1

FSI-99-TN48R
THE MODELI NG OF SHALLOW FLOWS
C.W. Hirt and J.E. Richardson
Flow Science, Inc.
INTRODUCTION
While methods exist for modeling complex three-dimensional flow problems,
there are some situations in which full three-dimensional simulations are not efficient
enough to be practical. One class of such problems are those flows characterized as
shallow. A shallow flow is one in which the horizontal extent of the flow is much larger
than the vertical extent. Examples include the ocean, large estuaries, seasonal floods,
liquid coatings, lubricating films, and water on automobile windshields.
If a flow is shallow enough that vertical accelerations can be neglected, then it can
be shown [1] that a good approximation to the flow is to replace all flow variables by
their averages in the vertical direction. The resulting, depth-averaged, three-dimensional
equations of motion then become a two-dimensional representation in the horizontal
plane. The most interesting cases involve a top fluid surface that is free to exhibit wave
phenomena. In some instances non-uniform horizontal boundaries (e.g., a sloping
beach) may also induce small deviations from purely horizontal flow. In this sense the
depth-averaged approximation still includes some three-dimensional effects.
Depth-averaged approximations are probably best known and most widely used in
applications relating to oceans or other large, shallow bodies of water. In this context the
approximation is most often referred to as the shallow-water approximation. There are
excellent discussions of the shallow-water equations and higher order refinements of
those equations in references [2,3].
Our purpose in this paper is to explore a new approach for numerically modeling
shallow flows. The method we propose is based on techniques used in the commercial
fluid dynamics simulation package FLOW-3D

. This program is designed for time-

dependent, three-dimensional flows having free surfaces and conforming to complex
geometry. Its strength as a robust analysis tool arises from two special numerical
techniques. One technique, the Volume-of-Fluid (VOF) method, is used to describe free-
surface behavior. The other technique, called FAVOR

, uses an area and volume

blockage scheme for representing the boundaries containing a flow.
We shall show that the VOF and FAVOR

techniques are ideally suited for

shallow-water approximations. In fact, it will be shown that they offer decided
advantages over numerical methods previously used for shallow flows.
The presentation begins with a brief summary of the VOF and FAVOR

methods. Then we show how these techniques are interpreted when applied in the limit
2
of the shallow-water approximation. This is followed by a discussion of the advantages
offered by these techniques for representing shallow flows over uneven surfaces,
including wetting and drying phenomena.
The paper concludes with a summary of how the depth-averaged model can be
used in the FLOW-3D

program. Several applications computed with this program

illustrate the new approach.
THE VOF METHOD
VOF and FAVOR

are examples of volume-fraction methods. In these methods

the region to be modeled is first subdivided into a grid of small elements or control
volumes. For elements that contain liquid, numerical values are retained for each flow
variable such as pressure, temperature and velocity within the element. Usually, these
values represent some sort of volumetric average of the quantities in the element.
When there are free surfaces, not all the elements contain liquid. Some elements
will be full and some empty. A few elements, those containing a free surface, will be
partially filled. A convenient way to identify the state of elements is to introduce a
quantity F that records the fraction of the elements volume that is filled with liquid. This
quantity is called the Volume-of-Fluid (VOF) function.
Knowing the fractional values, F, it is possible to construct the general location
and orientation of a free surface within a surface element. This can be done by checking
how much fluid there is in neighboring elements. The liquid in a surface element must
lie closest to those neighbors having the most liquid.
When surface locations and orientations have been determined, it is then possible
to apply the proper free surface boundary conditions needed to numerically compute the
motion of the liquid. As the liquid moves it carries the F function values along in the
same way a dye would be carried with the flow. Free surfaces are automatically tracked
in this way as they move through the fixed grid of control volumes. Of course, this
advection process must be done in a manner that maintains the step-function character of
the F function.
A big advantage of the VOF scheme is that liquid moves through a fixed grid, so
there is no grid deformation or grid reconstruction to contend with. Also, liquid masses
can coalesce or break up as dictated by the dynamics and with no special logic required to
determine surface intersections. These features make the VOF technique especially well
suited for cyclic wetting and drying processes such as waves on beaches or tidal surges.
THE FAVOR METHOD
The FAVOR

