Jay,

Our CFD-ACE+ code can simulate the physics that you are interested in. One particularly power feature that you may find useful is that it can calculate on meshes with polyhedral cells (ie: a cell may have any number of faces). You can use hybrid structured/unstructured meshes, but the tool that you may find most useful is CFD-VisCART. VisCART is a viscous-cartesian mesher that is well suited for complex geometries. You give it a surface definition file from a CAD package. It then generates a cartesian mesh, based on user defined parameters, which approximates the surface geometry. Finally, it creates a viscous layer projected to the CAD defined surfaces based on user specified spacing parameters. This mesher gives you an excellent combination of fast meshing (like an unstructured mesher) and control over grid spacing near walls (like a structured mesher).

Feel free to take a look at our web site <www.cfdrc.com> and contact me if you have any questions.

Regards, Alton

As part of my PhD research I am trying to model the interaction of a transient non-reacting fluid flow with a smoke detector. The smoke detector has a fairly complex geometry that I am trying to capture in order to examine the flow distributions within the smoke detector. I have been using a CFD code that uses a structured hex mesh and I am unhappy with the over-simplicity of the resulting grid that I can create. I am looking for recommendations on a CFD code and/with a mesh generator that can accomodate a complex geometry such as a smoke detector.

Here are some additional details. An inlet boundary condition specifies a transient flow of velocity, temperature, and particle concentration that is "blown" at the detector. Radiation is not a concern. The length scales are on the order of centimeters to millimeters for the detector. The range of velocities are in the range of 0.5 m/s down to nearly zero (I might consider a diffusion only scenario as well). Particle concentration is of interest. I have access to Digital UNIX (DEC Alpha) and WinNT platforms. Thank you for your time!

Hello,

If you are unhappy with the meshes you can create then I would recommend you try ICEM CFD HEXA. It is one of the most powerful structured multiblock and unstructured block meshers on the market.

It currently supports 120 solvers so they should be away to connect it to any existing solver.

For more information and a FREE demonstartion CD contact your nearest office. A complete list of these can be found at

http://www.icemcfd.com

I hope this helps you.

Regards

David Minns ICEM CFD UK

You might want to look at our code, M-Implicit. It is able to handle very complex and distorted meshes and is *very* fast. Have a look at our website www.mcube.fr

Regards,

dimitri