What's New

GPU Acceleration on Windows

AcuSolve GPU acceleration is now available on CUDA-enabled Windows machines by including the -gpu command option. Windows GPU requires a Nvidia card with minimum Compute Capability of 3.0 and minimum driver version of 396.26. Linux GPU requires a NVidia card with minimum Compute Capability of 3.0 and minimum driver version of 418.39.

EDEM 1-way Coupling

The influence of a flow field on particle motion can now be simulated with AcuSolve and EDEM. The flow field from an AcuSolve simulation can be imported into an EDEM simulation to perform a one-way, sequential coupling simulation.

Heat Exchanger Component Upstream Temperature

You can now output the value of temperature used by the HEAT_EXCHANGER_COMPONENT at a distance from the inlet surface specified by upstream_distance. This value is referred to as T_upstream in the HEAT_EXCHANGER_COMPONENT documentation.

Cylindrical Anisotropic Conductivity

Material conductivity may now be defined in a cylindrical coordinate system. You provide the center, axis, and coefficients of the anisotropic conductivity.

Specify Species Names

User-provided names are now allowed for individual species.

Element Statistics Output

Element-based statistical values of min, max, standard deviation, and uniformity are now available on element sets and can be output through acuTrans with the .oes file extension.

Log File Output Improvements

You are now notified in the .log file when reversed flow exists at flow boundaries. The .log file also now includes statistical values of min, max, and average variable quantities at the end of each run. Pressure and temperature offsets used during the simulation are recorded in the .log file and a banner is added at the head of the .log file indicating the version and build of the solver as well as information about the platform used.

New UDF Variables

Density and viscosity are now available in User-Defined Functions (UDFs) from the udfGetElmData() function call. The data names are UDF_ELM_DENSITY and UDF_ELM_VISCOSITY, respectively.

Tutorial links to SimLab Learning Center

SimLab video-based AcuSolve tutorials from the SimLab Learning Center are now accessible directly from links within the AcuSolve tutorial documentation pages.

Tutorial Additions

Twenty-four (24) brand new tutorials have been added based on the SimLab interface and all of the current SimLab tutorials for AcuSolve have been recreated in a new user-friendly video format. Two (2) new tutorials have been added for the HwCFD interface, and five (5) tutorials have been converted from HM to the HwCFD interface.

• Chaco is no longer available as an option in AcuPrep for domain decomposition.
• AcuPrep will now ignore the initialize_stokes parameter when certain variable density types are used.
• An issue loading only a .Log file into AcuProbe when no results directory was present has been fixed.
• An issue with writing dew point temperature through element output has been fixed.
• An issue related to using a combination of species and turbulence with a multiphase fluid has been fixed.
• A few issues related to AcuTrans export of AcuFieldView and CGNS formats have been fixed.
• An issue with full restart when using auto_wall has been fixed.
• Core_friction_exponent was added to the documentation under HEAT_EXCHANGER_COMPONENT.
• Various typos have been corrected in the documentation under HEAT_EXCHANGER_COMPONENT.
• Pressure_precedence_factor was added to the documentation under LINEAR_SOLVER_PARAMETERS.
• Density_type has been added to the documentation under MULTI_FIELD_MODEL.
• The documentation under MULTI_FIELD_MODEL for field_interaction_models has been corrected to not limit the number of field interaction models to one.
• Turbulence_damping_levelset has been added to the documentation under FIELD_INTERACTION_MODEL.
• Specular_ordinate_averaging has been added to the documentation under RADIATION_SURFACE.
• Radiation_interface_type has been added to the documentation under RADIATION_SURFACE.
• Temperature_type of none has been added to the documentation under SIMPLE_BOUNDARY_CONDITION.
• MOMENTUM_SOURCE has been added to the documentation under BODY_SOURCE.
• A correction has been made in the example text under HEAT_SOURCE.
• An image in ACU-T: 1000 now shows the correct boundary conditions.
• Corrections to radiation coefficients have been made to ACU-T: 3201.
• Tutorials ACU-T: 3202 and ACU-T: 3203 (participating media radiation) have been made more consistent.
• Settings for Auto Solution Strategy in ACU-T: 5403 have been made consistent between the image and steps.