method is another volume fraction technique, only in this case one

that is used to define geometry. Just as the fractional volume of liquid in each element of
a grid is used to locate fluid surfaces, another fractional volume quantity can be used to
3
define solid surfaces. In practice, one keeps the open volume fraction V
f
of an element
that is not blocked by a solid. It turns out that it is also useful to store the open area
fractions at each face of an element. In any case, whether one stores the open or blocked
fractions of the elements, the same technique used in the VOF method can be used to
locate solid boundaries cutting through a fixed grid. This information is then used to
define the wall boundary conditions that a flow must conform to.
Since the bounding geometry of a flow is usually stationary, the volume fractions
V
f
and area fractions A
f
dont have to be moved or updated with the flow. When the
VOF method is combined with the FAVOR

method, the fractional volume of liquid F is

defined to be the fraction of the open volume of an element, V
f
, not the fraction of the
total element volume. In other words, if is the volume of an element, then the actual
volume of liquid in that element is (FV
f
) not (F).
THE SHALLOW-WATER INTREPRETATION OF VOF AND FAVOR
Now we are in position to see how the shallow-water equations can be interpreted
in terms of F and V
f
. In particular, we shall show that V
f
can be used to define a variable
bottom contour and F the depth of fluid. To do this, we begin with the standard shallow-
water or depth-averaged equations [1],
In these equations (u,v) are horizontal velocities and (g
x
,g
y
) body accelerations in the
(x,y) directions, p is the pressure, is the rotation rate in radians per unit time for
Coriolis forces and (f
x
,f
y
) are viscous stresses. The fluid height is denoted by h, while the
height of the bottom contour is h
B
.
When the depth averaging treatment is applied to the three-dimensional vertical
momentum equation, it reduces to a hydrostatic relation for the pressure, p=gh, in terms
of the fluid density , vertical acceleration of gravity g and the fluid height h.
Since these equations are statements of momentum and mass conservation (more
about this later), they must be equivalent to the corresponding equations used in the
FLOW-3D

program. To make the analogy, however, the three-dimensional formulation

used in FLOW-3D

must first be limited to two dimensions. Restricting fluid to reside in

only one vertical layer of control volumes does this. Let the height of this layer be z.
, 2
1
x x
f v g
x
p
y
u
v
x
u
u
t
u
+ + +

) 1 ( 2
1
y y
f u g
y
p
y
v
v
x
v
u
t
v
+ +

0
)] ( [ )] ( [ ) (

y
h h v
x
h h u
t
h h
B B B
4
The two-dimensional momentum equations used in FLOW-3D

are identical to
the shallow water equations if the fluid pressure is defined correctly. In FLOW-3D

the
pressure in an element containing a free surface is defined as p= p
0
+g(h-z/2), where p
o
is the gas pressure on the surface of the liquid and h is the height of the surface above the
bottom of the grid. Except for a constant, this is equivalent to the hydrostatic pressure
used in the shallow water approximation, which means the momentum equations in the
two approaches are equivalent. In practice, for the shallow water option, the pressure is
replaced by p=p
0
+gH, where H is the sum of the fluid and obstacle heights.
The volume/area blockages used in the FAVOR

method can be interpreted as

the height of the bottom contour according to the relation h
B
=(1-V
f
)z. When making
this correspondence, it is only necessary to make sure all the approximations used in
FLOW-3D

consider the solid blockage to lie at the bottom of the control volumes. This
is an easy thing to do.
The fluid height in terms of the VOF representation at the centers of control
volumes is h- h
B
=FV
f
z. At the edges of elements, where (A
x
,A
y
) are the open area
fractions at the x and y faces, the fluid height is h- h
B
=FA
f
z. However, since the bottom
contour must vary smoothly to be consistent with the neglect of vertical accelerations,
there are no differences between volume and area fractions, i.e., V
f
=A
f
.
Substituting the fluid height expressions into the shallow water continuity
equation, and using the appropriate area fractions for the x and y directions, we arrive at
This is precisely the equation for F used in the VOF method for flow in a single,
horizontal layer of control volumes provided there is no transport of F in the z direction, a
restriction that is necessary in the shallow-flow model. This completes the demonstration
of the equivalence between the VOF and FAVOR

