STABILIZED FINITE ELEMENT METHOD WITH AN ALE

STRATEGY TO SOLVE MOVING BOUNDARIES PROBLEMS

M. Viale and N. Nigro
Universidad Nacional de Rosario
Pelegrini 250, (2000) Rosario, Argentina
nnigro@intec.unl.edu.ar

Abstract. Fluid ow problems with moving boundaries are one of the challenge problems to be solved in this
decade. Our target is oriented to develop a nite element code to simulate the uid ow inside the cylinder of an
internal combustion engine in order to understand how this ow eld is related with the combustion, the heat release
and the intake and exhaust charging process. In this paper we only present some preliminary results using the ALE
technique coupled with a stabilized nite element method applied to compressible uid ow problems with moving
boundaries.
Keywords.

1.

Fluid mechanics Computational uid dynamics, moving boundaries, in-cylinder ows

Introduction

Fluid ow problems with moving boundaries are one of the challenge problems to be solved in this decade.
They are inherently unsteady problems where the domain is changing according to a user-dened law commonly
associated with a prexed boundary motion or in a coupled way with the ow itself. The former case is simpler
than the later, commonly named uid-structure interaction, because of many reasons. One of them is associated
with the grid generation. While in the former the mesh may be produced in advance with no enough care about
the evolution of the ow eld in the later the boundaries move in an unpredictable way and the grid generation
should be solved at ow eld computation time. Other important subject is related to the dierent time scales
that may characterize the behavior of uid and solid materials. Flow with moving boundaries can be encountered
in many practical situations. For example ow motion around a ship with a changing free surface has attracted
a great deal of research interest in recent years. In this case the free surface is an unknown moving boundary
and the ship may be treated as a rigid body. The landing of an aircraft with the air owing around the moving
composed aps is another example of great interest. Other eld with a rapid development is that associated
with the simulation of the complex haemodynamics in order to solve the blood ow in moving arteries.
Recently, with the enormous development of computer capabilities, the simulation of in-cylinder ow inside
an internal combustion engine is feasible with the target in lower emissions and higher performances. In this
case the combustion chamber is a variable volume vessel with moving boundaries represented by the piston and
the intake and exhaust valves. This project is oriented to simulate the in-cylinder ow in order to understand
how this ow eld is related with the combustion, the heat release and the intake and exhaust charging process.
The numerical solution of this problem was originally performed via a nite volume method using an ALE
(Arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian) strategy. The list of references is huge and only some of the most cited references are included here (I. Demirdzic (1990),J. Trepanier and Camarero (1991),J. Trepanier and Camarero
(1993),C. Farhat and Stern (1997)). One of the main diculties of the nite volume formulation is the satisfaction of the geometric conservation law (GCL). Several dierent proposals were published in order to bypass
this diculty. On the other hand the nite element formulation has the ability of being completely consistent
with the ALE strategy satisfying the GCL with no special care (I. Lomtev (1999)). Therefore a compressible
Navier-Stokes code based on nite elements with an ALE strategy is adopted (J. Donea (1982),T. Nomura
(1992),T. Sheu (1999),I. Lomtev (1999),W. Tworzydlo (1992)). An SUPG formulation for the spatial discretization (Brooks and Hughes (1982); Hughes and Tezduyar (1984)) and a nite dierence scheme for the
time evolution is chosen. This work plan is divided in three steps, the rst considers the development of an
scalar transport element with an ALE strategy, the second adds the inviscid ow equations in a moving domain
formulation and the third step considers the original target, the compressible Navier-Stokes solved via a nite
element and ALE code.
In the rst stage the model originally presented by Kershaw and coworkers (Kershaw and Milovich (1998))
based on the usage of a transformation to a reference grid selected as the initial mesh was used. Even though
this strategy is valid it presents several disadvantages specially when vector elds having tensor diusion terms
are involved. In the scalar case in an isotropic medium this inconvenience is not relevant because the diusion
coecient is transformed in a diusion tensor. In Euler equations this problem is not present because there
is no diusion term. However in the Navier-Stokes equations the stress tensor playing the role of diusion
introduces Christoel symbols when the transformation to the reference grid is performed. This fact increases
the computational cost in a drastic way. To avoid this situation it is possible to use a standard ALE strategy

where the solution is computed over a moving grid in a lagrangian way but with an arbitrary velocity. In general
this velocity is dierent from the uid one in order to keep the mesh in a good shape. For the solution of a
scalar eld a model presented by Sheu et.al. (T. Sheu (1999)) was adopted and numerical results over a test
case is presented. This development was extended to the inviscid ow model (Euler equations) and some basic
tests were solved to demonstrate mainly the geometric conservation law. In future works it is planned to apply
this development to in-cylinder ow in an internal combustion engine .
2.

