Simulation of Turbulent Thermal Convection Using Finite Volumes

To simulate turbulent Rayleigh-Benard convection in cylindrical domains an explicit/semi-implicit finite volume method with fourth order approximations in space was developed. Using this method and cylindrical staggered grids of about 11 million nodes clustered in vicinity of the boundary we performed simulations of turbulent Rayleigh-Benard convection in wide cylindrical containers of the aspect ratios Γ = 5 and 10 and the Rayleigh number from 105 to 108. In the present paper the method, its numerical stability and mesh generation algorithm are discussed.