representations as used for a single

layer of control volumes and the usual shallow water formulation. Additions of Coriolis
forces and viscous stresses are straightforward and need no further comment.
EXPLICIT AND IMPLICIT OPTIONS FOR CONTINUITY EQUATION
When making numerical approximations to Eqs.2, there are two options. The
simplest option is to use Eq. 2 as an explicit expression for advancing the fluid fraction
(F) through time. That is, the velocities would first be advanced through a small step in
time using discrete approximations to Eqs. 1. Then an approximation of Eq. 2 would be
used to compute a time-advanced value of F, denoted F
n+1
, in terms of the new velocities
and the previous time value of F denoted by F
n
.
) 2 ( . 0

y
F vA
x
F uA
t
F V
y
x
f
5
The alternative option is to compute the new values F
n+1
using an implicit
formulation of Eqs. 1-2. In this scheme the values of velocity used in Eq. 2 are
considered functions of F
n+1
through the pressure definition p=gF
n+1
. An implicit
equation for the new values of pressure (i.e., F
n+1
) is formed from a combination of Eq. 1-
2 that can be solved by a simple iteration process.
The explicit method is very simple and requires no iteration process. However,
the penalty for this is that there is a limitation on the size of the time step to prevent
gravity waves from moving more than one grid cell in one time step:
Where t is the time step, x is the width of a grid cell, g is the acceleration of gravity
and h is the depth of fluid.
To eliminate this time-step restriction, it is necessary to use the implicit
formulation, which couples the depth of fluid to the velocities causing changes in the
depth. In many cases the increase in time-step size that can be realized by the implicit
approach more than compensates for the extra work required to solve the implicit
equations.
ADVANTAGES OF VOLUME FRACTION METHODS FOR SHALLOW FLOWS
The advantages of using volume fraction techniques to represent bottom contours
and free surfaces are many. One advantage is associated with the fact that fluid moves
through a fixed grid. This mean it is easy to have fluid move into dry regions or to
withdraw from previously wet regions. No re-meshing is necessary to account for
movement of the lateral boundaries of the fluid.
Defining bottom contours with area/volume fractions, i.e., with the FAVOR

technique, eliminates the often-tedious task of generating finite-element or body-fitted

grids.
Nonlinear waves and weak hydraulic jumps are automatically included in the
model because it uses the nonlinear momentum equations. There is, however, a
limitation on the size of a hydraulic jump that can be accurately modeled. This limitation
arises because the form of the momentum equations, Eqs. 1, are not in a strict
momentum-conservation form (i.e., written in terms of hu and not the velocity u). In
three-dimensional situations the non-conservative form of the momentum equations can
be used to obtain highly accurate solutions to hydraulic jumps. This is not true of the
depth-averaged equations. The averaging process for shallow flows involves an
assumption that there is no significant vertical acceleration, an assumption that is not
correct in a strong hydraulic jump.
) 3 (
2 gh
x
t


6
A measure of the size of jump that can be accurately treated by the present
method can be obtained by comparing the hydraulic-jump conditions predicted using
kinetic energy versus momentum conservation laws. It is well known that momentum is
the right quantity to use, but the velocity equations in Eqs.1 are equivalent to a
conservation of kinetic energy. The comparison of the two approaches shows that they
differ by a quantity proportional to:
Here h is the jump height and h
0
is the liquid depth ahead of the jump. We see that the
difference in jump conditions is second order in the jump height. When is small (say
jump heights less than 20% of the fluid depth) the error committed by evaluating jumps
in terms of kinetic energy is less than 1%. For stronger jumps a simple modification of
the momentum equation can be introduced that works quite well. This is described in
Appendix A.
The incorporation of this shallow-water approximation into the FLOW-3D

