Advanced near-wall modeling for engine heat transfer

•The first formulation and implementation of the compressible wall function of Han and Reitz in the framework of hybrid wall treatment.•The model is validated against spark ignition (SI) engine heat transfer measurements (“pancake” engine benchmark). Predicted wall heat flux evolutions on the cylinder head exhibit very good agreement with the experimental data, being superior to similar numerical predictions available in the published literature.•The present work demonstrates potential advantages of the hybrid wall heat transfer approach in conjunction with the advanced turbulence model.

Recent developments in the engine heat transfer modeling tend to improve existing wall heat transfer models (temperature wall functions) which mostly rely on the standard or low-Re variants of k-ε turbulence model. Presently applied mesh resolutions already allow for first near-wall computational cells reaching the buffer or locally even viscous/conductive sub-layer, thus increasing the importance of more sophisticated modeling approach. As temperature gradient-induced density and fluid property variations become significant, wall heat transfer is strongly influenced by property variations (viscous/conductive sub-layer) and predictive capability of the turbulence model (buffer region), standard wall laws being inadequate anymore, even for attached boundary layers. The present approach relies on the k-ζ-f turbulence model and formulates a compressible wall function of Han and Reitz in the framework of hybrid wall treatment. The model is validated against spark ignition (SI) engine heat transfer measurements. Predicted wall heat flux evolutions on the cylinder head exhibit very good agreement with the experimental data, being superior to similar numerical predictions available in the published literature.

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