The mathematical model

Our target is the simulation of compressible viscous ow inside the cylinder of an internal combustion engine.
Then, the mathematical model is dened by compressible Navier-Stokes equations in a variable domain. In the
following sections we present rst the mathematical formulation in a xed domain and then the ALE strategy
to consider the boundary movement.
2.1.

Compressible viscous ow in a xed domain

Compressible Navier-Stokes equations are one of the most used models to predict the behaviour of an
internal gas ow. This set of partial dierential equations may be seen as an advective-diusive system of
equations like
Fia
Fid
U
+
=
+S
t
xi
xi

(1)

where the rst term is the rate of change of the state variable U expressed in conservative form followed by
the divergence of the advective and diusive uxes and a source term. The conservation variables are dened
as:
U = [, u1 , u2 , u3 , e]

(2)

where is the density, e is the total energy composed by the internal energy i plus the kinetic energy,

e=i+

1
2

u2
i

i = Cv T

and [u1 , u2 , u3 ] represents the linear momentum vector. The advective uxes and the diusive uxes are
dened as:

ui
u1 ui + pi1

a
Fi = u2 ui + pi2

u3 ui + pi3
hui

Fid

i1

i2
=

i3
qi + ik uk

(4)

being h = e + p/ the enthalpy, q = T the heat ux according to the Fourier law and ij an element
of the deviatoric stress tensor. The source term depends in particular on the applications. In general mass
source term is not included, the momentum sources are external forces applied to the system and nally, energy
sources are the work of these external forces plus some body heat addition or release between the system and
the environment.
S = [0; b1 ; b2 ; b3 ; b u + Q]
2.2.

(5)

ALE strategy

In this section we only present a brief summary of the main expressions about the original work of Arbitrary
Lagrangian Eulerian (ALE) in a nite element context for the inviscid case written by Donea and coworkers. For
more details about this formulation we refer to the original work (J. Donea (1982)). It is well known that there
are two viewpoints mostly used in the description of the ow motion equations, one is called the Lagrangian
approach where the mesh moves with the uid and the other is the Eulerian approach in which the mesh is
xed and the uid moves around it. The arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian description is a generalization of these
two approaches where the computational grid moves with an arbitrary velocity w in the laboratory system. If
w = 0 we recover the Eulerian approach and if w = u we recover the Lagrangian one considering u as the uid
ow velocity. A very simple physical scenario is given by gure 1.

Figure 1: Dierent approaches for the description of the ow motion

The boat number 1 is attached to the ground by an anchor and therefore its velocity is null and the observer
inside this boat has an Eulerian description of the ow. The boat number 2 is free to follow the river stream
and its observer has a Lagrangian description of the ow motion. Finally there is a third boat which is powered
by an engine with a velocity w non aligned with the river stream, therefore its observer has an ALE description
of the ow.
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Figure 2: Denition of dierent reference frames

In order to gain some insight about this general description gure 2 shows the three reference frames and
their corresponding coordinates. A particular point P of a portion of uid with a position a relative to the
material domain is plot for both the initial time t = 0 and for some time after. By denition these material
coordinates do not change in time. It is also possible to follow the motion of the same point P in the spatial
domain by its position x and by an arbitrary motion of the reference domain where its position may be dened
by .
Initially the material domain (Lagrangian coordinates), the spatial domain (Eulerian coordinates) and the
reference domain (mixed coordinates) coincide among them. So, x = a and the position of any point in the
reference domain relative to the original conguration is expressed by = 0.
Some time after x = a and = 0. In the ALE description a particle is identied by its material coordinates
a in the initial conguration but this process of identication is indirect and takes place through the mixed
position vector . There is a link between the material coordinates and the mixed coordinates in the form:
i = fi (ai , t)

(6)

ALE description is similar to a mapping between the initial conguration of the continuum in the current
conguration of the arbitrary reference frame, whose jacobian determinant is computed by

J =|

i
|
aj

(7)

Other two important properties of this jacobian are expressed by:

dV = J(a, t)dV0

(8)

J
=J
t

(9)

2.2.1.