program has many additional advantages associated with the numerous user conveniences
and auxiliary physical models already in the commercial program. For example, area and
volume fractions used in the FAVOR

method can be defined using a solids modeler in

the program or by importing CAD data. Other advantages include a complete set of heat-
transfer capabilities, non-Newtonian viscous stresses, wind shear stresses, porous media
flow resistance and chemical species transport and reaction capabilities. The addition of
surface tension forces with wall adhesion to the depth averaged equations is described in
Appendix B.
USING THE SHALLOW-WATER APPROXIMATION IN FLOW-3D
To use the shallow-water model in the FLOW-3D

program, there are three

conventions that must be followed. First, the shallow direction is always the z direction.
Second, the bottom contour and all fluid must remain in one horizontal layer of cells
having height z. This means z must be larger than any fluid height occurring in the
simulation. This height should not be excessively high, however, or there could be a loss
of resolution in fluid and bottom height variations.
Thirdly, the top surface of the layer of cells containing fluid must be open so that
the program will recognize that there is a free surface open to a fixed gas pressure.
Defining two grid cells in the z direction satisfies this criteria. An alternative method is
to use one cell in the z direction and a specified pressure boundary condition at the top
(WT=5) with a zero fluid fraction (FBCT(n,6)=0.0 or FBC(6)=0.0).
Activation of the shallow water model in FLOW-3D

is accomplished by setting
the parameter ISWAT=1 for the explicit option or ISWAT=2 for the implicit option
(Note: the implicit option is only available in versions after 7.6). Definition of the
bottom contour is made by using obstacles to fill the space below the contour.
0
2
,
) 1 ( 4 h
h
where

7
Figure 1. Wave run-up sequence on beach (left) and withdrawal (right). Only a
small portion of computation near the wetting line is shown.
Initial fluid configurations, Coriolis forces, and bottom roughness (i.e., obstacle
roughness) are defined in the same way as for three-dimensional simulations (consult the
manual). A wind shear on the free surface can be imposed in terms of the top wall
tangential velocity components (UBC(6) and VBC(6)) or their time-dependent
counterparts UBCT(n,6) and VBCT(n,6)). A nonzero value for the wind shear
coefficient (WNDSHR) is needed to activate this model and set the strength of the
applied shear stress.
If it is expected that relatively strong hydraulic jumps may develop, the second
order momentum advection option IORDER=3 should be selected because this includes a
correction to momentum advection that gives the proper jump conditions.
SAMPLE APPLICATIONS
In this section we illustrate the shallow flow model by applying it to several simple
problems. The examples selected show a variety of capabilities that could be extended in
many directions with only a small amount of imagination.
A. Wave Run-up and Fall-back on a Sloping Beach
Periodic waves running up on a sloping beach offer a good example of the wetting
and drying capabilities of the combined VOF-FAVOR

