CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

How to figure out how to use other solvers and utilities

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 1

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

How to figure out how to use other solvers and utilities

• There are only written tutorials to some of the applications and utilities in Open-
FOAM. Be aware of the documentation that actually does exist in the UserGuide
and ProgrammersGuide!

• We will now learn how to search the installation for information on how to use
solvers and utilities.

• A documentation might be lagging, but the source code is not!

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 2

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

How to find solver tutorials

• Type tut to go to the $FOAM_TUTORIALS directory. Here you find many
case-setups for the solvers in OpenFOAM.

• Type:
tree -d -L 2 $FOAM_TUTORIALS
to get a list of for which solvers there are tutorial cases available.

• Type:
tree -d -L 2 $FOAM_TUTORIALS/incompressible/icoFoam
to get a list of which tutorial cases are available for the icoFoam solver.

• All the solver tutorials have Allrun scripts that describe the use of those
tutorials. We will now have a look at the Allrun script of the
$FOAM_TUTORIALS/incompressible/icoFoam tutorials. This is actu-
ally what you will do manually when you do the cavity tutorials in the
UserGuide. In other words, you can use the Allrun script as a short
summary of the description in the UserGuide.

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 3

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

Read Allrun scripts to learn more (1/7)

(Note that the following description shows the principle. There might be small differences in
exactly what is done by the Allrun script between versions.)

In the icoFoam tutorial directory there is an Allrun script.

When running this script it is preferred to copy the entire directory to your run directory, so
that you keep a clean version of the tutorials in the installation directory. Type:
cp -r $FOAM_TUTORIALS/incompressible/icoFoam $FOAM_RUN
cd $FOAM_RUN/icoFoam/cavity
./Allrun >& log_Allrun&

Looking in the Allrun script, you can see a list of cases that will be executed:
cavityCases="cavity cavityFine cavityGrade cavityHighRe cavityClipped"
Some of those cases are actually created by the script.
At the end of the script it also runs the elbow case.
The script contains Linux commands and calls for OpenFOAM applications in order to set up
and run the simulations.

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 4

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

Read Allrun scripts to learn more (2/7)

The Allrun script for the icoFoam cavity tutorials actually
first runs the cavity case
#Running blockMesh on cavity:
blockMesh
#Running icoFoam on cavity:
icoFoam

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 5

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

Read Allrun scripts to learn more (3/7)

The Allrun script for the icoFoam cavity tutorials actually
then runs the cavityFine case:
#Cloning cavityFine case from cavity:
mkdir cavityFine
cp -r cavity/{0,system,constant} cavityFine
[change "20 20 1" in blockMeshDict to "41 41 1"]
[set startTime in controlDict to 0.5]
[set endTime in controlDict to 0.7]
[set deltaT in controlDict to 0.0025]
[set writeControl in controlDict to runTime]
[set writeInterval in controlDict to 0.1]
#Running blockMesh on cavityFine
blockMesh
#Running mapFields from cavity to cavityFine
mapFields -case cavity -sourceTime latestTime -consistent
#Running icoFoam on cavityFine
icoFoam

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 6

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

Read Allrun scripts to learn more (4/7)

The Allrun script for the icoFoam cavity tutorials actually
then runs the cavityGrade case:
#Running blockMesh on cavityGrade
blockMesh
#Running mapFields from cavityFine to cavityGrade
mapFields -case cavityFine -sourceTime latestTime -consistent
#Running icoFoam on cavityGrade
icoFoam

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 7

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

Read Allrun scripts to learn more (5/7)

The Allrun script for the icoFoam cavity tutorials actually
then runs the cavityHighRe case:
#Cloning cavityHighRe case from cavity
mkdir cavityHighRe
cp -r cavity/{0,system,constant} cavityHighRe
#Setting cavityHighRe to generate a secondary vortex
[set startFrom in controlDict to latestTime;]
[set endTime in controlDict to 2.0;]
[change 0.01 in transportProperties to 0.001]
#Copying cavity/0* directory to cavityHighRe
cp -r cavity/0* cavityHighRe
#Running blockMesh on cavityHighRe
blockMesh
#Running icoFoam on cavityHighRe
icoFoam

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 8

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

Read Allrun scripts to learn more (6/7)

The Allrun script for the icoFoam cavity tutorials actually
then runs the cavityClipped case:
#Running blockMesh on cavityClipped
blockMesh
#Running mapFields from cavity to cavityClipped
cp -r cavityClipped/0 cavityClipped/0.5
mapFields -case cavity -sourceTime latestTime
[Reset the boundary condition for fixedWalls to:]
[ type fixedValue; ]
[ value uniform (0 0 0); ]
[ We do this since the fixedWalls got ]
[ interpolated values by cutting the domain ]
#Running icoFoam on cavityClipped
icoFoam

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 9

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

Read Allrun scripts to learn more (7/7)

The Allrun script for the icoFoam cavity tutorials actually
finally runs the elbow case

Now, open each case with paraFoam and have a look.

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 10

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

Run ALL the tutorials using the Allrun scripts

We will not do this now!

• You can also run another Allrun script, located in the $FOAM_TUTORIALS direc-
tory. This script will run through ALL the tutorials (calls Allrun in each solver
directory). It can also check the log files for errors, using a test loop (have a look
at the Allrun script).

• Use the Allclean script to clean up when you no longer need the results from
all the tutorials (only removes files that are created when running the cases).

• You can use this script as a tutorial of how to generate the meshes, how to run
the solvers, how to clone cases, how to map the results between different cases
etc.

• Again, I suggest that you copy the files to your run directory:

cp -r $FOAM_TUTORIALS $FOAM_RUN

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 11

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

How to find tutorials for the utilities

• There are no ’case’ tutorials for the utilities, but we can search for examples:
find $WM_PROJECT_DIR -name \*Dict | grep -v blockMeshDict | grep -v controlDict

You will get a list of example dictionaries for the utilities that use a dictionary. Some of
those examples can be found next to the source code of each particular utility, and some
are also used in the solver tutorials. The ones that don’t use a dictionary are usually
easier to learn how to use, in particular when using the -help flag.

Now you should be ready to go on exploring the applications by yourself.

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 12

 CFD with OpenSource Software, 2020

More tutorials can be found in

• The UserGuide

• The ProgrammersGuide, chapter 3

• The OpenFOAM Wiki

(e.g. the Turbomachinery Working Group)

• The OpenFOAM Forum

• The OpenFOAM Workshop trainings

Håkan Nilsson, Chalmers / Mechanics and Maritime Sciences / Fluid Dynamics 13