Kinematic domain decomposition to simulate flows past moving objects

Abstract

A new method is developed to solve the unsteady Navier-Stokes equations on a composite grid which consists of subdomain grids moving with respect to each other. These subdomains are structured grids with different topologies. However, their interfaces are unstructured in the sense that they may or may not arbitrarily overlap with each other. This method captures the boundary-motion-induced flow component. The method is demonstrated for a transonic flow past an airfoil which experiences a combined motion of pitching and plunging.