method. The wave generator for

this example was located 48 m away from the water line on a beach with an incline of 1
in 4. The periodic waves have a wavelength of 16 m, a period of 3.15 s and amplitude of
0.5 m.
Many wave cycles were simulated, which included repeated wetting and drying of a
portion of the beach. A typical run-up sequence of surface profiles is shown in the left
plot of Fig. 1. The right plot of Fig. 1 shows a corresponding sequence for the fallback of
water. The up and back motion of the wetting line covers several computational grid
cells.
B. Waves Generated by the Collapse of a Circular Column of Fluid
8
x
z
z
z
Figure 2. Surface waves generated by the collapse of circular column of water.
Times from left to right: 0.0, 1.49 and 3.5 s. Wave heights amplified by factor of 8.
x
z
Figure 3. Waves passing through the opening in a breakwater.
The waves generated in a rectangular swimming pool when a person dives in and
their reflection from the sides of the pool offer a nice example of complex, three-
dimensional wave interactions. In this example we have used dimensions more
consistent with a large, shallow holding tank. The pool is 10 m square and contains water
to a depth of 0.30 m. At the center of the pool there is a circular column of water of
radius 1.0 m and height 0.40 m. The water is initially at rest.
Figure 2 shows the initial configuration and subsequent times at 1.49 s and 3.5 s.
The surface disturbance amplitude has been multiplied by 8 for better visualization of the
waves.
C. Waves Incident on a Breakwater
As an illustration of how the shallow-water model handles waves in the presence of
internal obstacles a computation was performed for periodic waves directed at the
opening in a breakwater.
9
The waves start 26 m away from the entrance to the harbor, which is a rectangular
area of 50 m by 100 m. The average fluid depth is 6 m. The incident waves have an
amplitude of 0.75 m, a wavelength of 16 m and a period of 2.09 s. Figure 3 shows a
snapshot taken after several waves have passed through the 20 m opening in the
breakwater.
REFERENCES
1. Pedlosky, J., Geophysical Fluid Dynamics, Springer-Verlag, New York (1987).
2. Knauss, J.A., Introduction to Physical Oceanography, Prentice-Hall, Inc., New Jersey
(1978).
3. Su, C.H. and Gardner, C.S., Korteweg-de Vries Equation and Generalizations III, J.
Mathematical Physics, 10, No.3 (1969).
APPENDIX A: CORRECTION FOR STRONG HYDRAULIC JUMPS
The momentum equation should be written in a fully conservative way to insure
the proper jump conditions at a hydraulic jump. This form, however, is not consistent
with the formulation used in FLOW-3D

, which uses a non-conservative momentum

equation for depth-averaged flows. It is well known that the non-conservative equation
predicts a jump that conserves energy and not momentum, which is incorrect.
A simple modification to the difference approximations for the non-conservative
momentum equation can be easily derived that approximates the fully conservative form
of the equation. The modification needed can be illustrated with one-dimensional flow in
the x direction. Ignoring viscous and body forces (and non-uniform ground effects) the
governing partial differential equations for the fluid height H and velocity u are,
In differential form the mass equation (first equation above) can be used to reduce
the momentum equation to the non-conservative form,
As we have noted above, this form of the momentum equation does not give the
correct jump condition, but is the form most convenient for numerical approximation.
1 .
0
A
x
H
Hg
x
Huu
t
Hu
x
Hu
t
H

2 . A
x
H
g
x
u
u
t
u

10
How can it be that Eq.A2 comes directly from Eq.A1 yet does not give the correct
hydraulic jump condition for momentum? The answer to this question involves several
issues. First, it must be recognized that the depth-averaged equations involve the
assumption that vertical accelerations can be neglected, which cannot be correct at a
hydraulic jump. Nevertheless, it should be possible to satisfy integrated jump conditions
between two uniform states.
As mentioned in the main text, the difference between the conservation of
momentum and conservation of energy jump conditions is second order in jump height.
Could it be that this higher order effect is missed because the depth-averaging
procedure has already omitted some comparable higher order terms? To answer this
question we propose writing difference approximations to Eqs.A1 and then manipulating
them in the same way that lead to Eq.A2. The goal of this exercise is to see how the
difference form of Eq.A2 must be written to maintain the momentum conservation
property contained in Eqs.A1.
In our case the height H is located at the center of a grid cell, while the velocity u
is located at the sides of the cell. An upstream or donor cell scheme is used for the
advection terms to insure numerical stability. These assumptions lead to the difference
equations (using constant cell sizes for simplicity):
Notice that the first term in the second equation has been broken into two terms
that represent the time derivative of u and H respectively. The first equation can be used
to eliminate the H time derivative term to yield:
Now we can divide through by the average H. On the right-hand side we have
taken the liberty to cancel H factors in the numerator and denominator.
( )
n
i
n
i
n
i n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i n
i
n
i
n
i n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
x
H
Hg x
u u
u H
u u
u H
u
H H H H
u u
H H
t
x
u u
H
u u
H
H H H H
t
x
2 / 1
2 / 1 2 / 1
2 / 1
2 / 1 2 / 3
2 / 1 1
2 / 1
1
1 1
1
2 / 1
1
2 / 1
1 1
1
2 / 1 2 / 1 2 / 1 2 / 3
1
1
1 1
1
2 2
2 2 2
0
2 2 2 2
+
+

