gambit Tutorial

The Durham gambit Tutorial.

Introduction.
This provides a short step by step guide to modelling an aerofoil using the Fluent package. The aim being to get you to produce a mesh in the shortest possible space of time. Additional tutorials are available from the Help menu in gambit for more complex geometries.

Meshing the Aerofoil.

Creating the Geometry.

Start gambit Obtain the NACA5012 coordinates file (available next to this document) File-> Import -> Vertex Data (then select the file you just downloaded) You should have a screen that looks like Figure 1:

Now we want to create two edges from these points. Select the 2nd icon in the 2nd row of buttons at the top right of the screen. This will bring up a number of buttons to manipulate edges. The first button in the third row from the top allows you to select the type of line. Right click on it and hold the mouse button down a menu will pop up from which you can select NURBS. Use the point picker, mouse and NURBS tool to make two edges, one of the bottom and one of the top surface of the aerofoil. Ideally we'd make just one but creating a face out of that later is tricky! Gambit is very sensitive about the order that the points are read in from the file and the -1-

Figure 1: Point Input to Gambit.

gambit Tutorial order in which you select them. The file has the points arranged in a suitable manner. To select the points in the correct order:

select from the trailing edge to the leading edge for the top surface select from the leading edge to the trailing edge for the lower surface You can determine which order the points are read in by making the vertex labels visible.

Then we want to create the surface on which we will calculate the fluid flow. To do this we will create a domain around 1 chord lengths above and below the aerofoil and 1.5 chord lengths before and after. This is slightly arbitrary and we may want to change this after we look at the results! Add points at (-1.5,1),(-1.5,-1),(2,1) and (2,-1) Join these points together with straight lines. Your screen should look like Figure 2:

Figure 2: Edges in Gambit.

We now have six edges from which we construct our surface. We are going to construct two surfaces which we will then subtract to give us our final face. Join the outer edges into a wireframe face (Geometry Button -> Face Button -> Wireframe Button You may have to right click and hold to find it!) Join the inner edges (the aerofoil) into a wireframe face Subtract the two faces. (Geometry Button -> Face Button > Subtract Button. You will find this by right clicking on the third icon from the left in the face group) Make sure that the second face you select is the aerofoil otherwise you will end up meshing the inside of the aerofoil not the outside! -2-

gambit Tutorial Meshing the Surface.

For simplicity we are going to use an unstructured mesh. This may not be the best mesh for the problem! To do this we will apply an edge mesh to all the edges you have created and then put an unstructured mesh onto the surface. So mesh the inlet and the outlet with around twenty points. (Mesh Button -> Edge Button)

The number of points is controlled by the interval count option (fourth division down from the top) you will have to change it as the default is interval size. You may want to put in a successive ratio that alters the spacing of the points as you go along the edge. In this example I've concentrated some points towards the centre of the edge as this is where the interesting flow effects will happen. Gambit has some idiosyncrasies in it's meshing selection, after you have asked it to mesh something you have to reselect the edge to make further changes.

Mesh the top and bottom with around twenty points as well. Mesh the top and bottom of the aerofoil with around forty points. Mesh the face. (Mesh Button -> Face Button) you will need to select tri elements. You should end up with something like Figure 3:

Figure 3: The meshed aerofoil.

We now need to tell gambit about the physical nature of the problem and then we can export to Fluent. You will need to tell Gambit that we are going to use Fluent at this stage. Use the Solver Menu and select Fluent 5/6. Hit the Zone Button and then you have two other buttons:

Specify Boundary Types use this to specify what is going to happen at each edge. Specify Continuum Types use this to specify fluids or solids. -3-

gambit Tutorial

Put the inlet on the left as a pressure inlet, the outlet on the right as a pressure outlet. Make sure you select edges as the entity. The top and bottom edges should be a symmetry plane (which is a bit of trick as we are not really interested in any symmetry). The aerofoil should be a wall surface. Specify Fluid as the Continuum type for the face. You are now ready to export your mesh: File -> Export -> Mesh (Dont forget to Save your Gambit files as well!) Push the 2D button as this is a 2D case.

Summary
You have now successfully meshed up a basic geometry. This then needs to be imported into Fluent to run an actual calculation. At the time of writing we recommend that you import it into Fluent 12 for which another tutorial is available. Grant Ingram 16 November 2010

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