Kinematics in the ALE description

Following J. Donea (1982) we describe a physical property associated with the ow of a continuum media
by g(i , t). By (6) we have
g(i , t) = g[fi (ai , t)] = g(ai , t)

(10)

The time derivative of (10) keeping the material coordinates constant is written as:
g(a, t)
t

=
a

g(, t)
t

Noting that wi =
(gw) = g

i
t

g(, t) i
i t

(11)

is the grid velocity and using the following identity

w+w

(12)

and (9) we arrive to

J

(gw)

= Jg
=

w + Jw

g J
t

+ Jw

g
g
(13)

Therefore (11) may be rewritten as:

Lagrangian

Eulerian

g(a, t)
g(, t)
g(, t) i
=
+
t
t
i t
a

g(a, t)
g(, t) g(, t) i
J
= J[
+
]
t
t
i t
g(a, t)
J
J
g(, t) g(, t) i
J
+ g(a, t)
= g(a, t)
+ J[
+
]
t
t
t
t
i t
(J g)
1 J
g
= J[ g
+
+ w g]
t
t
t
J
(J g)
g
= J[g w +
+ w g]
t
t
(14)

(J g)
g
= J[
+
t
t

(gw)]

(15)

Expression (15) appears to be a fundamental relationship which enables us to transform any law expressed
in spatial (Eulerian) variables into an equivalent law expressed in mixed variables. The g in (15) is a spatial
t
derivative, i.e., taken with the point xed in position.

2.2.2.

Conservation laws in the ALE description

We rewrite our original set of equations (1) in expanded form as:

+
(uj )
t
xj
ui

+
(ui uj )
t
xj
e

+
(euj )
t
xj

=0
p
xj

(puj )
xj

= bi
= uj bj

(16)
and using (15) they may be transformed to the following set of equations:

(J)
t

= J xj ((wj uj ))

(ui J) = J xj (ui (wj uj ))

t

(eJ) = J xj (e(wj uj ))
t

p
)
xj

+J(uj bj
(puj ))
xj

+J(bi

(17)
The above set of equations (17) may be rewritten again in a compact form as:
U
Fia
+
w
t
xi

U=

Fid
+S
xi

(18)

similar to (1) but now for the ALE description. In the algebraic manipulations we have dropped the viscous
uxes because they do not change in the ALE description relative to those in xed grids.
2.2.3.

Weak variational form of the ALE conservation equations

We follow the paper of J. Donea (1982) but instead of assuming constant density we work with compressible
ow formulation.
Mass equation
After some algebraic manipulations using (9) and (15) and the rst equation in (17) we arrive to:

= (w u)
=

(u) + w

(19)

Even though both expressions are equivalent and useful we have chosen the last one. Multiplying this
equation by an arbitrary weighting function and integrating over a control volume V (t) we obtain the
following weak form of the mass conservation equation:

V (t)

dV
t

V (t)

(u)dV +

V (t)

dV
(20)

Energy equation
In the same way for the energy conservation equation we have its weak variational form written as:

V (t)

(e)dV
t

V (t)

((e + p)u)dV

V (t)

(e)dV =

V (t)

b u
(21)

 Momentum equations
Finally the weak variational formulation of the momentum conservation equation is written as:

V (t)

(u)dV
t

V (t)

(u u + pI)dV

V (t)

(u)dV =

V (t)

b
(22)

where means for tensor product and I represent an identity second order tensor.
2.2.4.

Some remarks

We have to remark that this formulation satises naturally the geometric conservation law (GCL) as it
was demonstrated by I. Lomtev (1999).
Another remark is due to the spatial stabilization technique. Equation (18) restricted to inviscid ows
may be written in a quasi-linear form as:

U
Fia
+
w
t
xi
U
+ [Ai wi I]
t

U =0
U =0
(23)

Therefore, the spatial stabilization (upwind) scheme to be used may be computed from the modied
advective jacobian instead of the original ones. In the next section we present some details about the
numerical method employed with special emphasis on the spatial discretization scheme.
3.

The numerical method

In order to get a numerical solution of the continuum problem presented in the above section we have to
discretize the problem using a particular numerical method. In this work we have used a SUPG technique that
is very popular in the context of nite element method and is one of the most referenced in the CFD area. There
are a lot of references concerning with this technique that may be included here but for simplicity reasons we
forward the readers towards two of the most cited references (Brooks and Hughes (1982),Hughes and Tezduyar
(1984)).
This technique is based on a Petrov-Galerkin weighted residual method which allows to use test functions
that can be dierent from the interpolation ones and not necessarily continuous. This method introduces the
numerical dissipation needed to stabilize the system in advection-dominated problems, keeping the consistency
with the continuum problem. For each node a there is an interpolation function Na (hat type in 1D, bilinear
in 2D, and multilinear in general) and a test function Wa = Na + Pa , where Pa is called the perturbation
function. The standard Galerkin method is recovered when we impose Pa 0. The Pa (and, of course, Wa )
are not necessarily continuous through the inter-element boundaries.
3.1.

