Solving the Equations of Compressible Viscous Flow about Aerospace Configurations

Abstract

The development of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) procedures has progressed extremely rapidly during the past two decades. The parallel rapid development in computer hardware resources and architectures has not only matched the explosive algorithm development but has indeed provided and continues to provide its impetus. Together the resources are now available for the numerical simulation of the flow about complex three-dimensional aerospace configurations (see Fig. 1). Yet, in many ways the discipline of CFD is still in its infancy. Major decisions concerning its future direction need to be taken and many impeding obstacles must be overcome before its evolution into a mature discipline for solving the equations of compressible viscous flow.While the battles of the past concerning CFD centered on shock-fitting versus shock-capturing algorithms or finite-element versus finite-difference procedures, present and future battles will be concerned with structured multiblock-element grids versus unstructured single-element grids, turbulence modeling versus direct simulation of turbulent phenomena, and indirect relaxation or approximately factored procedures versus direct solution procedures. These items will be discussed in the paper with regard to the development of CFD for applications to aerospace problems of current and future engineering interest.