+ +
+ +
+
+
+ +
+
+
+
+
+ +
+
+ + +
+
+
+ +
+

,
_

,
_

,
_

+
+
1
1
]
1

,
_

,
_

,
_

+
+

,
_

,
_

,
_

,
_

+
+
1
1
]
1

,
_

,
_

,
_

( ) ( )
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
x
H
Hg x u u
u u
H u u
H H
t
x
2 / 1
2 / 1 2 / 1
2 / 1 2 / 1
2 / 1
1
2 / 1
1 1
1
2 2
+
+
+
+
+
+
+ +
+

,
_

,
_

+
+

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_

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_

( ) ( ) ( )
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i n
i
n
i
H H g u u
u u
H H
H
u u
t
x

,
_

+
+
+
,
_

+ +
+
+ +
+
+
+
+ 1 2 / 1 2 / 1
2 / 1 2 / 1
1 1
1
2 / 1
1
2 / 1
2
2

11
This is the desired result; the equation is the usual non-conservative equation except for
the H factor in the advection term. To put this into practice we must approximate the
H
n+1
terms in the denominator by H
n
values since we cant compute the new H values
until the new velocities have been computed. Thus, to approximate the conservation of
momentum jump condition when using the non-conservative momentum equation we
must multiply the advection term by the factor,
This result is for the case that u is positive. If u is directed negative the factor is,
It should be observed that this factor remains close to unity as long as the fluid
height does not change significantly from one grid cell to the next. It should also be
observed that when making the transition to a continuum equation by taking the limit of
vanishing cell size, this factor reduces to unity and Eq.A2 is recovered.
The inclusion of the H factor adds a higher-order effect necessary for a better
approximation to the momentum jump condition. Physically, the factor may be thought
of as performing a momentum averaging. That is, the velocity change is equal to the
momentum entering the control volume divided by the total mass in the control volume.
With this simple change added to the FLOW-3D

difference equations, the results

for hydraulic jumps are in reasonably good agreement with theoretical expectations. For
example, Fig.A1 shows a comparison between the original code and the modified code
for a propagating jump generated by an initial step discontinuity having a 10:1 height
ratio. The modified results are identical in the rarefaction region but have a smaller jump
height and faster jump speed. This confirms the fact that the H factor has little effect in
regions with slow variations in fluid height, but does have an affect on strong jumps. In
this case the computed jump speed is within 5% of the predicted theoretical value.
These results should be qualitatively compared to those given in Fig. A2, which is
taken from L. Fraccarollo, Discussion of Numerical Modeling of Anhui Debris Flow, J.
Hydraulic Eng., 937 (1997). The results in Fig.A2 show differences in the rarefaction
regions, which are not seen in the results of Fig.A1. Fraccarollo indicates that such
differences are associated with the use on a non-conservative mass equation which he
used for his simulations, while we used a conservative relation for our examples.
.
2 2
1
1 1
1
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
H H
H
H H
H
+

+
+
+ +
+
.
2 2
1
1
1 1
1
1
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
n
i
H H
H
H H
H
+

+
+
+
+ +
+
+
0.0 20.0 40.0 60.0 80.0 100.0
x
0.0
12.0
z
Figure A1. Comparison of results from non-conservative formulation and
modified formulation for a jump generated by a ratio 10 discontinuity.
Modified results have smaller jump height and higher speed.
12
APPENDIX B: SURFACE TENSION AND WALL ADHESION
There are many potential applications for a shallow water model in liquid coating.
For this class of applications, however, it is essential to have surface tension forces
including adhesion to solid surfaces. The usual surface tension model in FLOW-3D

