Circular Weir Simulation, Eulerian Three-Phase (Air, Water, and Sand), ANSYS Fluent Training

Description

Description

The present problem simulates the three-phase flow of water, air, and sand flowing over a circular weir using ANSYS Fluent software. We perform this CFD project and investigate it by CFD analysis.

If any obstacle is placed on the path of the fluid flow, it causes the fluid level to rise behind it and increase its velocity, eventually leading to fluid overflowing on the obstacle.

These obstacles are regarded as weirs. Weirs have different uses depending on their shape and are mostly used in civil engineering.

The present model is designed in two dimensions using the Design Modeler. The meshing of the present project has been done using ANSYS Meshing software. The element number is 4770.

Circular Weir Methodology

In this project, the water will enter the computational domain with a velocity of 1m/s, and it flows over the sand bed behind the weir.

The water flow will lift some of the sand and carry it as it flows over the weir.

The standard k-epsilon model is exploited to solve fluid flow equations, and the Eulerian multiphase model is used to investigate the motion and interaction of the existing phases.

Circular Weir Conclusion

At the end of the solution process, two-dimensional contours related to the volume fraction of the air, water, and sand phases, pressure, streamlines, and velocity vectors are obtained.

As can be observed in the sand volume fraction contour, the water flow will lift some of the sand from its bed and move it as the water flows over the weir, now in the long term, the sand bed behind the weir will be washed completely, and the blank space behind the circular obstacle will turn into a tangential path for water.