AcuSolve v2020 brings new features, enhancements to existing features, and improvements in speed as well as convenience.

• Specular transmission for Discrete Ordinate radiation
• Nucleate boiling
• Surface condensation and evaporation
• GPU acceleration

Specular Transmission for Discrete Ordinate Model radiation

As an enhancement to the addition of Discrete Ordinate Modeling for radiation, introduced in v2019, AcuSolve now supports the transmission of radiation through participating media with the addition of the Specular Transmission feature. This feature supports radiation through internal and external interfaces.

Nucleate Boiling

Local changes in heat flux due to boiling can be captured with both single and multi-phase. In single-phase the local heat flux is adjusted to account for the effect of boiling while in multi-phase the onset of boiling prompts the generation of air bubbles at the nucleation site.

Humidity Condensation and Evaporation

Humidity as a field quantity was introduced in v2019. In v2020 you are now able to track and quantify the accumulation of water vapor on a surface due to humidity through condensation and loss through evaporation.

GPU Acceleration

On Linux AcuSolve is now available with enhanced GPU acceleration. The addition of a GPU-supported AcuSolve enhances the already powerful offering of the hwCFDSolvers package which also includes nanoFluidX and ultraFluidX.

Tutorial additions

Nine (9) HyperMesh tutorials have been added for features including acuOptiStruct and thermal FSI, enclosure radiation, solar radiation with thermal shell, Discrete Ordinate (DO) radiation with specular transmission, single-phase nucleate boiling, two-phase nucleate boiling, humidity evaporation and condensation, MotionSolve co-simulation, and HyperStudy optimization.

Eight (8) HyperWorksCFD X tutorials have been added for features including transient conjugate heat transfer, enclosure radiation, solar radiation with thermal shell, Discrete Ordinate (DO) radiation with specular transmission, level set, rigid body dynamics, and MotionSolve co-simulation.

Validation addition

One (1) validation case has been added for DO radiation with specular transmission.

Thermal FSI format expansion

AcuOptiStruct now supports the export of Altair OptiStruct files in standard format in addition to long format.

Additional TIME_AVERAGE_OUTPUT commands

Additional controls have been added to the TIME_AVERAGE_OUTPUT command. You can now specify the start and end of time averaging either by step or by simulation time.

Algebraic Eulerian interface type

The Algebraic Eulerian multiphase model interface type is now available to set through an input command. The default sharp interface setting is most appropriate for bubbly flows while the smooth interface setting is better for cases involving solid particles.

Total pressure now available as a field variable

Total pressure is now available under Derived Quantity Output.

Additional radiation quadratures available with Discrete Ordinate Model radiation

S12, S14, and S16 quadratures have been added to the Discrete Ordinate radiation model.

FAN_COMPONENT now supports P-Q curve input

Fan modeling is greatly simplified as you can now specify performance directly through P-Q curves.

• Specifying time-varying rotational mesh motion through a multiplier function is made much simpler and more straightforward through the addition of the multiplier_function_on_time parameter. You can now construct your multiplier functions by specifying angular velocity directly as a function of time.
• Fluid-Structure Interaction (FSI) output has been improved to include the minimum, maximum, and standard deviation of all three components for both the structural force and displacement.
• The field specified as backflow for level set applications now is correctly applied only to the region of backflow.
• Restarted simulations where the time increment is controlled by a multiplier function now apply the proper time increment at initiation.
• Restarted simulations involving flexible bodies with non-zero external forces controlled by a multiplier function now apply the proper external force at initiation.
• The combination of isothermal compressibility with a non-constant density material is now correctly caught in AcuPrep.
• An error with incorrect initialization has been corrected when you specify OpenMP as the message passing type.
• The readacusolve executable has been removed from distribution.
• AcuMakeDll now supports MicroSoft Visual Studio 2017 (v15.0).