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Usage of the user-defined fan model is best demonstrated by an example. With this in mind, consider the domain shown in Figure 7.5.1. An inlet supplies air at 10 m/s to a cylindrical region, 1.25 m long and 0.2 m in diameter, surrounded by a symmetry boundary. At the center of the flow domain is a circular fan. A pressure outlet boundary is at the downstream end.
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Solving this problem with the user-defined fan model will cause ANSYS FLUENT to periodically write out a radial profile file with the current solution variables at the fan face. These variables (static pressure, pressure jump, axial, radial, and swirling (tangential) velocity components) will represent averaged quantities over annular sections of the fan. The sizes of the annular regions are determined by the size of the fan and the number of radial points to be used in the profiles.
Once the profile file is written, ANSYS FLUENT will invoke an executable, which will perform the following tasks:
ANSYS FLUENT will then read the new profile file and continue with the calculation.
Setting the User-Defined Fan Parameters
Specification of the parameters for the user-defined fan begins in the User-Defined Fan Model dialog box (Figure 7.5.2).
Define
User-Defined
Fan Model...
In this dialog box, you can select the fan zone(s) on which your executable will operate under Fan Zones. In this example, there is only one fan, fan-8. If you have multiple fan zones in a simulation, for which you have different profile specifications, you can select them all at this point. Your executable will be able to differentiate between the fan zones because the zone ID for each fan is included in the solution profile file. The executable will be invoked once for each zone, and separate profile files will be written for each.
The executable file will be called on to update the profile file periodically, based on the input for the Iteration Update Interval. An input of 10, as shown in the dialog box, means that the fan executable in this example will act every 10 iterations to modify the profile file.
The number of points in the profile file to be written by ANSYS FLUENT is entered under Output Profile Points. This profile file can have the same or a different number of points as the one that is written by the external executable.
Finally, the name of the executable should be entered under External Command Name. In the current example, the name of the executable is fantest.
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If the executable is not located in your working directory, then you must type the complete path to the executable.
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Sample User-Defined Fan Program
The executable file will be built from the Fortran program, fantest.f, which is shown below. You can obtain a copy of this subroutine and the two that it calls (to read and write profile files) by contacting your ANSYS FLUENT technical support engineer.
c
c This program is invoked at intervals by FLUENT to
c read a profile-format file that contains radially
c averaged data at a fan face, compute new pressure-jump
c and swirl-velocity components, and write a new profile
c file that will subsequently be read by FLUENT to
c update the fan conditions.
c
c Usage: fantest < input_profile > output_profile
c
integer npmax
parameter (npmax = 900)
integer inp ! input: number of profile points
integer iptype ! input: profile type (0=radial, 1=point)
real ir(npmax) ! input: radial positions
real ip(npmax) ! input: pressure
real idp(npmax) ! input: pressure-jump
real iva(npmax) ! input: axial velocity
real ivr(npmax) ! input: radial velocity
real ivt(npmax) ! input: tangential velocity
character*80 zoneid
integer rfanprof ! function to read a profile file
integer status
c
status = rfanprof(npmax,zoneid,iptype,
$ inp,ir,ip,idp,iva,ivr,ivt)
if (status.ne.0) then
write(*,*) 'error reading input profile file'
else
do 10 i = 1, inp
idp(i) = 200.0 - 10.0*iva(i)
ivt(i) = 20.0*ir(i)
ivr(i) = 0.0
10 continue
call wfanprof(6,zoneid,iptype,inp,ir,idp,ivr,ivt)
endif
stop
end
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After the variable declarations, which have comments on the right, the subroutine rfanprof is called to read the profile file, and pass the current values of the relevant variables (as defined in the declaration list) to fantest. A loop is done on the number of points in the profile to compute new values for:
After the loop, a new profile is written by the subroutine wfanprof, shown below. (For more information on profile file formats, see Section 7.6.2.)
subroutine wfanprof(unit,zoneid,ptype,n,r,dp,vr,vt)
c
c writes a FLUENT profile file for input by the
c user fan model
c
integer unit ! output unit number
character*80 zoneid
integer ptype ! profile type (0=radial, 1=point)
integer n ! number of points
real r(n) ! radial position
real dp(n) ! pressure jump
real vr(n) ! radial velocity
real vt(n) ! tangential velocity
character*6 typenam
if (ptype.eq.0) then
typenam = 'radial'
else
typenam = 'point'
endif
write(unit,*) '((', zoneid(1:index(zoneid,'\0')-1), ' ',
$ typenam, n, ')'
write(unit,*) '(r'
write(unit,100) r
write(unit,*) ')'
write(unit,*) '(pressure-jump'
write(unit,100) dp
write(unit,*) ')'
write(unit,*) '(radial-velocity'
write(unit,100) vr
write(unit,*) ')'
write(unit,*) '(tangential-velocity'
write(unit,100) vt
write(unit,*) ')'
100 format(5(e15.8,1x))
return
end
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This subroutine will write a profile file in either radial or point format, based on your input for the integer ptype. (See Section 7.6 for more details on the types of profile files that are available.) The names that you use for the various profiles are arbitrary. Once you have initialized the profile files, the names you use in wfanprof will appear as profile names in the Fan dialog box.
