Assessment of artificial fluid properties for high-order accurate large-eddy simulations of shock-free compressible turbulent flows with strong temperature gradients

Abstract The capability of artificial fluid properties (AFP) to serve as a sub-grid scale (SGS) model and to provide stability in high-order accurate large-eddy simulations (LES) of shock-free compressible turbulent flows with strong temperature gradients is assessed. Predictive LES of such flows, which are directly relevant to applications such as engines, require an accurate description of turbulence, which typically makes them susceptible to issues of accuracy and numerical instabilities. In the present implementation, AFP schemes along with a high-order compact filter ensure robustness of otherwise non-dissipative high-order central difference spatial discretisation schemes. It is shown that a judicious choice of both filter and AFP parameters is required in order for AFP to be used as an accurate SGS model. Optimal parameter values for the AFP and the corresponding filter parameter are identified and validated in the framework of the current LES solver. First, an inviscid Taylor-Green vortex configuration is examined to evaluate the ideal combination of the filter parameter and the coefficients in the AFP framework. It is verified that AFP works as an alternative model for the unclosed subgrid-scale (SGS) dissipation terms. The AFP results are also compared to those from the dynamic Smagorinsky model (DSM), with good agreement. Second, the optimal parameter values of AFP obtained from the inviscid Taylor-Green vortex tests are validated on a series of test configurations with increasing complexity, that include an inviscid 1D advection problem involving a thermal contact discontinuity, an inviscid 2D Kelvin-Helmholtz instability test and 3D experimental unheated and heated spatially developing turbulent round jets. Robust and accurate predictions are shown with the LES solver employing the optimal model parameters in each of these tests. In particular, good agreement between the LES predictions and experimental measurements for both the flow and temperature statistics is achieved for the laboratory jets, demonstrating the accuracy of the LES/AFP simulations applied to practical turbulent configurations. The robustness of the solver in the presence of strong temperature gradients is also demonstrated by simulating a round jet case having very high temperature gradients similar to those occurring in reacting flows. In contrast, the LES/DSM simulation of this case is noted to be unstable, and failed to provide converged results.