Hands-On Integrated CFD Educational Interface and EFD/ePIV/Flowcoach Laboratories for Introductory Fluids Mechanics (Invited)

The development, implementation, and evaluation of an effective curriculum for students to learn integrated computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and experimental fluid dynamics (EFD) including ePIV and Flowcoach in introductory undergraduate level courses and laboratories is described. The CFD objective is to teach students from novice to expert users who are well prepared for engineering practice using a CFD Educational Interface for hands-on student experience, which mirrors actual engineering practice. The Educational Interface teaches CFD methodology and procedures through a step-by-step interactive implementation automating the CFD process. A hierarchical system of predefined active options facilitates use at introductory and intermediate levels, encouraging self-learning, and eases transition to using industrial CFD codes. The EFD objective is to teach students use of modern facilities, measurement systems, and uncertainty analysis (UA) following a step-bystep approach, which mirrors the “real-life” EFD process: setup facility; install model; setup equipment; setup data acquisition; perform calibrations; data acquisition, analysis and reduction; and UA, and comparison CFD and/or analytical fluid dynamics (AFD) results. Students conduct fluids engineering experiments using tabletop and modern facilities such as pipe stands and wind tunnels and modern measurement systems, including pressure transducers, pitot probes, load cells, ePIV, Flowcoach and computer data acquisition systems (Lab View) and data reduction. Students analyze and relate CFD and EFD results to fluid physics and classroom lectures, including teamwork and presentation of results in written and graphical form. Implementation is described based on results for an introductory level fluid mechanics course, which includes integrated CFD and EFD laboratories for the same geometries and conditions. The laboratories constitute one credit hour of a four credit hour one semester course and include tabletop kinematic viscosity experiment focusing on UA procedures and pipe and airfoil experiments focusing on integrated EFD and CFD. An independent evaluation investigates and reports the learning outcomes and the effectiveness of the CFD educational interface, ePIV, Flowcoach and CFD and EFD laboratories.