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Assessment of Numerical Simulation Capabilities of the Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS 6) for Planar Air Curtain Flows

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Abstract

Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) results are discussed for momentum driven planar jet flows, resembling configurations in use for air curtain in the context of smoke control in building fire. The CFD package Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS) is used. Special focus is given to the impact of grid resolution, synthetic turbulent inflow boundary condition and sub-grid scale eddy viscosity models. The computational results are compared with summarized literature data. Investigation of different set-ups of inlet boundary conditions, including the inlet duct length, velocity profile and method of generation of turbulence at the level of the inflow, reveals that the inlet boundary condition is the most influential factor governing the flow downstream. The FDS results successfully reproduce the planar jet flows, both in terms of mean variables and second-order statistics. ‘Reference’ results have been obtained with a fully developed turbulent flow emerging from a long inlet duct. By reducing the inlet duct length and applying the Synthetic Eddy Method (SEM) at the inflow boundary condition, the ‘reference’ results have been reproduced with a reduction in the computing times of approximately 20%. However, care must be taken when choosing the parameters of SEM, in particular the number of eddies and their length scale. The impact of turbulent viscosity model is noticeable, but not of primary importance for the flow at hand, provided that a sufficiently fine computational mesh is used.

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Acknowledgements

This research has been conducted at Ghent University, supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 51608076), Chongqing Science and Technology Commission (Grant No. cstc2016shmszx30016), Chongqing Construction Science and Technology Planning Project (Grant No. 2015-1-34), Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (Grant No. 106112015CDJXY210008), State Scholarship Fund (Grant No. 201306050081) and the 111 Project, No. B13041. The authors greatly acknowledge Dr. Randall McDermott (NIST, USA) for the inspiring communication concerning the SEM implementation details in FDS, version 6.0.1. Dr. Tarek Beji is Postdoctoral Fellow of the Fund of Scientific Research – Flanders (Belgium) (FWO-Vlaanderen). The computational resources (Stevin Supercomputer Infrastructure) and services used in this work were provided by the VSC (Flemish Supercomputer Center), funded by Ghent University, the Hercules Foundation and the Flemish Government – department EWI.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Urban Construction and Environmental Engineering, Chongqing University, Chongqing, China

    Long-Xing Yu, Fang Liu & Miao-Cheng Weng

  2. Department of Flow, Heat and Combustion Mechanics, Ghent University – UGent, Ghent, Belgium

    Long-Xing Yu, Tarek Beji, Georgios Maragkos & Bart Merci

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  1. Long-Xing Yu
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Correspondence to Miao-Cheng Weng.

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Yu, LX., Beji, T., Maragkos, G. et al. Assessment of Numerical Simulation Capabilities of the Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS 6) for Planar Air Curtain Flows. Fire Technol 54, 583–612 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10694-018-0701-7

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