Scalable computation of thermomechanical turbomachinery problems

A commonly held view in the turbomachinery community is that finite element methods are not well-suited for very large-scale thermomechanical simulations. We seek to dispel this notion by presenting performance data for a collection of realistic, large-scale thermomechanical simulations. We describe...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Finite elements in analysis and design 2019-03, Vol.155, p.32-42
Main Authors: Richardson, Chris N., Sime, Nathan, Wells, Garth N.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Computer simulation
Degrees of freedom
Finite element analysis
Finite element method
Formulations
Licenses
Multigrid
Parallel computing
Thermomechanical analysis
Thermomechanical modelling
Turbomachinery
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Summary:A commonly held view in the turbomachinery community is that finite element methods are not well-suited for very large-scale thermomechanical simulations. We seek to dispel this notion by presenting performance data for a collection of realistic, large-scale thermomechanical simulations. We describe the necessary technology to compute problems with O(107) to O(109) degrees-of-freedom, and emphasise what is required to achieve near linear computational complexity with good parallel scaling. Performance data is presented for turbomachinery components with up to 3.3 billion degrees-of-freedom. The software libraries used to perform the simulations are freely available under open source licenses. The performance demonstrated in this work opens up the possibility of system-level thermomechanical modelling, and lays the foundation for further research into high-performance formulations for even larger problems and for other physical processes, such as contact, that are important in turbomachinery analysis. •Demonstrates that complex turbomachinery thermomechanical problems can be solved scalably.•Provides a key ingredient for the push towards systems level, whole engine simulations.•Explains via complexity analysis why efforts to improve direct solvers cannot succeed.•Explains the necessary mathematical properties for a finite element solver for thermomechanical problems to be scalable, which will help practitioners.•Provides proof and concept and viability of extreme scale simulation which will justify new research into specific topics.
ISSN:0168-874X
1872-6925
DOI:10.1016/j.finel.2018.11.002