Tips & Tricks

Using CFD-VIEW Scripting for transient simulations post-processing

With the Python scripting capabilities of CFD-VIEW, you can quickly and easily perform the repetitive tasks you encounter when post-processing transient simulations.

CFD-VIEW: Save Smaller mdl Files

While working with CFD-VIEW, the user has the option of saving an mdl file. This file stores all the entities created in CFD-VIEW, from the point the DTF file (or other data file) was imported, to their current state at the time of saving. The user can thus reopen this file anytime later to resume work.

Plotter Operations with CFD-VIEW

The Plotter operator in CFD-VIEW supports signal processing for Time History data. A previous user tip – Digital Signal Processing using CFD-VIEW – shows how time history date can be made available and how to perform a PSD on a periodic signal. The aim of this new user tip is to list all options supported by the Plotter Operator.

Wireframe Display in CFD-VisCART

Rotation, zoom, pan and other graphical operations require re-drawing of the model in the new position within the graphics window. When dealing with large models, these operations can slow down considerably due to the huge amount of graphical data that needs to be processed and re-drawn.

Getting Average Quantities in CFD-VIEW

Many times, post-processing results requires computing average quantities of variables over a surface or volume. CFD-VIEW makes it easy with three calculator functions under the ‘Miscellaneous’ function category, as shown in Figure 1.

Visual Display of Bad Cells in CFD-VisCART

Most models have certain parts or regions where the grid density needs to be higher than other areas to accommodate for steep curvatures, sharply changing topology, etc.

Digital Signal Processing using CFD-VIEW

Signals (stream of data) obtained from physical or numerical experiments often require additional processing to understand/interpret the physics they represent. The processing of signals through digital means is termed Digital Signal Processing (DSP).

Using Local and Global Body Fit Factors in CFD-VisCART

The 'Body-fit Factor' is a percentage value used to determine how closely the Cartesian mesh front faces are projected to the real geometric surfaces. In other words, the Body-fit factor controls grid quality versus geometric fidelity. The value is between 0% and 100%, where 0%means no projection and 100% means complete projection to the surface.

Surface facet selection tool in CFD-VisCART

CFD-VisCART has always allowed surface selection where any surface can be selected by clicking on the graphics area or in the explorer window. Additionally, there is Facet Selection tool that allows the user to select individual facets or triangles of a surface (each surface is composed of triangulated faces called facets).

Plotting Multiple Variables in the CFD-VIEW Plotter

Plotting two or more variables on same plot having values of different magnitude/scale becomes difficult or many times impossible. In these cases plotting data with multiple Y-axes becomes very useful and sometimes necessary.