does not apply in the shallow limit because adhesion forces must be nearly horizontal and
cannot be included in an equivalent pressure formulation. To remedy this a new model
for surface tension has been especially developed for the shallow-water limit. This model
has been incorporated into a routine for thermocapillary effects, which allows for force
contributions in any direction.
Surface tension forces may be temperature dependent and adhesion to the
substrate does account for the slope of the substrate. No special input is required to
activate this model other than the usual values for surface tension, contact angle and, if
applicable, the coefficient of the temperature dependence.
The new model is a direct extension of the thermocapillary force computation
done in the program routine tfsten. For thermocapillary effects only force components
associated with a changing surface tension coefficient are included in routine tfsten,
while all the remaining forces are represented by an equivalent normal pressure and are
computed in another routine.
For shallow-water applications we have modified tfsten to compute all the forces.
It is convenient, however, to still use an equivalent pressure for the basic surface tension
forces that includes thermocapillary effects. This is done by first computing the surface
tension forces acting at the four sides of a computational grid cell. Then, the sum of
vertical forces divided by the horizontal area of the cell is defined to be the surface-
tension pressure.
Figure A2. Comparison of results computed for a jump using conservative (solid)
and non-conservative (dashed) formulations. Conservative results have smaller
jump height and higher jump speed.
13
Wall adhesion effects are added to any grid cell having fluid and with one or more
empty neighbor cells. If the substrate is sloped then vertical components of adhesion are
included in the equivalent pressure calculation. All horizontal adhesion forces are
retained as separate horizontal forces in the force arrays used for thermocapillary effects.
Several example problems have been done to test this surface tension addition.
These included a cylindrical liquid rib with a 10 contact angle and a spherical cap also
with a 10 contact angle. In both cases the liquid remained stationary indicating that the
surface tension and adhesion forces are consistent with the initial configurations. When
the contact angles were increased somewhat the fluid in both cases contracted toward the
new angle.
A more dynamic test example is the evolution of a spherical cap running down an
inclined slope. The cap is a portion of a spherical water drop of radius 1.0 cm having a
thickness of 0.25 cm. The contact angle is 60 and the plate is inclined at an angle of 45
to the vertical. Fig. B1 shows the liquid drop and wet trail after 0.2 s. A characteristic
steepening of the drop surface at the front and gentle sloping at the back are easily seen.
The wet trail is a consequence of the no-slip condition used on the plate surface, which is
also a characteristic of real drops. No actual experimental data was available with which
to make detailed comparisons.
Finally, we have computed an example of permanent waves on a sheet of water
flowing down a vertical wall. This problem was originally studied experimentally by
Kapitza and Kapitza (Collected Papers of P.L. Kapitza, ed. D.Ter Haar, Vol.2, 690
Pergamon 1965). Surface tension is an important component affecting the dynamics of
the waves. The example modeled is for an alcohol sheet (=0.79, =22.9, =0.02) of
average thickness 0.0197cm. Periodic boundary conditions were used in the direction of
flow with a grid length equal to the observed disturbance wavelength of 1.77cm. Also, a
roughness was added to the plate in order to adjust the mean flow rate to the proper
theoretical value. The roughness accounts for the fact that the wall shear stress is not
correct because the depth-averaged model does not account for a parabolic velocity
profile. A roughness value of 0.0008cm was found to give the desired flow rate.
The computed surface profile assumes a solitary wave type of behavior having a
crest with a long sloping tail and a steeper leading edge that moved into a few small
amplitude precursor capillary waves, Fig. B2. These features are in excellent agreement
with the experimental observations. What is not as good is the amplitude of the wave,
x
z
x
z
Figure B1. Drop sliding down a 45 tilted surface, leaving a wet trail.
14
which is computed to be higher than what is observed. For example, the ratio of the peak
height to the height of the flat portion was computed to be 3.46. This is higher than the
values of 1.84 to 2.4 obtained from computed solutions based on full Navier-Stokes
formulations (B. Ramaswamy, S. Chippada and S.W. Joo, J. Fluid Mech. 325, 163
(1996)).
0.0 0.354 0.708 1.062 1.416 1.770
x
0.0
0.07
Figure B2. Solitary type wave moving down (to the right) a vertical wall.