[Tom Lauriks]

Hi foamers,


I need to use openfoam on my university's cluster. I have a storage restriction on the cluster of 50 GB. I'm quite new to transient simulations. The first model that I ran, was quickly using up 47GB, even with the storage interval set to only once per 0.5 s.

The models that I'm running are mainly only CFD. I'm currently using unsteady RANS (pimpleFoam), with a function object for 1 or two scalars that will be transported. My models will have at least 20-30 million cells. But maybe much more, like 100 million cells. In the future, I'll probably be peforming LES of similar domain sizes. For the record, I'm performing simulations of wind flow over urban areas. So, we're talking about airflow over domains of at least a couple of hundreds of meters.

Can anyone give me an estimate of the storage space that I need, to store the results of such a transient simulation, at an acceptable storage interval?

[flotus1]

Unless that university cluster is from the early 2000's, there must be a way to get workspaces with more than 50GB. Better check the documentation again, or ask one of the admins.

That being said, you don't usually run all simulations with a fixed, small output interval for the whole flow field. Instead, you write a few monitor quantities to text files, that allow you to check how the simulation is doing. Ideally, these output quantities already include the quantities you are actually interested in.
Using small output intervals for the whole flow field is the exception. For example when you want to create a fancy animation. These runs can easily use up several TB of storage for typical LES. And modern clusters should be able to handle that.

[Tom Lauriks]

Thanks for your answer.