Mesh-free Simulation of Open Channel Flow with the Presence of an Obstacle

In the open channel flow, presence of an obstacle is able to alter velocity and water depth in the channel. The variation around the obstacle is highly dependent on the obstacle’s shape. To create a subcritical flow, an airplane wing shape obstacle with a flat top and a mild downstream slope is set up across the channel. With this obstacle, the eddy can impossibly occur in the downstream of the obstacle. To create the flow is useful to be a background flow for studying the wave propagation in the open channel flow. Since the flow shows to be two-dimensional, 2D mesh-free simulation is conducted, by making use of its advantage in automatically capturing the free surface. In the method, the fluid is discretized into a set of particles or points with the ability of movement, compared with the fixed meshes in the mesh-based methods such as Finite Volume Method (FVM). The inflow and outflow for the open channel flow is modeled with the open boundary condition in the method. The inflow is modeled by inputting the fluid particles according to the discharge while the outflow condition is simulated by prescribing pressure distribution the particles in the outlet zone. In this way, a 6 m long channel is modeled with various discharges. In the simulation, the water depth and velocity distribution are investigated along the channel. The flow is also examined around the obstacle to check whether it is the condition of subcritical flow without any eddy.