Isotropic and anisotropic mesh adaptation for RANS simulations of a nacelle under crosswind conditions

Mesh adaptation of unstructured meshes for aerodynamic simulations, that typically resolve the Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations, is a promising approach to enable high numerical precision on complex geometries. Its objective is to minimize the discretization error without using empirical meshing guidelines. The most common approach of mesh adaptation is the “feature-based” isotropic mesh adaptation: from an initial flow prediction on an isotropic unstructured mesh, a local error estimator is computed using a flow variable. It is then used to adapt the mesh using isotropic tetrahedra. Additional near-wall resolution can be achieved by extruding prism layers from the walls. A more efficient approach is to use anisotropic mesh adaptation purely with tetrahedra that are stretched to follow the flow's preferential directions. In this work, we demonstrate the abilities of feature-based isotropic and anisotropic mesh adaptation on a complex flow phenomenon of importance for jet engines: flow separation in a nacelle under crosswind conditions. Two different solvers, adapted for either isotropic or anisotropic meshes, are employed. Results are compared with standard unstructured simulations with user-imposed mesh refinements and highlight the ability of mesh adaptation to automatically capture all the relevant flow phenomena without any user input and at reduced mesh size.