
cd mixerVesselAMI

rm -rf 0

# Make meshes
blockMesh
surfaceFeatureExtract
snappyHexMesh -overwrite
createBaffles -overwrite
mergeOrSplitBaffles -split -overwrite

# Copy variables after meshing to prevent unnecessary patch variables from being created.
cp -r 0.orig 0

# Initialize alpha value
setFields

decomposePar -force
mpirun -np 6 interDyMFoam -parallel
reconstructPar -noFunctionObjects

paraFoam

Calculation time

  • Making meshes: 8 minutes 17.25 seconds, Single
  • Calculating: 4 days 19 hours 32 minutes 46 seconds, 6 parallel

*Inter(R) Core(TM) i7-2600 CPU @ 3.40GHz 3.40GHz