At the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland - the Official Scientific Advisor to the Alinghi Challenge for the 2003 America's Cup - researchers working in the group of Prof. Alfio Quarteroni have applied leading-edge numerical flow simulation techniques using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software. These simulations have provided valuable information to the Alinghi Designers Rolf Vrolijk and Manolo Ruiz del Elvira who, together with Coordinator Grant Simmer, designed the winning high-performance Alinghi racing yacht.

Papers include various topics such as: application of overset methods, overset grid tools, and methods for deformation/relative motion.

The method, which utilizes a Cartesian background mesh, can create surface-only grids, purely Cartesian grids, and boundary-fitted grids. Harpoon uses tetrahedral, prism and pyramid cells to ensure high mesh fidelity near model surfaces. Purely tetrahedral cells can also be generated. Finished meshes can be exported to all major CFD and FEA programs.

Furthermore, the software can handle non-watertight CAD models and users can specify level of detail resolution without having to modify the original surface definition.

"We call this an extreme mesher, because it provides quality, simplicity, speed, flexibility and reliability that are unprecedented," says Kent Misegades, CEI's president. "We think Harpoon will revolutionize computational simulation by breaking up the current bottleneck of pre-processing."

The software creates individual mesh systems for objects within the system using a grid setup based on the length scales and the physics of each zone. It then manages communications among the multiple zones ensuring reliable, fast and stable convergence. The entire system can be modeled in one swoop with a dramatic reduction in solution time. In a problem simulating the use of multi-zone grids, Coolit v5.0 computed the flow through four pin-fin heat sinks with a reduction in cell count from over one million to just sixty-two thousand and a savings in compute time--from over 8 hours to less than 15 minutes!.

Coolit v5.0 operates on all Windows-based platforms: Windows 95,95, NT, 2000 and XP. For further information, contact Daat Research Corp. at info@daat.com.

The Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC) has successfully simulated the Coanda effect using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) – which may help improve low-speed maneuverability of ships and planes. The engineers demonstrated that by blowing air out of a strategically located slot in an airfoil, the rear stagnation point could be moved further aft along the trailing edge of the airfoil, thereby increasing lift. The military has worked on a number of potential applications for this effect, such as making it possible for submarines moving at low speeds to make sharp turns. The key to the advance made by the NWSC was the use of the Reynolds stress model for predicting turbulence in the jet, which the research shows is far more accurate than the more common k-epsilon models.

The Naval Surface Warfare Center is the principal Navy resource, national focal point and international leader in surface and undersea vehicle science, ship systems and related maritime technology. A major technical component of the Naval Sea Systems Command, the Division is a source of innovative technology for other national priorities such as environment, energy and transportation. The Division is responsible for research, development, test and evaluation, fleet support, and in-service engineering for surface and undersea vehicles, including hull, machinery and electrical systems, and propulsors. It conducts logistics research and development, and provides support to the Maritime Administration and the maritime industry. The technical leadership areas of the Carderock Division include materials, structures, ship protection systems, vehicle concepts, hydrodynamics, acoustic and electromagnetic signatures, environmental protection systems, and logistics.