Initializing the Flow Field and Profile Files
The next step in the setup of the user-defined fan is to initialize (create) the profile files that will be used. To do this, first initialize the flow field with the Solution Initialization task page (using the velocity inlet conditions, for example), and then type the command (update-user-fans) in the console window. (The parentheses are part of the command, and must be typed in.)
This will create the profile names that are given in the subroutine wfanprof.
Selecting the Profiles
Once the profile names have been established, you will need to visit the Fan dialog box (Figure 7.5.3) to complete the problem setup. (See Section 7.3.18 for general information on using the Fan dialog box.)
At this time, the Fan Axis, Fan Origin, and Fan Hub Radius can be entered, along with the choice of profiles for the calculation of pressure jump, tangential velocity, and radial velocity. With the profile options enabled, you can select the names of the profiles from the drop-down lists. In the dialog box above, the selected profiles are named fan-8 pressure-jump, fan-8 tangential-velocity, and fan-8 radial-velocity, corresponding to the names that were used in the subroutine wfanprof.
Performing the Calculation
The solution is now ready to run. As it begins to converge, the report in the console window shows that the profile files are being written and read every 10 iterations:
iter continuity x-velocity y-velocity z-velocity k
! 1 residual normalization factors changed (continuity
1 1.0000e+00 1.0000e+00 1.0000e+00 1.0000e+00 1.0000e+00
! 2 residual normalization factors changed (continuity
2 1.0000e+00 1.0000e+00 1.0000e+00 1.0000e+00 9.4933e-01
3 6.8870e-01 7.2663e-01 7.3802e-01 7.5822e-01 6.1033e-01
. . . . . .
. . . . . .
. . . . . .
9 2.1779e-01 9.8139e-02 3.0497e-01 2.9609e-01 2.8612e-01
Writing "fan-8-out.prof"...
Done.
Reading "fan-8-in.prof"...
Reading profile file...
10 "fan-8" radial-profile points, r, pressure-jump,
radial-velocity, tangential-velocity.
Done.
10 1.7612e-01 7.4618e-02 2.5194e-01 2.4538e-01 2.4569e-01
11 1.6895e-01 8.3699e-02 2.0316e-01 2.0280e-01 2.1169e-01
. . . . . .
. . . . . .
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The file fan-8-out.prof is written out by ANSYS FLUENT and read by the executable fantest. It contains values for pressure, pressure jump, axial velocity, radial velocity, and tangential velocity at 20 radial locations at the site of the fan. The file fan-8-in.prof is generated by fantest and contains updated values for pressure jump and radial and tangential velocity only. It is therefore a smaller file than fan-8-out.prof. The prefix for these files takes its name from the fan zone with which the profiles are associated. An example of the profile file fan-8-in.prof is shown below. This represents the last profile file to be written by fantest during the convergence history.
((fan-8 radial 10) (r 0.24295786E-01 0.33130988E-01 0.41966137E-01 0.50801374E-01 0.59636571E-01 0.68471842E-01 0.77307090E-01 0.86142287E-01 0.94963484E-01 0.95353782E-01 ) (pressure-jump 0.10182057E+03 0.98394081E+02 0.97748657E+02 0.97787750E+02 0.97905228E+02 0.98020668E+02 0.98138817E+02 0.98264198E+02 0.98469681E+02 0.98478783E+02 ) (radial-velocity 0.00000000E+00 0.00000000E+00 0.00000000E+00 0.00000000E+00 0.00000000E+00 0.00000000E+00 0.00000000E+00 0.00000000E+00 0.00000000E+00 0.00000000E+00 ) (tangential-velocity 0.48591572E+00 0.66261977E+00 0.83932275E+00 0.10160275E+01 0.11927314E+01 0.13694369E+01 0.15461419E+01 0.17228458E+01 0.18992697E+01 0.19070756E+01 ) |
Results
A plot of the transverse velocity components at the site of the fan is shown in Figure 7.5.4. As expected, there is no radial component, and the tangential (swirling) component increases with radius.
As a final check on the result, an XY plot of the static pressure as a function of
position is shown (Figure
7.5.5). This XY plot is made on a line at
=0.05 m, or at about half the radius of the duct. According to the input file shown above, the pressure jump at the site of the fan should be approximately 97.8 Pa/m. Examination of the figure supports this finding.
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7.5.1 Steps for Using
