Computational Investigation of Full-Scale Tethered Underwater Kite

Author(s):  
Amirmahdi Ghasemi ◽  
David J. Olinger ◽  
Gretar Tryggvason

In this paper, a numerical simulation of three-dimensional motion of tether undersea kites (TUSK) for power generation is studied. TUSK systems includes a rigid-winged kite, or glider, moving in an ocean current in which a tethered kite is connected by a flexible tether to a fixed structure. Kite hydrodynamic forces are transmitted through the tether to an electrical generator on the fixed structure. The numerical simulation models the flow field in a three-dimensional domain near the rigid undersea kite wing by solving the full Navier-Stokes equations. In order to resolve the boundary layer near the kite surface, adequate grid resolution is needed which increases the computational run time drastically especially in 3D simulations. Therefore, in this study a slip boundary condition is implemented at the kite interface to accurately predict the total drag, with lower grid resolution. In order to reduce the numerical run times, a moving computational domain method is also used. A PID controller is used to adjuste the kite pitch, roll and yaw angles during power (tether reel-out) and retraction (reel-in) phases. A baseline simulation study of a full-scale TUSK system is conducted in which the expected cross-current, figure-8 motions during a kite reel-out phase is captured. The effect of the tether drag on the kite motion and resulting power output is also investigated and compared with the results of the baseline simulation.

Author(s):  
Amirmahdi Ghasemi ◽  
David J. Olinger ◽  
Gretar Tryggvason

In this paper, a numerical simulation of tether undersea kites (TUSK) used for power generation is undertaken. The effect of varying key design parameters in these systems is studied. TUSK systems consist of a rigid-winged kite, or glider, moving in an ocean current. One proposed TUSK concept uses a tethered kite which is connected by a flexible tether to a support structure with a generator on a surface buoy. The numerical simulation models the flow field in a three-dimensional domain near the rigid undersea kite wing by solving the full Navier-Stokes equations. A moving computational domain method is used to reduce the computational run times. A second-order corrector-predictor method, along with Open Multi-Processing (OpenMP), is employed to solve the flow equations. In order to track the rigid kite, which is a rectangular planform wing with a NACA 0021 airfoil, an immersed boundary method is used. The tension force in the elastic tether is modeled by a simple Hooke’s law, and the effect of tether damping is added. PID control methods are used to adjust the kite pitch, roll and yaw angles during power (tether reel-out) and retraction (reel-in) phases to obtain the desired kite trajectories. During the reel-out phase the kite moves in successive cross-current motions in a figure-8 pattern, the tether length increases and power is generated. During reel-in the kite motion is along the tether, and kite hydrodynamic forces are reduced so that net positive power is produced. The effects of different key design parameters in TUSK systems, such as the ratio of tether to current velocity, and tether retraction velocity, are then further studied. System power output, kite trajectories, and vorticity flow fields for the kite are also determined.


Author(s):  
Amirmahdi Ghasemi ◽  
David J. Olinger ◽  
Gretar Tryggvason

In this paper, a numerical simulation of three dimensional motion of tether undersea kites (TUSK) for power generation is studied. TUSK systems consist of a rigid-winged kite, or glider, moving in an ocean current. One proposed concept uses a tethered kite which is connected by a flexible tether to a support structure with a generator on the ocean surface. The numerical simulation models the flow field in a three-dimensional domain near the rigid undersea kite wing by solving the full Navier-Stokes equations. A two-step projection method along with Open Multi-Processing (OpenMP) is employed to solve the flow equations. In order to track the rigid kite, an immersed boundary method is used. A NACA 0021 airfoil is used for the cross section shape of the kite, and the tension forces in the elastic tethers are modeled by a simple Hooke’s law. A grid refinement study has been carried out to ensure the independence of the numerical results on the grid mesh resolution. Also, the Reynolds number independency has been studied. PID control methods are used to adjust the kite pitch, roll and yaw angles during power (tether reel-out) and retraction (reel-in) phases to obtain desired kite trajectories. During the reel-out phase the kite moves in successive cross-current motions in a figure-8 pattern, the tether length increases and power is generated. During reel-in the kite motion is along the tether, and kite hydrodynamic forces are reduced so that net positive power is produced. Kite trajectories, hydrodynamic forces on the kite, kite tether tension and output power are determined and analyzed for a baseline TUSK simulation.


Akustika ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 25-29
Author(s):  
Igor Khramtsov ◽  
Vadim Palchikovskiy ◽  
Oleg Kustov

The article considers the determination of the impedance of the acoustic liner sample on the basis of numerical simulation of physical processes in a honeycomb resonator with a grazing incidence of sound waves. The computational domain is the test section of a grazing incidence impedance tube with an acoustic liner sample. The liner sample is a single honeycomb resonator with a depth of 14 mm and an open area percent of 4.2%. Numerical simulation is performed based on the direct solution of the non-stationary compressible Navier-Stokes equations in a three-dimensional formulation. The pressure-time and velocity-time signals are recorded in the numerical simulation and processed by Dean's method and the direct method (from the ratio of acoustic pressure to normal acoustic velocity). The comparison of impedances obtained by the two methods demonstrates a good agreement with each other.


