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STUDY AND SIMULATION ON TURBULENT FLOW OVER A

NACA0015 HYDROFOIL
Mateus, Javier1; Ortiz, Esteban2; Castillo, Freddy3; Jacome, Juan3

1Escuela Politécnica Nacional, Facultad de Ingeniería Mecatrónica, Quito, Ecuador
2Escuela Politécnica Nacional, Facultad de Ingeniería Mecatrónica, Quito, Ecuador
3Escuela Politécnica Nacional, Facultad de Ingeniería Mecatrónica, Quito, Ecuador
4Escuela Politécnica Nacional, Facultad de Ingeniería Mecatrónica, Quito, Ecuador

Abstract: We will analyze the hydrofoil NACA0015 with the software ANSYS Fluent CFD because it has been
developed throughout the years as a simulator and having a more intuitive and user-friendly interface which
makes it a suitable option for us, but its greatest disadvantage is that as a private software it has lots of
restrictions for the user and that’s the reason we decided to use ANSYS Fluent only as a simulator and designed
the mesh in the software GMSH, an open source software created specifically to design the geometry and the
mesh depending on the requirements and parameters desired by the user. We will use the LES (Large eddy
simulation) that is a model of turbulence, with this model we hope to save time and computational resources by
modeling the small eddies instead of calculating them, for the cavitation model we will use the Schnerr-Sauer
model that is a default solver in ANSYS Fluent.

Keywords: ANSYS, simulation, large eddy simulation(LES), mesh, geometry.

1 1. INTRODUCTION simulate the cavitation. A paper written by Lorusso [1] is

Cavitation causes surface damages and induces noisy and
vibration, which negatively affect the performance of the
machines. [1], cavitation is a common problem in the
turbomachines.
The cavitation can occur in many ways and the types of
cavitation are briefly summed up: bubble cavitation, sheet
cavitation, cloud cavitation, super-cavitation and vortex
cavitation. [1]
another source we want to compare our results with, because
he also used the same NACA profile, cavitation model and
also, he simulates with an unstructured mesh.
3. PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION:
To applicate the volume of fluid method we will suppose that
the two-phase flow is a homogeneous mixture, for this reason
we have to calculate the dynamic viscosity and density like
multiphase flow [2].

The cavitation phenome is more consistent if we use LES,

according with Hidalgo [2], the results of the simulation
using LES are a good option to understand the cavitation. 4. GOVERNING EQUATIONS:
Cavitation is a really complicated phenomenon to understand
and specially to simulate and by using LES our hopes are to The next formulas are the bases of the large eddy simulation,
simplify this problem but keeping the accuracy of the data the equation of continuity and momentum are: [2]
obtained during the simulation which will let us do a better
analysis of the phenomenon.

2. BACKGROUND
In past papers written by Hidalgo [2] he simulated a
cavitation flow using the open source software Open FOAM
with a mesh developed using SALOME open source
software. We will try to reproduce the phenomenon using the
same boundary condition and the same NACA but using
GMSH software to create the mesh and ANSYS Fluent to
 Apellido Nombre; Apellido Nombre; Apellido Nombre; Apellido Nombre
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See Figure 1

The geometry that we try to use is chosse from Hidalgo [2]

Boundary Conditions:

5. CAVITATION MODEL We will try to use the same Boundary Conditions of Hidalgo
[2].
For NACA 0015 Sauer and Schnerr model had good results
in another’s experiments like Deimel [3], that recommend
this model for the mass transportation. Sauer and Schnerr
model [4] was elaborated to try to understand the unsteady
cavitating flow.

This model combinates the Volume of Fluid technique and a

model predicting the growth and collapse process of bubbles. The results of our mesh are the following:
[4] This method is applied for the simulation of cavitating
flow over a NACA 0015 hydrofoil. Data Type Number
The coefficients Cc and Cv are not present in the original Nodes 18870
formulation of the model: they are usually introduced in some Quadrangles 18884
CFD implementations in order to enhance the evaporation or Hexahedrons 8985
the condensation effect, and usually they are proposed to be
equal to one [5]

Figure 3. Mesh refinement.

6. MESH
We will use an unstructured mesh for our simulation in
accordance with Hidalgo [2]. The unstructured mesh has
some advantages over a structured one like been easier to
draw around complex geometries just as airfoils and
hydrofoils [2]. One of the disadvantages of the unstructured
mesh is that it consumes more computational resources than a Figure 4. Mesh generation in GMSH.
structured mesh, also it is a good option to start simulating
and obtain results with a low percentage of error [3]. Our
mesh will consist of hexahedron for the volume elements and 7. COMPARISONS
quadrangles for the surface elements because the Finite
Volume Method requires this type of geometry to converge. We try to compare our results with the results of others papers
We increase the refinement of the elements of the mesh on [9] [6], we use the same cavitational models as the authors in
the surroundings of the profile, the refinement decreace as the this papers but the difference is that they use the open source
elements of the mesh get further away from the surface of the software OpenFOAM as their simulator and we choose to
profile. work with ANSYS Fluent as [10], [11]. Also, we will compare
We decided to use GMSH to design the mesh because it is a the results with other cavitation models implemented in the
basic but complete program that allows the user to have more papers of some authors such as Kubota [12].
control over the mesh as it let the user define the type of
element the mesh will be structured with.
8. REFERENCES
Geometry
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[1] M. Lopez, M. Lorusso, G. Pascazio, P. Ferrão, J. Unsteady Cavitation on a Hydrofoil Section,” J. Fluid Mech.,
Fournier, and B. Lacarrière, “ScienceDirect ScienceDirect vol. 240, pp. 59–96, 1992.
ScienceDirect Numerical investigation of cavitation on a
NACA0015 hydrofoil by Numerical investigation of
cavitation on a NACA0015 hydrofoil by means of
OpenFOAM means of OpenFOAM Assessing the of using
the heat demand-outdoor ,” Energy Procedia, vol. 126, pp.
794–801, 2017.

[2] et al Hidalgo V, Luo X, Yu A, “Cavitating flow

simulation with mesh development using Salome open source
software,” 11 th Int. Conf. Hydrodyn. (ICHD2014),
Singapore Nanyang Technol. Univ., no. October, pp. 400–
405, 2014.

[3] C. Deimel and R. Skoda, “Implementation of an explicit

density-based solver for the simulation of cavitating flows in
OpenFOAM,” OpenFOAM Work., no. June, pp. 4–5, 2014.

[4] J. Sauer and G. H. Schnerr, “Unsteady cavitating flow: a

new cavitation model based on a modified front capturing
method and bubble dynamics,” FEDSM’00, ASME Fluids
Eng. Summer Conf., no. January 2000, pp. 11–15, 2000.

[5] G. Cazzoli, S. Falfari, G. M. Bianchi, C. Forte, and C.

Catellani, “Assessment of the Cavitation Models
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[6] X. L. Victor H- Hidalgo, “Benefits of hydropower

research in Ecuador using OpenFOAM based on CFD
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[7] A. Asnaghi, E. Jahanbakhsh, and M. S. Seif, “Unsteady

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[8] E. Roohi, M. R. Pendar, and A. Rahimi, “Simulation of

three-dimensional cavitation behind a disk using various
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[9] J. Stigler and J. Svozil, “Modeling of cavitation flow on

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[10] R. E. A. Arndt, “NUMERICAL MODELING OF

SHEET AND TIP VORTEX CAVITATION WITH
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[12] A. Kubota, H. Kato, and H. Yamaguchi, “A New

Modeling Of Cavitating Flows - a Numerical Study Of