Perturbation function

Following the procedure employed in the xed grid Euler equations and adopting for the ALE description
that the advective jacobians are transformed according to (23) we dene the SUPG perturbation function as:
Pa = [A wI] Na
h
= ||A wI||1
2
(24)
In this work we have used an extra way for computing the intrinsic time scale matrix that is less expensive
than (24) and works reasonably good. This procedure is due to G. Le Beau and Tezduyar (1993) and may be
written as:

 = I
h
= |max |1
2
max = |u w| + c
(25)
Rewriting the weak variational formulation presented above (20),(21) and (22) and after using the compact
notation with the SUPG method just described we arrive to:

Wa
V (t)

4.

U
dV +
t

Wa

F a dV

V (t)

Wa w

Wa F d dV +

UdV =

V (t)

V (t)

Wa SdV

(26)

V (t)

Validation tests

4.1.

Test 1: Shock-reection problem

This two dimensiona, inviscid, steady problem involves three ow regions separated by an oblique shock
and its reection from a wall. It is a standard benchmark problem (G. Le Beau and Tezduyar (1993), Shakib
(1988)). The importance of such a test is to check the ability of our code to resolve ows involving shocks. The
computational domain is a rectangular region of dimensions 4.1 in the x direction and 1.0 in the y direction.
The mesh consists of 60 20 rectangular elements. The boundary conditions are the following:
[, u1 , u2 , M ] = [1, 1, 0, 2.9]
left,
[, u1 , u2 , M ] = [1.7, 0.9033, 0.1746, 2.3781] top.

(27)

While gure (3) shows at left the isobars and at right the density at y = 0 25 where it may be viewed the
three dierent regions above mentioned.

 





Figure 3: Shock reection problem. Results

4.2.

Test 2: ALE for scalar advection-diusion problems.

This problem proposed by T. Sheu (1999) consists of solving the standard scalar advection-diusion equation
written here as:
t + 2yx + xy y 2 (xx + yy ) = f (x, y, t)
f (x, y, t) = et y(2x3 2y 3 3x2 y + 4xy 2 2x2 2y 2 + 3xy)

(28)

whose analytic solution is

(x, y, t) = et x(1 x)y 2

(29)

The domain is dened by x [0, 1] y [0.5, 1.5] and the bottom side is changing in time. To compute this
variation the grid velocity is specied by:

w = [0, /2 sin(2) cos(t)( 1)]

(30)

The following table shows the evolution of the error norm with time.
Time
0.1
0.2
0.3
0.4
0.5

L2 norm
1.7094104
2.6002104
3.7011104
4.5049104
4.7182104

Time
0.6
0.7
0.8
0.9
1.0

L2 norm
4.3216104
3.4826104
2.4646104
1.5422104
9.6967104

The results in the above table and in the gure (4) show a very good agreement with those reported by
T. Sheu (1999).

Figure 4: Scalar advection-diusion with ALE. Test

4.3.

Test 3: Random grid

This test proposed by J. Trepanier and Camarero (1991). The test consists in verifying the geometric
conservation law (GCL) and for that we move the mesh keeping the boundaries xed. The initial solution is
spatially uniform and should remain steadily frozen. This was veried by the simulation and here we only show
some meshes used in the computation, see gure 5. The solution is constant in time and uniform in space at
machine tolerance.
5.

Conclusions and future trends

These are only some preliminary results about solving CFD problems involving variable domain. We
have chosen ALE strategy instead of other methodologies like space-time nite element method because of
computational cost reasons. We have found our results very promising, specially in the geometric conservation
law point of view. We plan to continue our work solving more challenge problems involving inviscid or viscous
ow with our nal target of simulating the heat and uid ow inside a cylinder of an internal combustion engine.
6.

References

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ows with particular emphasis on the incompressible navier-stokes equations. Comp. Meth. Applied Mech.
and Engineering, volume 32, pp. 199259.

10

10

10

10

Figure 5: Random grid. Meshes

C. Farhat, M. L. and Stern, P., 1997. High performance solution of three-dimensional nonlinear aeroelastic
problems via parallel partitioned algorithms: methodology and preliminary results. Advances in Enginnering Software, volume 28, pp. 4361.
G. Le Beau, S. Ray, S. A. and Tezduyar, T., 1993. Supg nite element computation of compressible ows
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