Air Source Heat Pump - What simulation to use

I’m looking to run a simulation to determine the impact of wind within a built up area around a air source heat pump. The objective is to determine if the wind will create cold plumes around the outlet of the heat pump, something which needs to be avoided to ensure that cold air does not circulate back into the intake fans.

I undertand 2 systems need to be considered
1 - the intake and outlet of the heat pump from the ambient air.
2 - the wind with a velocity blowing around the air pump being effected by the walls of adjacent buildings.

What is the best simulation to consider these two systems? And how can I create a 3D plot of the results.

I have yet to set anything up so cannot share a link.

Thanks,

Hey @sbromley!

First thing that came into my head was a convective heat transfer analysis, you could enclose the heat generating component and let air flow through the domain. An example project to get some inspiration on the BCs etc. can be found here: SimScale - let us know if that helps!

Happy weekend!

Jousef

Thanks @jousefm

I have set up with a convective heat transfer analysis as you suggested. The sim requires a hex dominant or hex dominant parametic, however I get the following error ‘Simulation assignment on the geometry is not supported for the currently selected mesh. Try to regenerate your mesh or use the mesh as simulation domain.’ I find that if the mesh is used as a domain it consumes the geometry that represents the pump, which obviously is no good as it deletes the inlet and outlet of the pump.

I have set up a very basic start to see if I can get something atleast running before address other obvious missing information that I will begin to add.

I have geometry representing the pump with velocity inlet and pressure outlet and an enclosure representing the ambient air.

Having looked at other forum posts, the variations that I have tried, but get the same failed mesh are;

1 - Ambient air volume and fan air volume as seperate non intersecting bodies
2 - Ambient air volume and fan air volume as intersecting bodies
3 - Various mesh types
4 - Hex parametric mesh with cell zones. The cell zone was made up of the pump air volume.
I appreciate your help. I think If I can get a mesh and get the basic model running the rest I can cope with.

Many thanks,