2012 ◽  
Vol 468-471 ◽  
pp. 2231-2234
Author(s):  
Feng Gao ◽  
Wei Yan Zhong

Numerical simulation of the three-dimensional steady and unsteady turbulent flow in the whole flow field of a multi-blade centrifugal fan is performed. Unstructured grids is used to discrete the computational domain. Pressure boundary conditions are specified to the inlet and the outlet. The SIMPLE algorithm in conjunction with the RNG k-ε turbulent model is used to solve the three-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations. The moving reference frame is adopted to transfer data between the interfaces of the rotating field and the stationary field. Based on the calculation of the inner-flow in the fan, the pressure pulsation of some important monitoring points and the aerodynamic noise distribution, banding together experiment data were farther analyzed The simulation results are of important significance to the optimal design and noise control of the fan.


2011 ◽  
Vol 317-319 ◽  
pp. 2157-2161
Author(s):  
Yong Chao Zhang ◽  
Qing Guang Chen ◽  
Yong Jian Zhang ◽  
Xiang Xing Jia

The full flow field model of a widely used multi-blade centrifugal fan was built, and unstructured grids were used to discrete the computational domain. The moving reference frame is adopted to transfer data between the interfaces of the rotating field and the stationary field. Pressure boundary conditions are specified to the inlet and the outlet. The SIMPLE algorithm in conjunction with the RNG k-ε turbulent model was used to solve the three-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations. The steady and unsteady numerical simulations of the inner flow in the fan at different working conditions were presented using the CFD method. The numerical simulation results were validated by contrasting to the experiment results. The results displayed the characteristics of the velocity field, pressure field, pressure fluctuation at two monitoring points in the centrifugal fan. The results can provide basis for optimizing the fan design and the internal flow, and have important value of engineering applications in the increase of the overall performance in operation.


Akustika ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 32 ◽  
pp. 182-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
Igor Khramtsov ◽  
Oleg Kustov ◽  
Vadim Palchikovskiy

The acoustic characteristics of a full-scale sample of an actual single-layer liner are determined by numerical simulation of physical processes in normal incidence interferometer. Numerical simulation is performed based on solving the unsteady Navier-Stokes equations with allowance for compressibility in three-dimensional statement. It is noted the good agreement of the acoustic characteristics of the liner sample obtained in numerical simulation and in experiment. It is shown that conducting numerical simulation on single cell sample of the liner also gives results that are in good agreement with the experiment. It allows predicting the acoustic characteristics of samples of locally reacting liners with a more complex geometry in further.


2016 ◽  
pp. 92-97
Author(s):  
R. E. Volkov ◽  
A. G. Obukhov

The rectangular parallelepiped explicit difference schemes for the numerical solution of the complete built system of Navier-Stokes equations. These solutions describe the three-dimensional flow of a compressible viscous heat-conducting gas in a rising swirling flows, provided the forces of gravity and Coriolis. This assumes constancy of the coefficient of viscosity and thermal conductivity. The initial conditions are the features that are the exact analytical solution of the complete Navier-Stokes equations. Propose specific boundary conditions under which the upward flow of gas is modeled by blowing through the square hole in the upper surface of the computational domain. A variant of parallelization algorithm for calculating gas dynamic and energy characteristics. The results of calculations of gasdynamic parameters dependency on the speed of the vertical blowing by the time the flow of a steady state flow.


2014 ◽  
Vol 16 (5) ◽  
pp. 901-918 ◽  

<div> <p>Three-dimensional calculations were performed to simulate the flow around a cylindrical vegetation element using the Scale Adaptive Simulation (SAS) model; commonly, this is the first step of the modeling of the flow through multiple vegetation elements. SAS solves the Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes equations in stable flow regions, while in regions with unstable flow it goes unsteady producing a resolved turbulent spectrum after reducing eddy viscosity according to the locally resolved vortex size represented by the von Karman length scale. A finite volume numerical code was used for the spatial discretisation of the rectangular computational domain with stream-wise, cross-flow and vertical dimensions equal to 30D, 11D and 1D, respectively, which was resolved with unstructured grids. Calculations were compared with experiments and Large Eddy Simulations (LES). Predicted overall flow parameters and mean flow velocities exhibited a very satisfactory agreement with experiments and LES, while the agreement of predicted turbulent stresses was satisfactory. Calculations showed that SAS is an efficient and relatively fast turbulence modeling approach, especially in relevant practical problems, in which the very high accuracy that can be achieved by LES at the expense of large computational times is not required.</p> </div> <p>&nbsp;</p>


2009 ◽  
Vol 75 ◽  
pp. 1-6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fu Chi Wang ◽  
Qun Bo Fan ◽  
Lu Wang ◽  
Quan Sheng Wang ◽  
Zhuang Ma

To develop novel and advanced thermal barrier coatings, full-scale numerical simulation of plasma-sprayed functionally gradient materials is conducted in this paper, including the prediction of basic parameters at the nozzle exit, simulation of three dimensional simulation of the plasma jet, modeling of the interaction between the plasma jet and the particles, calculation of flight trajectories and temperature history of flying metal and ceramic particles, the interaction between the molten particles and the substrate, as well as the deposition process of the coatings. Various complex phenomena, such as turbulent effects with chemical reactions in the plasma jet, dispersion status of the particles onto the substrate, and the composition distribution of the functionally gradient materials, are fully taken into account. The numerical simulation results are found to be in good agreement with experimental evidence.


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