Assessment of Eddy-Viscosity Turbulence Models on Flow in a Wheelhouse

Abstract

Six different turbulence models were used to simulate the flow within the wheelhouse of a simplified body. The performance of each model was evaluated by comparing the results to data collected from wind tunnel experiments. The performance of large eddy simulation (LES) and detached eddy simulation (DES) is largely dependent on the time step and grid size to accurately resolve turbulent eddies. The standard k–ω and k–ω SST models deviated the most from the experimental data. The standard k–ε model was found to produce the most consistent results which matched experimental data for the simplified body and wheel.