On the computation of buoyancy-driven turbulent flows in rectangular enclosures

Abstract

Numerical computations are reported of turbulent natural convection of air in two tall rectangular enclosures with heated and cooled vertical walls. The very different aspect ratios considered, 30:1 and 5:1, lead to appreciable differences in flow structure in the two cases. It is found that a version of the Jones-Launder low-Reynolds-number k-ε model, used previously to compute heat transfer rates downstream of an abrupt expansion, leads to a very satisfactory agreement with reported experimental data of the velocity and thermal field, including the distribution of the Nusselt number. © 1989.