Trying to mesh a model with objects having both porous and solid parts

[dko]

Hi all,

In my project, I am trying to model airflow around plants in a hydroponic system using an incompressible, steady state, laminar model. To better represent my experimental data from a wind tunnel verification test, I decided to try modeling the plants using various frustum shapes with the bottom half having solid properties and the top half having a porous property (modeled using Darcy’s Law). In between the two parts making up each plant shaped as a frustum, there is a gap of 1E-5 inch.

The problem arises when I try to mesh this model. When trying to mesh this set-up, I am not able to complete the meshing operation, and the progress is stuck at 0% no matter how long I run it for.

Does anyone have a suggestion for me on how to resolve this issue?

Here is a link to my project:

SimScale Login

Thank you!
-Deanna

[igaviano]

Hi @dko, thanks for posting at our forum

Looking at your model, I see that the small feature suppression is set to a very low value, maybe incresing it to 1e-3 or 5e-4 should help in the mesh generation:

That wouldn’t cover the gaps, though, and as you mentioned there are many small ones in your model:

@dko

In between the two parts making up each plant shaped as a frustum, there is a gap of 1E-5 inch.

Maybe a solution in that case could be to apply Region Refinements to the places where these gaps appear, so that they are captured at the same time as the whole model isn’t refined altogether.

I also see some sharp edges which might make it difficult for the generation of boundary layers:

Cutting them to be of a finite lenght might also be helpful (only an illustration):

I guess these would be my suggestions. What do you think?

Best,
Igor