VULCAN Interface

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VULCAN (Viscous Upwind ALgorithm for Complex Flow ANalysis) is a turbulent,  non-equilibrium, finite-rate chemical kinetics, Navier-Stokes flow solver for structured, cell-centered, multi-block grids that is currently maintained and distributed (restricted to US) by the Hypersonic Airbreathing Propulsion Branch of NASA Langley Research Center.

The ANSYS ICEM CFD - VULCAN output interface writes a multiblock grid file and a VULCAN input file.  The multiblock grid file is written in the Plot3D multiblock grid file format, in Fortran free format (ASCII).  The grid can be written in single or double precision and the grid file name gets the extension ".grd".  The boundary conditions and interblock connectivity are written in the VULCAN input file format. The input file name gets the extension ".dat".  This file is a subset of the complete Vulcan input file.  Data such as solver control parameters can be added in the VULCAN User Interface.
 

Creating the VULCAN  grid file

The grid must be constructed  with the HEXA mesher and written out as a multiblock mesh.  After generating the mesh, boundary conditions can be defined.  Under the Output menu, go to select Solver and select VULCAN. Then select Boundary Conditions from the Output menu and the current boundary condition file to edit (default is "family_boco.fbc").   The "Family Boundary Conditions" window will open allowing to set the boundary condition name (BC NAME), type (BC TYPE) and the value of IN-ORDER for each boundary patch.
 

The VULCAN boundary conditions supported by this interface are:
EXTRAP, EXTRAP2, REGOUT, REGOUT2, SYMM, REFFIX, AXICL, SWALL,
AWALL, AWALLM, SINGULAR, FIXED, IWALL, IWALLM, TCWALLM,
SUBMDOTI, SUBIN, SUBOUT

Note that BC NAME is limited to 10 characters in VULCAN.

Once all boundary conditions have been assigned , the VULCAN output interface can be launched.  Under the Output menu, select Write Input.   A window will open to allow the specification of the files that will be translated into the VULCAN format.    Default names for the topology, boundary condition and VULCAN files will show up.  These can be modified as necessary.   The translator will add the suffix ".grd"  and ".dat" to the VULCAN mesh and input files.

The interface generates the VULCAN files in the current project directory.
 

Limitation

• The ANSYS ICEM CFD/VULCAN translator supports only 3D grids.
• Doesn't support non-C(0) connectivity.

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